"Mandela's Sash"

[Mike Cleven]

The story about Mandela receiving a Metis sash was genuinely interesting,
and went completely unreported in the mainstream media (as can only be
expected).  That you appear to have been banned from the banquet because of
your impetuous disregard for government-authorized protocol speaks volumes
about Canada - just as much about the elite disregard for the non-elite as
about white/aboriginal politics/tensions.

I wanted to mention that the Metis sash of the sort you mention is known in
the Jargon as "lasanjel".  Is this also a Michif word?  Certainly it is of
Metis origin, and must be part of the Metis dialect of French.  The attire
of the fur company employees - the lasanjel, tuque (or turban), and
loose-fitting shirt and hide leggings - was mentioned in a recent article
in some American magazine as having spread throughout Native America as a
fashion among many tribes, from the Choctaw and Apache through to the
various Californian and Plateau peoples.....

Mike Cleven
ironmtn at bigfoot.com
http://members.home.net/ironmtn/

The thunderbolt steers all things.
                           - Herakleitos