SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - Jacques Benoit Roberge was an industrial engineering student at Montreal's Ecole Polytechnique on Dec. 6, 1989. He met fellow student Anne-Marie Edward at noon as both were planning a fundraiser for the following week.

Jacques Benoit Roberge lights a candle Dec. 6 at the Salvation Army in memory of the 14 women who died at Montreal's Ecole Polytechnique 20 years ago. Roberge studied engineering at the school at the time of the shooting, and spoke with one of the victims hours before the tragedy. - Jeanne Gagnon/NNSL photo

Roberge said he remembers that as he left the polytechnique about 30 minutes before the events of that fateful day unfolded, he encountered a man entering the polytechnique with a large bag, and found it unusual at the time. To this day, he said, he doesn't know if the man was shooter Marc Lepine, but it still haunts him.

That afternoon Lepine entered the school armed with a rifle and killed 14 women before turning the gun on himself. Edward was one of the victims.

On Sunday, 20 years later, about 60 people gathered at the Yellowknife branch of the Salvation Army to remember the victims and Roberge was one of them.

"Je n'oublierai jamais; je me souviens (I will never forget; I remember). Yes, 20 years will provide some healing but it always hurts," said Roberge. "I am very touched that Yellowknifers, even 20 years after the events, 3,000 kilometres away, you still remember."

Roberge said the events were a life lesson, since he felt invincible as a 23-year-old at the time.

"What this event drove home for me is that this can happen right here at home," he said. "I used to think it would always happen to other people some place else. It really drove that message in. It really brought home the fact that there is, there has been ... and there still is gratuitous violence against women and it's something that event helps me remember and be aware of."

Elaine Carr spoke during the vigil. She learned of the events later as she was studying mechanical engineering at the University of Alberta in Edmonton.

"I think they represent a past that we're trying to get away from and remind us of a future that we want, which is one where people aren't told that they cannot be in a non-traditional occupation; they're not told that they shouldn't do something based on societal expectations," she said.

Joanne Stassen said that as a first-year liberal arts student in New Brunswick 20 years ago, she never really paid attention to discrimination against women. That awareness came recently with the violent death of a friend, she added.

"I know people sometimes think 'well, was it a mental health issue more than a violence against women issue,' but I think it's really important to mark things like this when we can because it's such a critical issue, especially here in the North," she said.