The Taiga Tribe--- It's not real!

I had intended this post to provide some historical background on the tribe to which the main character in Power belongs, but I have discovered that it is a fictional tribe- not even a wikipedia entry on it!
That being said, I will now discuss one of the general native American beliefs that have been included in the first section of the novel: the importance of animals.
To Indians, animals weren't just cute and cuddly pets, they served a purpose. The buffalo was a sacred animal on the plains and when the Spanish introduced the horse to the tribes, it revolutionized their way of life.
In Power, Omishto speaks about Aunt Ama and how she believes that the cat was born when she was and is with her for protection. Our narrator wishes she could have been born at the time when animals were 'assigned' to a person. She believes that even if there was an animal with her, it hadn't done her much good. This is a testimony of how she feels split between the world she lives in and the world she came from- the Taiga tribe, where animals weren't just twinkling eyes in the darkness, but sacred protectors of humans.