Today marks the first Canadian National Day for Truth and Reconciliation.
A day to remember and to pause and reflect on the tremendous harm done to the Indigenous people as a result of colonization.
Many indigenous children were taken away from their families and forced to enter residential schools that try to assimilate them into society by the Canadian Government.
Indian residential schools operated in Canada between the 1870s and the 1990s in partnership with the Anglican, Catholic, Methodist and Presbyterian churches.
Children between the ages of 4-16 attended.
There were many reports of abuse from the adult residential school survivors. In the past year, many unmarked graves
with hundreds of children have been discovered on the sites of several residential schools. Many Indigenous families never saw or reunited with their children again after they left for residential schools.
The many pairs of shoes represents many of the children lost and in unmarked graves.
This was certainly a dark period in Canadian history.