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Winnipeg Free Press - ONLINE EDITION

Roseau evacuees need toys

By: Carol Sanders

1/04/2009 8:33 AM | Comments: 25

Roseau River residents John Standingrock and his family Stryder, 5, wife Alissia, and infant daughter Sophie, 13 months, are waiting out the flood in their hotel room at the Delta downtown.

BORIS MINKEVICH / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Enlarge Image

Roseau River residents John Standingrock and his family Stryder, 5, wife Alissia, and infant daughter Sophie, 13 months, are waiting out the flood in their hotel room at the Delta downtown.

What do you do with a couple hundred country kids cooped up in city hotel rooms with nothing to do, nowhere to go and no money to spend?

That’s what some parents from evacuated Roseau River First Nation are asking.

"At home they’d be playing around in the yard making up games," said Debra Govereau, mother of Avys, 9, and Avriel, 4, who are staying at Winnipeg’s Delta hotel. "We’re trying to keep them busy."

The displaced families are getting a new insight on the old saying "there’s no place like home."

John Standingrock would like to take his son, five-year-old Stryder, to the Children’s Museum, but the family on social assistance has limited resources. They’ve been at the hotel since Thursday, when he and his pregnant wife, 13-month-old daughter Sophia, and Stryder were among more than 700 parents, children and seniors who left the flood-threatened community.  They brought clothes, toys and Sophia’s playpen.

"We could only take so much," Standingrock said in their cramped room where Stryder played on the bed and Sophia sat in her playpen. They need to go to the laundromat because they’re running out of clean clothes, the father said. It took five days and a call to the front desk to get clean towels, he said.

There is no fresh fruit in the buffet offered to the evacuees, and his son has been eating cereal for two days because the little boy doesn’t like the limited buffet choices. Elders accustomed to more simple foods like plain meat and potatoes and aren’t used to the dishes like lasagna, said Standingrock.

Some Roseau River members living in the city have been making bannock and soup and "smuggling" it to the evacuees, he said.

The supervisor at the Delta hotel Tuesday night declined to comment.

The Manitoba Association of Native Firefighters, which is responsible for the evacuation, hasn’t kept in touch with the evacuees, Standingrock complained. The association did not respond to a request for comment about complaints.

Some of the evacuees were treated to a Moose game at the MTS Centre, but more needs to be done, Standingrock said. The evacuees do not expect to be able to go home for a couple of weeks once the crest of the Red River has passed through their community. Some single and able-bodied community members have gone back in the meantime, he said.

Govereau is taking her daughters to the hotel pool twice a day and tries to find other diversions.

"We’re running out of colouring books," she said.

The Salvation Army is rallying help for the restless Roseau kids.

"We’ve been hearing all kinds of distress calls," Capt. Les Marshall said. "We’ve got to get these kids something to do."

The organization is collecting toys and board games for roughly 200 children staying at five Winnipeg hotels, and it’s no joke.  "It’s a pretty stressful thing to be moved out of your home," Marshall said. "We want to provide comfort to the kids and comfort to the parent by giving the kids something to do."

Donations may be dropped off at the Salvation Army at 324 Logan Ave.

carol.sanders@freepress.mb.ca

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25 Commentscomment icon

I think a lot of people are commenting here without having a full understanding of these people's experiences. I understand where some of the commenters' frustration is coming from, but without meeting the evacuees and learning more about their circumstances, none of us can make truly fair comment.

Shame they missed a chance to whine about Hurricane Katrina too! Gimmee gimmee....

GEEZZZ...........SAME OLD PEOPLE HERE IN WINNIPEG STILL RACIST AND DISCRIMINATION STILL ALIVE AND THEY CALL THIS FRIENDLY MANITOBA!!! NOW THAT IS FALSE ADVERTISEMENT!!! WHY DON'T WE JUST KEEP IN MIND THAT ALL PEOPLE ARE THE SAME AND WE SHOULD TREAT EVERYONE THE SAME!!! AND YES THESE FAMILIES HAVE TO BE THE ONES TO SUFFER OF LOSING THEIR HOMES OR GETTING FORCED OUT OF THERE HOMES WITH NO CHOICE!!!

PEOPLE SHOULD WATCH WHAT THEY SAY AND POST YOU KARMA HITS YOU 3X HARDER!!!

You would think that people would have packed games, movies, etc knowing they could be gone for a while. This evacuation was planned it wasn't done as an emergency in the middle of the night with only minutes to leave.
There's things to do that don't cost a lot of money...you just have to look around.
Complaining about the food? When I stay in a hotel I don't eat all my meals at the buffet. I BUY items and use the microwave/fridge in the room or go out. If they were at home they would have to buy food right?

Now's the time for Winnipeg to step up and show true neighborly spirit.I have't much money,but will gladly load as many young ones as I can and head for a park,any movie our theaters would like to donate during these times,or whatever.A wiener roast in the park would lots of fun also

to don marks,

Peace, love, and understanding, works both ways. Of course its tough to be away from home when you are a child. That's what parents are for. The hotel has a pool! Every kid I ever met loves swimming! Cereal! God forbid! What do they eat at home?

I'm with kayliel, Mom3Boys, and almost everyone else's comments. Nothing racial here, but the whining, complaining and ungratefulness has to go. Man I work 60+ hours a week between my TWO jobs, and I don't even get the luxuries these people are receiving right now.

I have stayed multiple times at the Delta and have stayed in all their different rooms. In addition to the comment about the laptop being next to the hotels TV, in all my stays there, I have not had a flat screen TV. How did they get one? How about a little less spending on electronics and more money spent on your kids.

You people make me sick. These evacuee DO NOT want to be in the city, and half of them have NEVER been to a big city before. I can tell you, I am watching these people 8 hours a day where I work.

They're asked to leave 50 dollars or more, just to make one 75 cent phone call (Yes hotels charge more than payphones).

They get meal allowances, that don't even cover half the price of a breakfast downtown. They do not enjoy eating out everyday, just as most people, you eventually get really sick of it. I'm sure they would be happier with a bag of potatoes and a nice big ham. (Cheaper too). (I know as a fact they DO NOT EAT MCDONALDS more than once every few months ok?)

I see them walking around, they look lost, theres nothing around but big buildings you can't go into and one way streets all over the place. Half don't want to drive, because it's too hard to get arond in the city (And I agree, I don't drive for that reason I've lived here my whole life).

Here, on site all the kids have to do..is pay 75 cents per arcade game.

Laundry is $3 a load or up, which is A LOT off your social assistant cheque if you've never had to use a laundromat before, and you wern't pre warned that you'll spend $20 a week on laundry alone.

If anyone thinks that they're enjoying being in the city, you couldn't be more wrong.

I personally, don't go out for weeks because I (working minimum wage job) can not afford to go out! Anything that is free I've done so many times it's boring.

Just because you city slickers got your laptops and your internet and you fancy skates and fancy bikes and all these MATERIAL things, it means next to NOTHING to the people you are talking about. They're all really great people (experiencing everyday since they arrived), who want to go home and live the lives they always have and that they love.

don marks: I comment on many articles, as do many others. To say the comments tend to be racially motivated is a very narrow view. I have not noticed a disproportionate number of comments on any particular kind of article. Did it ever occur to you that you may be focusing on the comments that occur on articles that you feel are pertinant to you, thereby affecting your perception about who comments where?

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