Carcross/Tagish First Nation hosts Yukon handgames championship for first time

Drummers, spectators and handgames players crowded around three mats in a packed Haa Shagóon Hídi Hall in Carcross this weekend, as hundreds of competitors played for the 37th Yukon Annual Handgames Championship.

Gordon Peter, a member of the Ross River Dena Council, has been playing handgames since the early 1990s and has travelled the North competing since 2005.

With 74 teams of six players each, Peter said he had never seen a Yukon tournament as well-attended as this one. 

"This is almost like a N.W.T. turnout with so many people," Peter said. "I've never seen anything like it." 

Peter says the high turnout is likely due to the growing popularity of handgames in recent years, and the venue's proximity to Whitehorse.

"This is a really good location for handgames," Peter said.

Handgames is a Dene tradition that has gained popularity among many First Nations. It consists of two six-player teams facing each other, with one team hiding a token and the "shooting team" guessing which player has it. Winning teams earn game sticks, needing a best-of-three result to win.

Dawn Alesna, the tournament's co-organizer, says Carcross/Tagish First Nation was "buzzing" with excitement to host the tournament for the first time.

The tournament's winner typically chooses the next year's host. Last year, a team from Selkirk First Nation gifted the tournament to Carcross/Tagish First Nation.

"It was awesome," Alesna said. "We've been talking about it for a couple years, so we're just very grateful."

This year's youth winners were the Little Warriors, and the adult winners were Alesna's team, Rainebow Rich. 

Rainebow Rich, which consists of players from Carcross/Tagish First Nation and Selkirk First Nation, are asking Selkirk First Nation's Pelly Crossing to host next year's tournament at Minto Landing. If they do not accept, Alesna says a couple other communities have already offered to host.

Alesna says the Carcross organizing committee looked forward to bringing "a sense of spiritual upliftment" to its community through this year's handgames tournament.

"I really enjoy just smiling, and laughing and watching while I'm playing," Alesna said. "You get immersed in it." 

Nearly 20 youth teams entered the tournament. Alesna says spreading the games to young people is particularly important.

"The young people are our future, so we need to lift them up."

Ten-year-old Mirage Barrett from Carcross/Tagish First Nation says this is her second tournament in her two and a half years of playing handgames.

"I like playing handgames and I just like the tournaments," Barrett said. "I like to see who wins and doesn't win."

She says her favourite part is the movement players use to hide the token.

"I like how we bounce around," she said.

Gordon Peter says handgames are about more than playing a game. He says handgames heal communities by reconnecting people to their culture.

"They have three mats, but their drumming, it's all one," he said. "It's almost like your heartbeat. Playing handgames is the best game that the Native person ever had."