Threads - The Last Stitch: A Retrospective on Threads

Episode Transcript:

Kyle Rudge (00:02):

It begins with a single thread woven through other thread, and then another and another until we have a single piece of fabric. That fabric is stretched, cut and stitched together with another, just like it. This process is repeated over and over and over until we have a beautiful tapestry that all began with a single thread.

Kyle Rudge (00:41):

Welcome to MCC Threads, where we look closely at how our stories in Manitoba weave together with the stories of MCC and its partners around the world. You know, sometimes it's best to just rip off the bandaid, so I'll come right out and say it. This is our last episode of MCC Threads. It's been quite the journey. It's been around in some form for well over a decade when I took over from the previous host, and that was about eight, nine years ago, and it was going strong for several years before that. Back then it was called Word Indeed. This month I'm going to highlight a handful of my favourite memories from my time here as a sort of celebration of all the stories we've told over the years. It starts with the rebrand when we went from Word Indeed to Threads in September of 2018. Well,

Anna Vogt (01:30):

I like to think of the threads kind of that, that connect to Ottawa with Columbia is also thinking about like, once you come together and you talk and you share stories, you realize how similar you are sometimes to another person, even though from the outset or looking from the outside. That doesn't seem like there are very many to bring back the word threads that tie us together.

Kyle Rudge (01:53):

Let me introduce you to Anna Vogt.

Anna Vogt (01:55):

I am the Director of MCC's office in Ottawa.

Kyle Rudge (01:58):

Anna has quite the story, but how do we get from this?

Anna Vogt (02:02):

I think sometimes when we think about humanitarian aid and we think, okay, there's people that are hungry, let's give them food. I think that's a really great way to start. But what is going to keep them from being hungry tomorrow.

Kyle Rudge (02:13):

To this?

Anna Vogt (02:14):

One of my most precious mementos from Columbia is actually a small quilt from the women.

Kyle Rudge (02:19):

Anna's story of serving in the SEED program and receiving this quilt is what inspired us to really lean into that idea that we are all threads and it is our stories woven together that truly make something beautiful.

Anna Vogt (02:32):

So the really interesting thing about this community, and I mentioned that they were Colombian, is that they're also Afro-Columbian. So everyone in the community is black because when during colonization and slavery, many slaves were actually brought from by the Spanish to Columbia to build some of the big fortresses to even defend Columbia against pirates. And so the community that I was living in was this a descendant community of this group of slaves. And they were, had been free for like hundreds of years already, but when they started quilting their own personal stories, they realized that their personal stories were connected to their history. And so they decided it wasn't enough to just quilt what had happened to them the night they were displaced. They needed to quilt their entire story. They needed to research their story. And so as they did, they realized that they had not only been displaced from where they had been living that first night, they had actually been displaced from Africa 500 years ago.

Kyle Rudge (03:31):

That quilt is in the National Museum of Columbia. Those women won a national peace prize for their work of documenting the stories and encouraging peace through their work of quilting. In June of 2021, we were in Winnipeg at the Kapabamayak Achaak Healing Forest. We sat inside the forest and spoke to two women and one man. One, an Indigenous elder, another a University of Winnipeg professor, and also we spoke to a third, a man, Kerry Saner-Harvey, who works locally with MCCs Indigenous Neighbours program.

Speaker 3 (04:04):

That's really nice because really a circle when we talk about a circle in the culture, it's not really a circle, it's a you're looking at it like the plain view, right? Yeah. It's actually a spiral because that movement doesn't stop. You keep going.

Kyle Rudge (04:19):

But, I'm, I'm seeing paths coming up, but also these large stones that seem to be carved in. What, what are the stones significance and these paths?

Speaker 3 (04:29):

Well, they're the, these are the grandmother stones from, you know, stone from each direction.

Kyle Rudge (04:34):

Forgive me, what is a grandmother stone?

Speaker 3 (04:37):

It's in Indigenous culture stones have more value than what you would just think about as stones. It's stones carry all the stories, all the wisdom of Mother Earth. So it's, it's like Natalie Rostaddejarlais did this. She's a rock painter and has been for 40, 50 years. So she looks at the stones and she connects with them and they, they show her the stories that they want her to bring out.

Kyle Rudge (05:13):

The interview in the forest was recorded just a week before the first mass grave site was found at residential schools. And while we were not exposed to that news before the interview, the lessons taught there still felt relevant.

Speaker 5 (05:25):

I think that connection action that Val was talking about, like paying attention to all the living things that are, and non-living things that are part of the earth. If, you know, if we can braid those cultures together rather than seeing them in opposition, it's not complicated. Right. Like to to to come together.

Kerry Saner-Harvey (05:47):

You know, when we began this project almost four years ago, I was aware that there were deaths and missing children at residential schools, but it hadn't really hit home for me how pervasive this was. How, how so many families had children that they loved who simply didn't come home. Not only did families lose their languages and, and teachings and livelihoods from the land, they lost what I as a parent can only describe as the most precious part of themselves.

Kyle Rudge (06:20):

Several times over the years, we highlighted some of the yearly events like Grow Hope. This is Simone Hildebrand-Thiessen. She works with MCC Manitoba. She was being interviewed for Grow Hope while also making vareneki in her kitchen.

Simone Hildebrand-Thiessen (06:33):

Yeah. So Grow Hope started about, I wanna say five years ago.

Kyle Rudge (06:38):

That interview was back in 2021. So about 2016 is when Grow Hope started.

Simone Hildebrand-Thiessen (06:43):

Where it is a connection between a community of sponsors, some folks usually in this we've often had in the city who are interested in supporting food and rural farmers. So it was started when we had a one farmer in particular approach MCC, and he wanted to, he wanted to donate some of the proceeds of his fields and get involved. And it's grown from there to where you or I or us and all of our friends can sponsor an acre of a farmer's field.

Kyle Rudge (07:13):

By sponsoring an acre, you're essentially covering the cost of seeding and care for an acre of crops. Once grown, the farmer who has donated their land and time will harvest and sell those crops with the proceeds going to grow Hope and MCC Manitoba. Last year, in July of 2024, we went on a road trip to the Greenwald Colony. We spoke to Joseph Hofer about life on the colony and their desire to help with Grow Hope.

Joseph Hofer (07:35):

You have a relationship with the land, you have a relationship with the local farming community. It's good for community. We feel you have a relationship with, with your creator, with God who, who blesses the work that you do. You're dependent on your creator, on our Lord to provide and watching things grow, creating, creating relationships along the way and creating the things necessary to make it, to make it work. So we love everything about farming, watching crops grow.

Kyle Rudge (08:07):

To be honest, I learned so much about farming over the years, the community that informs the nuances of seeding, timing, water and climate, how important all those factors are to farming. For some events, I even got pushed to be far more involved.

Speaker 9 (08:20):

I do it because I enjoy helping other people and fundraising and as well as the cycling part. It's just all around fun.

Kyle Rudge (08:28):

That was in July of 2022 where we talked with Kayella. Cycle Clear Lake was back after a two year hiatus due to the pandemic and everyone was super excited and Cycle Clear Lake, by the way, was an annual fundraising event where cyclists raised funds and ride around on trails around Clear Lake.

Speaker 9 (08:43):

Okay, so I think it was my third year cycling. There was this downhill that was really steep and then it had a curve. I didn't turn, I went straight into the bush.

Kyle Rudge (08:54):

Then just five years later, I recorded myself actually doing Cycle Clear Lake for my first time.

Kyle Rudge (09:00):

Oh my word.

Kyle Rudge (09:02):

Well, he's not wrong.

Kyle Rudge (09:03):

That is water.

Kyle Rudge (09:10):

July 6th of last year, I traveled to Riding Mountain National Park to participate in Cycle Clear Lake.

Kyle Rudge (09:16):

I am so wet.

Kyle Rudge (09:19):

And that's where I fell into the water. It was a wild ride to say the least, pun intended. When planning the episode with Jessica, one question that came up was that what was my favourite episode of all time? The answer was simple for me and I thought it best to save it for last. It goes back seven years ago where I spoke to Raha Fabdo. At the time, she was working with one of MCC's partners in Syria. For several years Raha and her family felt they were relatively shielded from the conflict.

Raha Fabdo (09:53):

And other kind of militaries was, was around us in many cities. That's very close to, to our, but we, we, we, we still have that hope that no, they won't come.

Kyle Rudge (10:07):

And then the worst happened.

Raha Fabdo (10:10):

They choose, like for us, a very hard time in Ramadan. They choose the, the main street in their that always and always be crowded. They do a very huge explosion and explode the police station building. And when that happened, three of building around him fall down. A lot of people in the street die and in the buildings of course. And yeah, it was a very hard time for us.

Kyle Rudge (10:49):

Did you lose anyone close to you?

Raha Fabdo (10:51):

All the people actually in Syria lose someone. Even if they are not the member of the closest family, they are member of the family or relatives or friends.

Kyle Rudge (11:03):

What do you, what do you do when, when such a huge explosion come, goes off in your city and then they're suddenly shooting in war for six or seven hours? What do you do?

Raha Fabdo (11:10):

Actually, one of the most important thing that, like the thing that make you love these people, that directly the people go out and trying to help, like give hand to anyone or when, when the building full. Of course there is a thousands of people or a hundred of people under the ground. They try to, to see if there is anyone life or anyone need help or yeah. They try to give help to anything, in anythings and to anyone.

Raha Fabdo (11:48):

Yes. After, after that, they always come and go out, but after maybe a few months, they, they entered to <inaudible> and like maybe 3 a.m. I remember that I wake up with a very loud voice because they enter to our city by explode our main hospital there. They enter to the hospital and explode the ho.., ex.., yeah, explode the hospital. Then with the checkpoint that was in front of her and then enter to, to <inaudible>.

Kyle Rudge (12:24):

Have you ever been tempted to just leave?

Raha Fabdo (12:30):

I think thousands and thousands of time to, to leave, not just one. I always thinking, not now, thanks God, <laugh>, but when I feel afraid, I think of leaving and go out. When that happened and it, I stay in the basement for, for months and or month and a half, I always thinking in that time that in the moment that I will go out from this basement, I will, I will leave. I don't want to stay anymore in Syria. I don't want to die in this way.

Kyle Rudge (13:07):

But you didn't leave.

Raha Fabdo (13:08):

No.

Kyle Rudge (13:09):

You've stayed. And why <laugh>?

Raha Fabdo (13:14):

Because when I go out, I, I return to the main reason that make me stay from the beginning of the first explosion till they enter to our, our area. I, I just return to the main idea that the people need me here. My job is very important. I can help people and I want, when I, I become old woman to sit with myself and say, okay, I did something good in my life. I helped my country and the hardest time that it crossed in it and I helped the people there. Yes.

Kyle Rudge (13:59):

I'm still moved to tears every time I listen to that interview. It's been a wonderful decade. Thank you to MCC Manitoba for allowing me the privilege of sharing the stories of those within MCC, the partners overseas, and with those who are so deeply impacted by the work of MCC in Manitoba and around the world. If you're looking for past episodes of MCC Threads, you can find it online at mcc.org. I'm Kyle Rudge and for the last time, this is MCC Threads.