Kids honour tradition at Alberta Indigenous Games with hand game tournament

The Alberta Indigenous Games continue in Edmonton this week with thousands of kids taking part in sports across the city. Marek Tkach has the story.

Dozens of children were at the Alberta Indigenous Games (AIG) Tuesday, competing in a traditional game that is not often heard of in traditional sports tournaments: hand game.

Traditionally a Dene game, the hand game is a guessing game where individual players or teams of players hide objects in one of their hands. The other team guesses which hand the object is in to score points, which can be stolen.

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Caroline Isadore, Driftpile Cree Nation councillor and AIG hand game organizer said she brought the game to the tournament six years ago where only a couple of teams competed.

Now there are a dozen teams with six to seven people playing.

“Hand game is something our ancestors, first peoples of the land, did,” said Isadore. “It is a way of bartering … Our livelihood, our sustainability as a first people, we would do a cultural event to be able to gather for sustainability and barter.”

Isadore said the Dene people of South Tallcree blessed Driftpile Cree Nation with the hand game, giving it to them to share.

And now kids from all over Alberta are playing.

In the Whati area in the Northwest Territories, only men are allowed to play the game. But down south, women are starting to play.

Tanya Noskey, a 10-year-old hand game player was at the AIG Tuesday competing.

“Girls are better at handgames than boys,” she told CTV News Edmonton.

The AIG wraps up Saturday with baseball, volleyball, archery and lacrosse finals.

With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Marek Tkach