Lynn Lau
Northern News Services

Inuvik (Nov 26/01) - Shanti Curtis turned 26 in Inuvik yesterday, on her first trip back since she was abducted by her father in 1977.

For the first time in 24 years, she got to celebrate her birthday with her mother by her side. For the first time since she was a toddler, she got to meet her sister, brother, maternal grandparents, aunts and uncles.

When Curtis was two-and-a-half, she was abducted by her father, an American draft dodger who was living here in the 1970s.

Until last week, all Curtis knew of her Inuvialuit roots was what she saw on the Discovery Channel, or in museums. Now, she's sampling caribou and muktuk (whale blubber), and meeting all her relatives.

"It's totally awesome," she says. "I'm just trying to get the family straight. It's such a huge family ... It's a whole new culture with different food. It's like you go out and kill your meal. It's all fresh."

Curtis's journey north started in February 2000, when she decided to look for her mother. "I just always thought when I was ready, I'd find her, and it was easy -- two hours on the Internet." She found phone numbers for Inuvik, and started calling all the Cockneys on the list. It wasn't long before she got her mother Margaret Cockney on the phone.

"Everyone warned me, you know, what if she doesn't want to talk to you? And you never know, but after that first scream on the phone ..."

On the other end, Cockney remembers that day exactly -- it was Feb. 27, 2000, at about 3:23 p.m. "Oh, my God," she says, "it was like emotions galore. It was awesome, better than awesome. It had always bothered me, but then it was like a big weight gone."

Cockney says when her daughter was stolen, the police told her they couldn't do anything about it because it was the girl's father who took her. Cockney hired a private investigator shortly after her boyfriend at the time disappeared with their daughter. But her $500 wasn't enough to keep the case open for long. In 1985, she went to Hawaii to look for Curtis in school yards, but after two weeks of searching, she returned home disappointed.

She says she always knew in her heart she'd meet her daughter again, she was just waiting for the day it would happen. Since their first phone conversation, mother and daughter have wasted no time catching up. They exchanged their photos by e-mail and chatted online with computer camcorders. They found out they both collect moons and stars, like the tattoo Curtis has on her shoulder and the smiling moon earrings Cockney wears. "It's just like having a new best friend," says Curtis.

In September 2000, they arranged to meet in Victoria, halfway between Inuvik and Arizona where Curtis lives with her husband. Although Curtis says she always thought about her lost mother, she says she's happy how things turned out. After she was taken away, she lived with her father in Hawaii until she was eight. When he decided he couldn't care of her any more, her aunt and uncle took over, raising her in small town Missouri. "They were great parents. I had a good life." Cockney says it was a relief to find out her daughter was well cared for all these years. "I'm just so happy she grew up good."