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Cochrane Girl Guides craft unique Remembrance Day ceremony

“They were doing what they could to help their communities— It's really no different than what we’re doing now,” Davies said. “We’re still being respectful to each other, we do fundraising— The promise and lore that we’ve had since the very start of guiding in 1910 it hasn’t changed and neither have our values.”
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The Cochrane Girl Guides have hand painted rocks with poppies to place in the Garden of Remembrance in honour of Remembrance Day. Submitted Photo

COCHRANE— Adapting to the adversity created by the COVID-19 pandemic, The Cochrane Girl Guides have found a unique way to honour Canadian veterans.

In a normal year the Girl Guides would be part of the Remembrance Day ceremony, marching down from Cochrane High School to honour veterans, said Cochrane Girl Guides district commissioner Su Davies, but this year due to COVID-19 that is not possible.

Embracing innovation and ensuring they had the opportunity to pay respect to Canadian veterans the Girl Guides instead held a ceremony at the Cochrane Cenotaph in the early hours of Wednesday (Nov. 11) morning, placing rocks they painted with poppies in the Garden of Remembrance.

“We didn’t want to ignore it,” Davies said. “We try and think back to what Guides and [Boy] Scouts were doing at the time.”

Davies said about 14 girls and their families laid the poppy rocks and read in Flanders Field to honour the day.

As part of the ceremony, Davies spoke to the role of the Girl Guides in the First and Second World War and how it related to contemporary members.

In the First World War the Girl Guides were more military-based and at the time were being groomed to be ready for action.

“They were ready to stand to attention and march,” Davies said. “The older ones would be babysitting, running schools. The Pathfinders and Rangers age, 14, 15 would be working as nurses' assistances. Some of them were even deployed abroad.”

There were Girl Guides stationed across Europe during the Second World War, Davies said, and some even served as spies gathering intelligence and running information between allies.

“This was the girls doing this,” Davies said. “They had so many different roles that we don’t have now. They were really thrown into the deep end.”

A goal for Remembrance Day has been imparting these stories to current Girl Guides and the tales are leaving an impact on members, Davies said.

“They were doing what they could to help their communities— It's really no different than what we’re doing now,” Davies said. “We’re still being respectful to each other, we do fundraising— The promise and lore that we’ve had since the very start of guiding in 1910 it hasn’t changed and neither have our values.”

The entire way of life for the Guides has been uprooted by COVID-19, she said, and the experience is helping members connect with those who served during the First and Second World Wars.

“Because of COVID we’ve regressed to maybe what they would have done back then,” Davies said. “Just because COVID is occurring doesn’t mean we're not having meetings.”

The Girl Guides have meetings outside huddled together in the cold and have been doing exercises like drills and learning morse code. 

Davies called on the Guides to think about what it would have been like using morse code during the war to communicate and the fear of hearing planes fly over, terror over the blitz, working in darkness and being alone receiving messages of life or death.

“They couldn’t imagine how hard that would be,” Davies said. 

It is important to carry these messages forward and remember those who paid countless sacrifices to ensure the life we enjoy today, Davies said, while showcasing the need to remember the values of the time, both the good and the bad.

“Discipline and respect are two things that are extremely important and they’re lessons we need to keep bringing through history to the future,” Davies said. “With that, I think comes the ability to look after yourself and not have to rely on others— We need to keep that spark alive.”

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