 Hey everyone, Rob here, and I'm with Gabrielle Crowe, and I'm really excited to be able to be here with her today. We met last weekend in Los Angeles and got to connect with her a little bit and learned that she is part of the Gabriellino Shoshone Tribal Council. She's the vice chair and I'm really excited for her to get to share some things with you and for me to be learning from her. You know, with this project of wearing all of my trash for a month, obviously my goal is to wake people up to how much trash we're creating and, you know, create a visual that sticks with people of the truth behind our consumerism. But there's obviously a much bigger picture. You know, behind this is consumerism. You know, for example, they say that for every garbage can that we put on the curb, 70 garbage cans worth of waste are actually produced up the production line. So, like, what you're seeing here is just the absolute tip of the trash iceberg. But even then, you know, the system of consumerism is one that comes from capitalism. It's one that comes from colonialism. Which means displacing people from the land. And I'm like, my goal is not just to get people to think about their trash. My goal is to get people to really radically rethink the way that they're interacting with earth, with humanity and with all of our plants and animal relatives. And so I'm really excited to get to connect with you and be able to share a message that's the bigger picture of the sort of, you know, the change that we need in society to be talking about equity, justice and regeneration. Yeah, great. And so I'm here actually today on Kumeya'i Land and we are actually in Encinitas, California, which is where I live. My ancestral lands are actually in Los Angeles, which part of the way I met Rob is I was working a bionic cleanup for a land trust that I work with. And so I'm basically here today to talk about kind of shifting a mindset for people. I think that a lot of times for me, especially as an environmental educator, it's easier for me to do it on a larger scale with kids. But I feel like it's not just kids that need to learn these things. It's kind of a reteaching for adults at the same time, because we're the ones that are using all these resources. And so we're trying to kind of shift the mindset and go back to a time before any of the colonialism happened, before anything in this beautiful area was actually destroyed. And we're trying to get back to that mindset. But after all the things that we've destroyed, how do we how do we get there? And so I've been going to different classrooms and teaching students. I'll actually take them and teach them a sand painting. And so part of that is I'll start at the beginning of it and talk to them about how different cultures and different cultures and different traditions that they have with their family. And so I ask them if they do different things for holidays or birthdays. Most of the time, everybody raises their hand. And so I tell them, what if I told you you're not allowed to do any of those things anymore? And so it's kind of getting kids to kind of stop and think for a second, like, well, what's wrong with what I do? There's nothing wrong with what you're doing. It's just it's different than what I want you to do at the time period. So kind of taking that and then having them close their eyes and think about a world that used to exist before. There were roads and cities and cars and all the different things that we have. And they're normal now, any technology and trying to reshift that and trying to think about how things were and how they explain the world around them. So different things that their that their grandparents would have taught them when they were living in the village, while their parents were out hunting and gathering. And so taking those ideas and having the kids actually draw them out in a sand painting. And then after they create these beautiful stories and they take all the time and effort to draw different things out and at the end of it, after they explain their story, I have them wipe everything away. And so for them, it's frustrating because they just worked on something for a long period of time. They're proud of it. And then at the end of it, they just wipe it away. So then I pose the question or ask them and I tell them, how are you going to tell that story? And so they're like, you know, they raise their hand. They're like, oh, you know, I can tell it to my parents or, you know, I can do this. I'm like, OK, well, what if I said you're not allowed to talk to them either? So it's kind of an explanation to the kids about what really happened in our culture, especially being from Southern California Indigenous tribes, that we were all scooped up and forced to work at the missions. And after this period of time, how do you ever go back to living on the land that you used to live on, that you cultivated those seeds for the next harvest? You know, you did all these things. You made sure that you only took the amount that you needed when you were fishing or, you know, you went and got apolloni, but not only did you use the meat for sustenance, you also used it to create jewelry and barter with other tribes. And so all these different things and this mindset has completely changed. As you can see now for the amount of things that we need just for our everyday life, which that wasn't how it used to be. And so taking that kind of lesson and teaching kids like if there's a break in that oral tradition and everything that's so important for our ancestors that taught us all these different things, how do you ever go back to that? Because all those things were made illegal, right? Yes. Yes. Speaking, practicing, connected to the land. Yeah, so it wasn't until the 1970s that they actually were allowed to be able to practice our own religion and practice our own cultures. And so how do you go back to practicing that after 200 years of not being able to do it? So so for us, we're reclaiming a lot of our culture. I basket we were relearning our languages, but it's a lot of stuff. Yeah. So just just 1970. I mean, really just for people here in Southern California, they it's easy to be disconnected, but up until 1970, it was illegal to simply exist in the way that was for thousands of years. Right? Yeah. So today, you know, there's a lot of people that are waking up and they they actually are wanting to start making a difference. But being here in Southern California and other places, people are just kind of lost of like, how can I actually make some changes that are actually meaningful and moving forward? Do you have any, you know, thoughts for people? Well, I think the number one thing that people can do is to actually acknowledge the land that you live on. Because obviously, unless you're an Indigenous person from this exact area, you came from somewhere else and I wouldn't go to a different country and, you know, just try and act like an American to do everything. I'd want to fully embrace myself in that, but it's also trying to learn about who were the first people that were living here and how you can get in contact with different tribal governments to see what things you can do as a person that lives in their ancestral lands to be an ally to them. Because I think that's the thing that we need the most help with is, especially living in Los Angeles and living in, you know, an urbanized native place that we're also spread out and resources are spread so thin that we need other people that live, that are, you know, stakeholders in each different area to actually be there and show up for us and help us with these different meetings and talking with different government officials or different agencies and also, you know, helping us with beach cleanups and different things that we can do to take care of the environment. Because really, when it all boils down to it, we're the first stewards of this land and we're trying to do the best to try and shift that mindset so that people also think about things. And they're so environmentally conscious that they want to keep those things, these plants that have been here for thousands of years, they want to keep them for the next few thousands. It's not just about a mindset of these things that I'm doing and today are the only thing that doesn't really affect anything. Everybody can make a change and everybody can do something. So even if a person's like, well, I'm only one person, if everybody has an attitude that they can help and do something, I think it can make a big difference. I completely agree. Well, we have, we'll have some links in the description of where you can learn more about Gabrielle's work, as well as some ways that you can, you know, learn and get involved. So definitely check out those links to educate yourself more. And yeah, I think that's it for now. Yeah, I think so. All right, well, we love you and nice to see you all. And.