Having stood in St. James Park as part of Occupy Toronto, travelled by transport truck, train and over an ice road, the Mongolian yurt is ready to be assembled in Attawapiskat.
After meetings with the community, the location for the yurt was decided upon, and we set upon the assembly of the yurt.
By the end of the first day of building, we had set up the base.
With the freezing temperatures, short days and the rush to set up the yurt, we called it "extreme yurt-building."
The walls are six sections of flexible lattice work. Sinew is used instead of nails.
Gord Longhi bracing the wall from the wind.
In Mongolia, the door faces the south. The door is facing east in keeping with the First Nation culture.
The centre piece of the yurt is called a toono.
The toono raising.
The toono is up!
The shell is done. Next step is two layers of sheep-felt insulation and the outer canvas.
So sorry Lara to draw you away from the not-boring-at-all NDP Leadership threads.
If it's so obvious that the people of Attawapiskat need real houses that will last for decades and protect them from the elements, why do people insult them by offering them tents to live in? Native housing is already substandard, overcrowded, and outdated. How does building yurts help that?
Even a charity like Habitat for Humanity understands the importance of building solid, spacious, permanent structures for third-world people to live in, rather than what is essentially slum housing.
Third World Housing Development and Indigenous People in North America
God you are boring M. Spector. Talk about stating the obvious. That said, this yurt initiative sounds interesting. I hope Laurie Miller will tell us more about how the community responded to the idea of creating an industry in Attawapiskat.
They don't need yurts. They need proper houses.