I’m New Here: Episode One
Guests: Karen Diemart, Ivy Watson and Angelika Langen
Pam (voice over)
When I say the words, “Fresh Start”, what comes to mind?
Is it blank walls and can of paint or maybe a crowd of anonymous faces to disappear into.
Maybe you’re just hungry and you didn’t hear anything after I said the word Fresh and you’re now you’re just ordering a pizza to be delivered.
Well...Fresh Start means to me means February 1st, 2020. I moved from my home town in Southwestern Ontario to northern British Columbia. It was a pretty big decision to leave all my family and friends to quit my job and move out and be in the same province as my partner so that we can live together.
The first time I came to the Bulkley Valley, I was struck by how unprepared I was; the landscape is absolutely breathtaking. Surrounded by 4 mountain ranges, the valley has lush green flats paired with the jagged Hudson Bay mountain range and the rolling babines, as well as, the beautiful Bulkley River.
The forest industry has remained dominant here. It’s one of the reasons people come to the Bulkley Valley as is mining, environmental and natural resource work, government and tourism.
As mentioned, none of those were the reasons I came here. I came because I fell in love and followed it until I landed here in Smithers. As a newcomer to town, I would ask people why they chose Smithers. And I liked the answers I got.
This podcast is a sample pack of the personalities that make the valley so unique.
This podcast is made possible by the Bulkley Valley Arts Council.
I’m Pam Haasen and, Hey, I’m new here! This is Episode 1.
PAM: OK...I’ve got you in this ear? You’re my first interview for this podcast.
Karen: Yeay!!! Ah...I don’t know...that’s a lot of pressure.
Pam: It’s a lot of pressure on both of us because I’m new here...which is the name of the podcast...it’s called “I’m new here” .
Karen: I’m old here (laugh)
Pam: I’m going to use that (laugh)
Karen Diemart was a Smithereen for 42 years. She moved out west from Toronto, Ontario which is a trek many Ontarians from South Western Ontario have made; will come here for pretty much anything...fresh air, mountains, sports, to work in a coffee shop, anything.
Karen: Ah...I graduated as a Fisheries biologist and began working for fish wildlife and habitat once habitat entered the field. And, um, and I retired as a biologist. I did my first 2 years of university at the University of Toronto but I was in developmental biology and all the specimens were pickled and I decided I needed to go to the west coast where you could get some real specimens. OK...so I graduated and headed to McBride and spent 2 years there trying to find work within fish and wildlife but the feds pretty well had that wrapped up. And, so, you know, I was doing...trying to find anything...working in the forest whatever...it was part of the “Go BC” time when there were lots of grants available and built some ski trails and then after that spring, I kinda went…”I need to find something else. Take a drive down Highway 16 and towards the coast and see what you find cause I’d only gone as far as Prince George. So I got to Smithers and saw that there was a Fish and Wildlife branch. So, I went back to McBride and said, “You know what? I think we should move. Let’s just go to Smithers cause there’s something there.”
So, um, that’s what I did in August of 1978. I landed a job with Fish and Wildlife early ‘79. And then I retired in 2015 from working with Fish, Wildlife and Habitat. When I left, I left with 35 years of government work.
After finding the place she was looking for, Karen also found the person she was looking for
Karen: Well, he was working in the office. I thought he was a bit of a goof. But, um, you know, things change! I have 2 children from my first marriage and Bruce has 2 from his and, combined, we have 4 boys.
Well, it wasn’t only just the fact that I could get work here...I mean I was new out of university so I really did want work so in ‘78 I was 24 coming here...and, we were introduced to some people on Hislap Road over there on the other side of Tyee Lake, and they were kind of the impetus to get us a place and stuff and so we lived on Hislap Road when we came here and it’s a spectacular view of the valley and it didn’t take very long, at all, to love this place and the people that we were meeting were, you know, really all encompassing together people and it, you know, the whole aspect of how you could live here and how you could work here was perfect!
Pam: We’re gonna to check back in with Karen in a bit. But there’s another person I’m really excited for you to meet.
Pam: It would be weird if your answer was really eloquent and perfect.
Ivy: Yeah, I’m, I am really eloquent...I know exactly what I want. My name is Ivy Watson.
Pam: I met Ivy through her mother...shout out to a whip-smart adventuress, engaging gourmand Suzanne. She returned home in the summer of 2020 when COVID made the living in Toronto pretty much unbearable. I feel like we hit it off immediately when I found someone who wanted to talk about the nitty-gritty of movies and TV as much as I did.
Ivy: It’s like my least favourite job interview question...it’s like “Tell me a little bit about yourself...ahhh...I’m a human woman (laughing) ...ummmm I currently live in Toronto and I’m from Smithers, obviously. I’ve, yeah, I’ve bounced around a little...I’m in that classic stage of millennial kind of, uh, (laughs), uh, millennial life lava which is, uh, I can’t figure out what (the fuck) to do with my life so I’m trying everything and quitting everything moments later...but, um, I’m basically in and out of school.
Pam: I liked Ivy’s perspective of the Bulkley Valley because she grew up here and she had a great childhood but, ultimately, didn’t feel like it didn’t shape her into an outdoorsy backpacker who makes her own yogurt. Ivy wanted to live in a city after a trip to New York opened her eyes to the lure that is a metropolis to a rural kid.
Ivy: I was telling you before...there was a tree that we used to come particularly to...to walk to it...we called it The Wishing Tree because it was kinda like this like I think it had died technically which is probably why they cut it down as well. But it was like very crooked and quirky looking and for kids that liked to climb trees...it was literally perfect and so we’d all, me, my brother and sister, got on to it and, if we all got on, we got to make our wish…(laughs) it was this really wholesome family memory of this area...um...I did know that, you know, that the things that make somewhere like Smithers special for people that live here um to make it perfect are not really the ways in which I utilize Smithers for the best of it, like, if you, what I mean is I’m not a super outdoorsy person, um, fishing and mountain biking certainly not at the top of my list so for the reasons that make Smithers like, uh, unique and the reasons that people would move here and stay because they, because it provides for like their interests and hobbies that don’t really align with mine. I like it, you know, for nostalgic reasons but, uh, no, my interests lie in, you know, um, more of what’s available in urban centres, you know, art and even, you know, as I say that, as far as small towns go, Smithers does a fair...puts in a fair effort trying to … (couldn’t hear this part) … (laughs) yes!...but…(laughs) and that’s a lot of high school plays...but, as far as high school plays go, they’re not, um, I can speak, you know, having that history myself...I was in high school...I did those plays and, um, were very lucky to have the level of, like, professionalism that we did, um, and I feel like the town is looking for that too but, um, yeah, as far as like where I wanted to be for my, like, you know, consider what I wanted to be influenced by and where my kind of interests were taking me as far as particularly like in my 20’s...so, yeah, I couldn’t wait to at least try this city and then, unfortunately, once I got there I realized it was better than I imagined and then I stayed and will stay, at least for awhile longer.
Pam: This is the sound of me seeing a bear cub while on a tour of the Northern Lights Wildlife Shelter.
Pam: Awwww ….ooooh???? Can I take a picture?
Angelika: Um...no, not of this guy yet...Um...you, you can…
Pam: That’s OK.
Angelika: I, I, I’ll tell you why…
Pam: Sure!
Angelika: We haven’t made him public yet...there’s never been a bear with markings like this. He’s got white feet.
Pam: So, almost like a …….
Pam: Days before my trip to the Northern Lights Wildlife Society, Angelika brought a very unusual bear to the shelter. A Nisga’a Enforcement Officer called that he was in possession of a cub that was orphaned as the mother was shot illegally.
With permission of the BC Conservation officers, Angelika’s team went to meet with these officers.
They had been told that this cub had unusual markings but they were unprepared for how unusual. It’s assumed that this cub carries kermode genes that manifested in an unusual way. Nisga’a officers named him Winnie and after initially, after being a bit depressed, the cub settled in well and is now friends with another bear at the shelter called Coda.
Angelika: He couldn’t walk...he was going on legs like this with his head resting on the legs.
Pam: Because he was tired?
Angelika: Because...no, he was so emaciated and weak that...and now he climbs to the very top of the plateau and it has really changed.
Pam: Yeah!!! Wow! And you can put 2 bears...so like, they weren’t found together, though?
Angelika: No...they are not related...there’s a third one in there, too. I don’t know...he’s probably hiding in the den.
Pam: OK, yeah.
Angelika: We put them together, very much, because it’s very much important that they interact and they play and everything else.
Pam: Yeah. Right! Yeah...Oh, my God...what a sweetheart! That’s like a heart break...so cute!
Male voice:
In British Columbia’s Bulkley Valley, there’s a one of a kind sanctuary for bear cubs and other orphaned wildlife. (Bear cub cry)
Angelika: We started the shelter back in 1990…(calling from a distance) “I could use some help here”
It was meant to be just a little thing...just to help out once in a while when something happened here locally and, yeah, it’s kinda mushroomed from there, ha ha ha.
Angelika Langen and her husband, Peter, met at the Koln Zoo in Germany where they both worked at the time. Angelika’s parents wanted to move to Canada in the late ‘70’s and when her parents came here in 1981, Angelika and Peter followed a year later. The magic of the Bulkley Valley is the effect that it has on people when they finally get here.
Angelika: Angelika Langen, Manager and Co-Founder of Northern Lights Wildlife Society.
Well, I grew up with the idea to immigrate to Canada. My dad immigrated when he was 21; had met my mother already and was going back and forth between Germany and Canada for years. I grew up with this and it was...always was the idea that, at some point, we would immigrate to Canada. In the late ‘70’s he finally found a property that he could purchase, um, and then they decided to leave. My parents and my 2 brothers immigrated in 1981 and my husband and I followed a year later. The plan was to build up a guest ranch and work as a family, operated as a family. Given that we came right in the recession, that really didn’t happen and, uh, eventually, after 4 years my husband and I came down here and did our own thing. And, yeah...the rest is history.
He was just all over Canada...just in the last few years he had kinda settled on BC, that he liked it the best and then he really...first he had a property in, uh, outside of Williams Lake where you could only fly in, um, and he was buying that and then that sale fell through and then he went further and he came here. He said when he came over the hill at Hungry Hill and saw the valley in front of him, he knew that’s where he wanted to be
Pam: Like a lot of good stories, Angeika and Peter didn’t come here to rehabilitate animals...they just saw a gap in the system of animal rescue as well as over extended conservation officers who are often euthanizing wild animals due to their behaviour or human contact.
Their story began in the Bulkley Valley where the family business called Mountain View Adventures which opened in 1983. They offered horseback riding, as well as kid’s camps to local and international markets.
Angelika: Well, it wasn’t even a plan...um, we read a newspaper article here in the Interior News and, uh, they had to kill 2 moose babies because the mum had been hit by a train and there was no place for them to go. Peter and I are both trained animal keepers; we worked in zoo’s in Europe and we were kinda looking at each other and going well. Well that’s kinda dumb, we could have taken them and just raised them and released them back into the wild again.
Um...I was very young and very enthusiastic...got all our credentials together...went to Fish and Wildlife, you know, with the “Here, I have a wonderful idea that’s gonna save you all kinds of trouble.”
And, uh, convinced that they would be all over this… and they wanted nothing to do with it. And then that started a 4 year battle for permits, and, uh, good German stubbornness, you know, I couldn’t just see the point “Why not!” Heh, heh, heh…
Pam: Right, right, right.
Angelika: Yeah, then the idea was only to do something locally...the occasional animal that, you know, in a situation like this when the train hit it and there was no place to go. In our wildest dreams, we did not think about becoming a province wide, all-consuming lifestyle altering operation.
Pam: When the demand on the Northern Lights Wildlife Society grew, the Langens’ learned they needed help. Which meant volunteers to work at the shelter. But it’s still up to Angelika to know who’s involved in the life and rehabilitation of wild animals. But how do you know who to choose? And what does it take to be a good bear handler?
Angelika: Um...anything that has to do with the bears and wants to work with bears has to commit for 12 months. And the reason for that is that we don’t want to change the handlers of the animals so that they don’t get habituated to humans in general but just to their handlers which kinda become the mother bear. And if you look at the bears in the wild, um, the mother and, sometimes, the older sibling, uh, are something that’s safe and the other bear is not safe so for us, if we kinda mimic that with humans, we can teach them to stay away from other humans and, by that, we prevent them from becoming nuisance bears once we release them and see every human that walks around as “Oh, you might bring me some food” .
Um, if you introduce too many handlers then it becomes humans bring food, it's not the mother bear anymore and that’s where the problem is and, therefore, it's imperative with the bear care that it’s only a couple of people that handles these bears and that they don’t change. So, with this year, with COVID, and people, all of a sudden, are able to come that really threw us for a loop and the bears are, basically, on us now...we were really lucky that one of the volunteers we had that was leaving this spring...she was working for Parks in Alberta and with all the parks being closed because of COVID and so on she didn’t get a job so she extended it. She had already started with some of the bears and she’s still with us.
Pam: Right.
Angelika: And, um, she will stay with us until July next year and, so, we got the ground covered. For awhile there it was pretty scary...it looked like, heh heh, I was going to be alone with a whole bunch of bears,
Pam: Yeah...exactly!
Angelika: But the same as you have in humans, momma bears are very different...some of them are more timid; some of them are more aggressive; some of them are very protective; other ones are very aloof and so on...and you have that in the other animals too...it really doesn’t matter...what you do need is you have to have the heart for it and the dedication...because if you’re signing on…(cell phone rings) oh, I’m sorry
Pam: That’s OK
Angelika: No, go away...um, i am…
Pam: You can answer it if you need to…
Angelika: Angelika speaking...can I help you? Yup. How can I help you? Yes, we are…
Pam: This is so typical of an Angelika day. She’s managing dozens of responsibilities all hours of the day. She also needs to have a professional, prompt and full of knowledge and information that changes. She’s on call all day, everyday...living with her kids and her grandchildren. And her mind is often in more than one place at a time.
Angelika: Yeah, they...I don’t think they do that anymore...it was Independent Glass but, um, somebody told me that they have a sign in the door now that says to bring it to Bandstra. Your welcome! Thank you...okay, bye.
(sigh)...just gonna turn this off...okay...so, um, you need...you need to know that you are willing to dedicate that time even when it gets hard because walking away before the twelve months are up can mean that that bear can’t be rehabbed and has to be euthanized.
Pam: Right.
Angelika: And, so, and that’s, I think, may be the only really, um, binding criteria is that you’re sticking it out and you don’t walk out on the animal.
Pam: Hmmm...
Angelika: That’s really important. It’s really hard because it doesn’t require any prior expertise in this field...um, some of the people we got that were absolutely amazing had animal backgrounds and others had never worked with animals before.
Pam: uh hum (?)
Angelika: It’s more trying to get a handle on how dedicated they seem. You can see that a lot in, uh, in the questions that they are asking. You know, if they’re more concerned with how much time off they have and what’s going on in town and so on and so forth. And that’s usually an indication already that they’re not so keen on the animals but they’re looking for more of a Canadian experience rather than a wildlife shelter experience. Um...and that’s just one of the things, you know, how willing are they when your talking to them about how their days can change them...sometimes they’ll have days where they maybe just sleep four hours a night because we’re in rescue mode and we have sick animals and so on and so forth and some of them are, you know, they will be right on and you can feel it in the questions and the comments...it’s not just...oh no, I can do this...like that’s important and I wouldn’t want to be involved, you know, whatever...you can hear their enthusiasm or when it’s just being said.
Pam: Right. Are you a good judge of character because of that?
Angelika: I hope so. (Aside)....OK, guys...we’re doing an interview...you can’t talk in between…
Is there something that you need from me? She wants food...that’s nothing new...you’re gonna have to wait a little bit for...okay? You guys taking the puppy? The puppy wasn’t here with me again.
The puppy is here...you can just leave him...
Pam: I love this interaction between Angelika’s grandchildren. She’s just sooo German! Reminds me of my Oma, actually. I can’t help but equate her to a momma bear. She’s tough and loving. She gives her attention and patience to what’s in front of her. That can be her grandchildren asking her for a snack or it can be an animal in need. Sometimes, it is a podcaster that wants to ask you all about your life…
(Grandchildren talking in background wanting Angelika’s attention)
Angelika: If you guys want to grab something inside...You want some fruit? There’s grapes in the kitchen…
Angelika: Sorry...um...most of the time the people that we choose, and it’s not just myself, we always run it by everybody, and, um, but most of the time the people that we choose are great. And every once in a while we got the wrong mix and that happens and we just have to deal with it. But it doesn’t happen very often.
Pam: Yeah…
Angelika: Most people come in and, often, it looks like it’s not gonna work out and, then, they dig in their heels and they want to make it work and then, all of a sudden, it just floats…(laughs)
Pam: Yeah...yeah…
That’s Episode 1 of I’m New Here...A podcast about the people of Bulkley Valley. On the next episode, I’m going to introduce you to more of what the Bulkley Valley has to offer. But, if you can’t wait, here’s a little taste….
River Wilde: “She’s a polite bitch. She’s, again, there’s those juxtapositions of I’m taking my clothes off but, oh, yeah, I’m wearing gloves, scarf and a hat because my skin is so precious...it shouldn’t be touched by air...you know, like, (laughs) those kind of things but meanwhile I’m a now tassel twirl and I’m gonna crawl on the floor…”
I’m New Here is a podcast created by me...Pam Haasen. The music is by Makaih Beats. This podcast is made possible by the Bulkley Valley Arts Council. Thanks to CACK Smithers Community Radio for playing this show.
Each episode of I’m New Here can be found wherever you get your podcasts and on haasenpod.com.
Thanks for listening!