Whiteclay

Sweat lodge

Remains of a camp fire are still smouldering in front of a sweat lodge. A buffalo skull and a long pipe lay in front of the lodge entry. There was a ceremony here last night. For the Sioux the sweat lodge is not just a steam bath, it has spiritual significance.

Last night at first a camp fire was kindled, thirty two big round stones placed in the fire and sprinkled with tobacco. When the stones became white hot they were taken to a hole dug in the middle of the lodge. Then the participants in the ceremony entered, dressed only in clothing that could be drenched in sweat: women wore loose dresses, men had boxer shorts (I read somewhere that one should enter the lodge naked; apparently moral standards fall everywhere). Two boys entered with their hand drums. The leader of the ceremony sat by the entry, a container full of water and a ladle next to him. The helper who brought the stones from the fireplace remained outside, his job was to open and close the entry flap. The sweat lodge is covered with heavy blankets and has no opening at the top, so when the entry flap is closed it gets completely dark inside. The leaders pours water on the stones, the water hisses and fills the lodge with steam. The temperature rises immediately and in a few minutes one starts sweating profusely. The boys with drums start singing a song in Lakota language. After about half an hour somebody asked for fresh air, the leader stopped the ceremony for a time and the entry flap was opened, light from the fire shone in. One could breathe fresh air but only bending down to the ground. The break did not last long, the flap was closed again, water hissed on the stones and the temperature rose, everybody was sweating and the boys sang to the regular rhythm of their drums. There were a couple more breaks like this. The whole ceremony lasted about two hours. In the end everybody left the lodge, the sacred pipe was lit up, at first the leader blew some smoke in four directions, then the pipe went around the circle, everybody having just one puff. At the end of the whole ceremony everybody shook everybody else's hand.

I took part in this ceremony and I must say I felt honoured. I had read about it and I knew it was practised by more traditionally minded Lakotas. It is not practised every day but rather as a preparatory rite of spiritual cleansing before other ceremonies, for example the Sundance. Indeed, there is a feeling of even physical purification when one comes out from a seam bath like this. I read somewhere that one has to know one of the traditional people to be invited to such a ceremony but here I was, having arrived at the Camp Whiteclay Justice only a few hours ago, having learned about the camp's existence only a day before and having arrived at the Pine Ridge Reservation only two days ago.

An Indian grandmother I met at Wounded Knee told me about it. There were some horse riders camping there, members of horse riding clubs, who took part in a protest ride from Wounded Knee to Whiteclay. Whiteclay is a tiny village just outside the reservation, it has about ten inhabitants but four shops selling beer. Alcohol is prohibited on the rez but who can stop anyone sell it just outside its border, in the neighbouring state of Nebraska? For years Whiteclay was the place where one could see the proverbial drunk Injuns. The drunk Injun is now an American stereotype. The Sioux, once proud warriors, came to Whiteclay to drown their melancholy. The sober Indian organisations, including the reservation authorities, tried to stop all this. They won a court case in Nebraska and the authorities did not extend the alcohol licence to the four shops. The shop owners of course appealed. As I arrived at Whiteclay I was told that in a few days time there was going to be a hearing at the High Court in Lincoln. The young riders protested against opening of the shops. So did those who joined the Camp Whiteclay Justice. So when I heard about this camp I knew, I had to be there as well.

Drunk Indians are a problem well known in America. Proud and fearless Sioux warriors are the thing of the past. Crazy Horse, whose gigantic sculpture some crazy Pole is trying to make in the Black Hills, might have been as fearless as the warriors in movies but the modern stereotype is a drunkard begging in front of a supermarket. An overage American is of course just as likely to meet a white drunkard by the supermarket but a white bum is not a representative of the whole white race because person sees white people constantly in other situations: at home, at work, in church, in shops, on a train and a drunk by a supermarket is one of many white people seen. However, a white person is much less likely to see Indians in other situations so a drunk by a supermarket is in his eyes a representative of the race.

Joe Pullian

Which of course does not mean that there is no problem. The problem must be there if there is a ban on the rez. Despite the ban my first experience of the Sioux was exactly that: drunks in front of the supermarket. As I drove into the Pine Ridge Reservation I stopped in the first place with a supermarket and some fast food places. As I got out of my car a drunkard approached and asked for change because he was hungry. I bought him some food but a minute later I had seven more like him. And interestingly on the board at the entry to the protest camp Whiteclay Justice has also written clearly that alcohol is not allowed there.

I found the camp thanks to this board as the rest is invisible from the road. A few tents, a few tipis (modern ones, transported on the roof of a camper van), a field kitchen. As I drove in I saw some people gathered around a camp fire. A man in a red T-shirt came to greet me. This was Joe Pulliam, the leader of the camp. He was happy to answer all the questions. The protest here is to remind people that sobriety is important. Hearing that I was just coming from Wounded Knee he said that he supported the grandmothers there and not the new-agers who often drink or take some other substances. It was so at the end of the Standing Rock protest, where he himself would sometimes have a drink. Not here, though, this camp is sober. The camp is maintained only by donations and by the sale of pictures Joe paints. He is an artist and showed me some of his pictures: Indian motives painted on handwritten pages pulled out of some old reservation statistics books. He sells the originals for a few hundred dollars and prints for a few tens. He mentioned that they have a sweat lodge every evening and if I stay overnight i could take part.

The riders from Wounded Knee came in the early afternoon. Everybody from the camp went to the village of Whiteclay, which consisted of those four shops and basically nothing else. I had never been there before but still I had an impression that something has finished. There was an air of emptiness. The riders galloped through the village, then turned around and entered from the other side, from Nebraska, colours flying. A big flag of Ogalala Nation and some other flags. In the middle of the village they formed a circle. Some young boys got off their horses and with an accompaniment of a drum sang a song in Lakota. Some people gave speeches. I had no idea who the speakers were but later I learned that one of them was Brian Brewer, the chief of Pine Ridge Reservation.

Later the riders rode into the camp and there they had some more songs and more speeches about virtues of sobriety. In the end the horses were led to the pasture and the riders invited for lunch.

There were talks around the camp fire long into the night and again in the morning. Mixed company, some Indians and some white people. Joe is probably mixed himself, he says he is a Lakota but he doesn't look very Indian. There are some white supporters, like Carl, a young blues musician from New York, or Byron, an old pensioner travelling in an old pick up with his equally old dog. However, the majority of campers are proper Indians, like Rudel Bearshirt from Wounded Knee or Curly, who leads ceremonies. Or like a local grandmother whose name I don't recall but who takes an active part in any discussion. Or Frank Bearkiller who came for a short visit with his daughter and granddaughter. Talks long into the night, many different talks. Like that of Frank Bearkiller who told us his life story. He grew up on the reservation but saw what is beyond because his father subscribed the National Geographic. Frank wanted to see the world beyond the rez and one day he parted and travelled all around the continent. It took him two and a half years. He told us also how he quit drinking. This was after a talk with his grandmother who suggested this if he wanted to improve his life. Any Indian worth his salt follows an advise of his grandmother and Frank wanted to be worth his salt.

Riders at Whiteclay

It is quite interesting: many times I heard sober Indians telling a story how they stopped drinking. It seems they consider it an important moment in their lives. I also heard sober Indians when meeting for the first time asking each other: "When did you quit drinking?"

There was also a discussion about the figure of Crazy Horse in the Black Hills. The discussion moved to this subject when my interlocutors learned that I - like the crazy sculptor of the figure - am Polish. For my interlocutors creating any kind of giant sculpture out of a mountain is a sacrilege. "Why don't you do something like this in your own country?" asked Curly. I said I can't answer because this is not something that would actually interest me. "What do you mean? You have taken your picture, at Mt. Rushmore, haven't you?" I said that I didn't go either to Mt. Rushmore or to the Crazy Horse sculpture. This caused a round of laughter. The grandmother sitting in th circle said that Crazy Horse appeared to her in a dream. "They will never finish this figure", she said. "This figure shows direction where the whites said the Sioux were supposed to live but when Crazy Horse appeared to me in my dream he was pointing the other direction."

Interesting, this burst of laughter. They seem to have a stereotype of a white man who in the Black Hills has to take a selfie with the presidential faces at Mt. Rushmore. The burst of laughter suggests that my behaviour is to them no less surprising than to a white European a sight of a chief riding a Ford Mustang rather than a wild horse.

In the meantime Curly, who leads ceremonies in the camp, says quite interesting things.

"You take many pictures but during a ceremony you can't. If I see you take pictures I'll take your camera and wont give it back. This is because you will go to a distant country and the photographed ceremony will still work but I won't be there to protect you from bad effects...

"This is sacred land. We pray here but we don't call anybody by name. If you name someone, you won't let him rest. When you pray you call someone by name and therefore you don't let him rest. We don't name him therefore we have gifts.

"This Bible of yours does not belong here. The Bible talks about the past, you want to bring back the past. You have this Bible and it talks about Jesus. Has anybody met Jesus? Is there anybody going to meet him? But Wisdom can only be passed from heart to heart.

"The youngsters keep asking questions and this means that they don't listen. You have to have eyes and ears open. Whoever has Wisdom can pass it on only when he knows that the listener is able to take it."

At one point Joe mentioned that somebody from the Reservation Council gave him some money and now wants to see the accounts. Joe says that he only asked for funds for some people to go to Lincoln for the court hearing. There will be the appeal hearing about the Whiteclay shops in Lincoln in a few days.

How did he say it? There will be a court hearing in a few days in Lincoln? It looks like my Sioux trail will take me to another interesting place.

You will find this text, 
and many more on the subject, 
in my book "DO THEY STILL LIVE IN WIGWAMS?":