Christmas Games in Arctic Bay

This evening, I ventured out with Aletha to the Christmas Games being held in the community / school gym. I wasn't too sure what to expect before arriving, but I am glad I went tonight. I have some pictures of the games , but my camera battery died early on, so I'll post up the ones I have and I'll be posting more throughout the week.

When we arrived, they were just getting started with a dice game, where we had to roll a large foam dice and not roll a 5. If we rolled a 5, we were out. This continued until there was only one person left, and they won a prize.

The next game was a traditional one for the younger girls (7,8,9) where they had to squat down, with one leg stuck out and the other one tucked under them and then switch legs over and over again until there was only one person hopping.

Next was a game was a traditional game for the boys (7,8,9) where they had to leg wrestle each other.

After, was another 16+ game where we had to rip as many pages out of a catalog as possible if we rolled a number 4 until the next person rolled a 4 and took over the page ripper position. I ripped out a total of 60 pages from the catalog. Most of them on my first run out to rip pages.

There were also games for the elders, one of which they had to not make a face after a teaspoon of lemon juice was put on their tongue, and another was a numbers game.

The older kids had a game where they had to put their feet and their arms in their jacket sleeves, and race down the gym floor on their hands and feet squawking like a raven. It was quite amusing to watch (sad that I don't have footage of this game, as it was a hoot!).

The last game that was played before we headed out was a scavenger hunt type game for 16+ (I sat this one out). They had to find people or items that were called out to them by the MCee. It was quite a challenge to figure out what items they had to find as it was all in Inuktitut, but I was able to guess the gist of what was being searched for based on who or what they brought back into the circle.

I'll be heading back to the games tomorrow to get more pictures and maybe film some of the games to send home for the kids to see.