Melting ice causing havocScientist says Arctic coast losing ice at alarming rate, increasing erosion along shoreline, affecting wildlife

Publication mail Contract #40012157

Volume 56 Issue 2 THURSDAY, JANUARY 16, 2020 75 CENTS

Tsiigehtchic applying for ball field funding

Stories keep Gwich'in alive

Film bridges cultures

"Even traditional knowledge tells us that things are changing faster than anyone can remember. "– Physical scientist Dustin Whalen on the melting of landfast ice and its effects on the coastline, page 3.

NewsSports Arts

Rock on

Pearl Gillis, left, Tyanna Bain, Mataya Gillis and Adrianna Hendricks raise their brooms in cele-bration as the four prepare to head to Langley, B.C. for the Canadian U21 National Curling Championships Jan. 18 to 26. The team will keep fans updated on their progress via the Facebook page. See full story on page 6.

Eric Bowling / NNSL photo

2 INUVIK DRUM, Thursday, January 16, 2020

Tsiigehtchic's ageing baseball dia-mond is in need of a serious overhaul and the community is reaching out to Canada's premier team for assistance in repairing it.

Part of the Toronto Blue Jay's pub-lic outreach program, the Jays Care Foundation's Field of Dreams program assists communities in funding new sports field projects to help build com-munity spirit and give more opportuni-ties to youth.

"Our baseball field is in horrible shape. There's ruts, grooves and big rocks everywhere. With a fly ball, you're taking your life in your hands," said economic development officer Brian Smith. "We were looking at grading the field and making it safer, but I decided to look at turf prices just to see.

"The first thing I punch in is that the Blue Jays have started a project in Pond Inlet. So I did the initial application and we made it to the short list."

Noting the Jays have been to every part of Canada except the Northwest Territories, Smith said Tsiigehtchic has a unique opportunity to fill a big hole in the map.

A new field would be a game chang-er for the community, he noted and would be in use all year round, giving people a place to play soccer, to snow-shoe, ski or even practise biathlon.

Smith added the field would be

a benefit to the Beaufort at large, since local baseball tournaments dot the summer landscape and a modern facility would be an excellent resource for people training in all sorts of sports, summer or winter.

To get to the next level, Smith said he needs photos, stories and  letters of support from residents citing of the importance of the field to their com-munity and lives. The deadline to apply is Jan. 31.

"Basically, what the Blue Jays want is to see Tsiigehtchic's personality and everything that goes on in the commu-nity. They want the project to be used for more than just baseball," he said. "It would be a safer field for the school.

"So, I'm hoping that through the testimonials, pictures, videos and out-reach from the community that we will be able to impress on the Blue Jays this would be a perfect candidate for them."

If all goes according to plan and the Jays take the worm, Smith said work on the field could begin as early as summer.

Along with the construction could come a visit from a few players too.

"They will send a couple of guys in, teach us how to do the install and it would last for years," said Smith. "They always throw a Blue Jay at you. It's great work, but it looks good on them too. Both sides win."

Smith said anyone interested in helping out could contact him at edo@tsiigehtchic.ca

If approved, a state-of-the art facility could benefit Beaufort at large

Tsiigehtchic reaching out to Toronto Blue Jays for baseball field upgrades

image courtesy of Toronto Blue Jays Care Foundation

A map of communities the Toronto Blue Jays have built baseball diamonds for. Tsiigehtchic economic development officer Brian Smith said he's hoping to fill the noticeable hole in the N.W.T. section of the map.

by Eric Bowling Northern News Services

sports & recreation

INUVIK DRUM, Thursday, January 16, 2020 3news

Landfast ice, where coastal sea ice freezes to the shore, melted at the fastest rate ever recorded in 2019 and an entire month sooner than in 2017.

Research conducted by Dustin Wha-len through Natural Resources Canada has shown the ice began melting June 8 this last year, which was one week ear-lier than in 2018 and a month ahead of the average.

"Even traditional knowledge tells us that things are changing faster than anyone can remember – ever," said Whalen. "Just in a year alone, you're seeing a three-week dif-ference. All of a sudden, the ocean is open to waves and erosion for another month of the summer.

"The impact is not just to the coast, but to the marine mammals and fish are pretty significant."

This has serious implications for the northern coastline and people who live on it. Landfast ice effectively acts as a barrier between the ocean and the coastline. During the summer months when the ice is not pres-ent, waves crash into the exposed soil.

Longer exposure time can lead to greater erosion and areas of the Beaufort coast are

disappearing at rates up to 40 metres a year in some areas.

Compounding the issue is more open water is subject to the effects of wind, creat-ing more, larger waves and even increasing the potential for more storms.

"We definitely saw increased waves and storms. Typically, July is a calmer summer month, when we see harvesting of whales and fishing. But this July, the open ocean had three weeks to create storms," he said. "So when the harvesting came in July, hunters, marine mammals and fish were faced with pretty severe conditions.

"In 2018, when they were harvesting on Hendrickson Island, a big storm came in and pushed ice up from off-shore all around their camp."

Open water also is far darker than bright ice, which over the course of a summer leads to greater absorption of sunlight. This could further accelerate the process.

However, Whalen noted the two phenom-enons might not be directly affecting each other.

"That's further off-shore. I don't think that's the reason the landfast ice broke up as soon as it did, the reason for that is the winter season we had last year," he said. "It was pretty warm throughout the entire

Mackenzie basin. There wasn't tons of snow accumulation and the ice was not as thick as it usually is.

"So there was less ice to break up and it moved much quicker. When that warmer river water reached the ocean, even the land-fast ice there wasn't as thick, strong or wide as it usually is. So it was easy for it to break up early."

Though there are many, many factors at work, landfast ice melting faster corresponds to similar findings from other angles. In September, the National Snow and Ice Data Center announced summer sea ice was at its second lowest extent since satellites began keeping track in 1979 – 2012 was the lowest extent.

Whalen said with more thawing events being observed, more erosion would be sure to follow.

"The ice is the driver of all things. As soon as the ice went, it allows the sea to come in, which spring-boards everything else," he said. "In terms of ocean temperature, this year was warmer than last year.

"This year we observed a lot more thaw-ing than last year, so you can say there was more erosion this year, because of the early ice break up and warmer summer tempera-tures."

The keynote speaker at an Alas-kan trade show says there is a new "gold rush" on in the Arctic and is calling for rapid development of the region.

Rear Admiral Paul Becker made the address at the 7th Annual Arctic Ambitions International Business Conference & Annual Trade Show

in Anchorage, Alaska."There's a new gold rush on in

the Arctic. This time the prize isn't a precious metal, it's for maritime control and it's for global power," he said, saying the United States was losing a lot of ground to Rus-sia. "If we don't change our course, they'll maintain advantage and dic-tate terms in the future that they'd like as opposed to us."

Did we get it wrong?Inuvik Drum is committed to getting facts and

names right. With that goes a commitment to acknow-ledge mistakes and run corrections. If you spot an error in Inuvik Drum, contact the editor at (867) 777-4545 or email inuvikdrum@nnsl.com.

Coastal ice melted a whole month earlier than expected in 2019

Beaufort landfast ice melted at its earliest recorded date

'New gold rush on in the Arctic' : Americans

by Eric Bowling Northern News Services

by Eric Bowling Northern News Services

Jaro Malanowski/Avatar Media image

Nathan Kuptana interviews physical scientist Dustin Whalen in this screenshot from the documentary Happen-ing to Us, a 22-minute documentary that was aired seven times at the United Nations COP25 conference in Madrid. Landfast ice, which would fill this area in during the winter, has been melting earlier and earlier in the year, exposing coastlines to more erosion.

NEWSBriefs

New study finds relationship between sea ice and permafrost

A study published Jan. 8 in Nature has sug-gested a relationship between Arctic sea ice and permafrost.

Examining the chemistry of layers of sta-lagmites in caves under the current layer of permafrost in Siberia, looking for traces of chemicals that could only be deposited if permafrost was absent, scientists were able to peek into the state of the layer over the last 1.5 million years. Then the Earth was in an inter-glacial period with more heat moving from the equator to the poles and follow that through the sub-sequential warming and cooling periods that happened from then to present day.

Their findings found that permafrost was largely absent when Arctic sea ice was at its lowest extent, indicating it's less affected by global temperatures and more so by the extent of sea ice. When sea is absent, air above the water is able to warm faster, which then carries heat further inland. Open water also allows for more moisture to reach the atmosphere, lead-ing to greater snowfall in the fall, which can insulate the ground from colder temperatures later in the winter.

The scientists note that if the processes hold true for modern anthropomorphic climate change, an acceleration in permafrost thaw should be expected with less Arctic sea ice.

Arctic Phytoplankton linked to cloud developmentAnother study has found that open sea ice

is enabling phytoplankton in the Arctic to multiply, leading to potential atmospheric side effects.

Researchers from Universite Laval in Que-bec used satellites to look for the pigment chlorophyll-a, which gives plants and other photosynthesizers their greenish colour. Scien-tists use increased presence of chlorophyll-to test for the presence of phytoplankton.

Scientists then took those numbers and cal-culated the volume of dimethylsulfide (DMS) produced by the biomass. They conclude the volume of DMS has increased by roughly 33 per cent each decade. With expectations the Arctic could be ice free in the summer within the next 25 years, the researchers suggest these concentrations could double in the coming decades.

DMS has been found to have an effect on cloud formation, so the researchers are cau-tioning the Arctic could see a shift in its cloud cover on top of the other changes it is currently undergoing.

More companies pledge to not ship through the Arctic

Eight more companies have signed the Arctic Corporate Shipping Pledge as of Jan. 7. Ocean Conservancy announced that Ralph Lauren Corporation, Kuehne + Nagel, PUMA, International Direct Packaging, Allbirds, Aritzia, Hudson Shipping Lines and Bureo have joined Nike, Asos, Bestseller, Columbia, Gap Inc., H&M Group, Kering, Li & Fung, PVH Corp. and ocean carriers CMA CGM, Evergreen, Hapag-Lloyd and the Mediterran-ean Shipping Company have agreed to not use new sea ways opening up in the Arctic to ship their products.

Shipping accounts for three per cent of all global greenhouse gas emissions.

As Arctic ecosystems are already under extreme pressure from climate change, con-servationists have been pushing for greater policing of traffic in the ocean to prevent fur-ther degradation to the environment.

The initiative was started by Ocean Con-servancy and Nike in October 2019.

NEWS Briefs

Retired U.S. Navy Rear Admiral Paul Becker says there's a new gold rush hap-pening in the Arc-tic, centred around maritime control and global power.Wikimedia commons photo

4 INUVIK DRUM, Thursday, January 16, 2020 alternatives

"What's your New Year's Resolution?"

Sara Anderson:"I don't have one."

Dylan Dillon:"Just keep on keeping on."

Brianna Gruben:"Become a better athlete."

Livia Amos-Forgotten:"I want to make 100 butter-flies in swimming!"

Isabelle Esau:"I want to finish Grade 6."

Adria Amos:"To finish school."

STREET talkwith Eric Bowling

inuvikdrum@nnsl.com

Monday, January 20Music and Language class for Tots1:15 to 2:15 p.m.Arctic Family CentreA five-week parent and child sing-a-long class. Free to anyone with children up to four years old. Runs until Feb. 17. Contact Jolene Donovan at 777-4400 ext 1.Tuesday, January 21 and 28Felt mobile making class6 to 8 p.m.InuvikUp to 10 spots available for parents hoping to make felt mobiles for their children. Anyone interested should contact Jolene Donovan at 777-4400 ext 1 or at jolene_donovan@gov.nt.ca.Wednesday, January 22 and 23Tsiigehtchic Firearms safety courseAll DayChief Bernard Learning CentreOnly 12 spots available. Priority will be given to Tsiige-htchic residents. Contact Rebecca Dylanger on Face-book for more info.

Community Calendar

To have an event listed in this free feature, call (867) 777-4545, or email inuvikdrum@nnsl.com. Submissions should be received two weeks prior to the event. Non-profit or community events only please. There is no guarantee submissions will be published.

Eric Bowling is editor of the Inuvik Drum. Send your ideas

to inuvikdrum@nnsl.com

NEIGHBOURLYNews

Nunavut moves to reduce caribou harvestKugluktuk

Nunavut's government is looking to limit permitted har-vest of Bluenose East and Cape Bathurst herds to bring their conservation policies in line with the Northwest Territories.

Population surveys of Bluenose East from 2019 showed a population drop to 19,250 individuals and the Cape Bathurst was down to 8,210.

If the plan goes ahead, harvest of Bluenose East will be reduced from 340 to 107 animals annually and ban the har-vesting of females. The plan has been met with some oppos-ition from the Kugluktuk Hunters and Trappers association, which stated it has never used all its allowed tags and is asking to keep the allowed harvest to 250 individuals and harvest sexes in equal numbers.

Tsiigehtchic votes to let liquor inTsiigehtchic

Residents in Tsiigehtchic voted to abolish the dry-com-munity status in a Jan. 13 plebiscite with an overwhelming majority. Restrictions remain in place until the Finance Min-ister signs off on the plebiscite.

Three options were presented on the ballot – keep the cur-rent dry system, move to a restricted system or simply move to an unrestricted system. The unrestricted option won with 22 votes, while the other two received eight votes each.

McPherson building new community hallFort McPherson

Construction of a new $5-million community hall could begin as early as May after the hamlet issued Request for Proposals this month.

Expected to have a capacity of 350 people and an area of 7,000-square-feet, the hall will serve as a replacement to the ageing hall that needed to be demolished after the structural integrity of the building was undercut by melting permafrost.

The new facility is planned to be as clean as possible, with hopes to install solar panels and run the building off propane or another non-diesel source of fuel. It is hoped the building will be completed by August 2021.

–with files from Blair McBride

Digital education for TsiigehtchicTsiigehtchic

Residents of Tsiigehtchic are being offered a free seminar and even a laptop for their efforts.

DigitalNWT is offering workshops across the territory and will be in Tsiigehtchic Feb. 10 at Chief Joe Bernard Learning Centre. Offering lessons in describing digital devices, how the internet works, how to use social media and apps and how to be proactive online, the class runs from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. for a week. Residents who sign up with Aurora College can get a free laptop for taking the course. Anyone who completes the course will also be put in a draw for an iPad.

Child development training in SachsSachs Harbour

A one-day training course is being offered in Sachs Har-bour Jan. 28 and 29, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. for anyone who works with children aged six to 12.

Providing training on the High Five principles of healthy child development, the training focuses on topics ranging from bullying, conflict resolution, physical literacy, children's mental health and healthy mentorship.

Also being offered is a course on strengthening children's mental health, providing education on the impact of stress and environment on a child and offer tools to help lead to better outcomes. Anyone interested should contact Amanda Grob-becker at agrobbecker@nwtrpa.org.

image courtesy of GNWT

A map showing the known ranges of three caribou herds. The GNWT reduced the allowed harvest of Bluenose-East caribou last summer and the Nunavut government is now moving to bring its harvest numbers in line.

INUVIK DRUM, Thursday, January 16, 2020 5opinions

Well, that was epic.Three days of workshops, fire-

works, dogsled rides, dancing, sing-ing, movies and snow carving. All within walking distance.

And all for free.To heck with the Calgary Stam-

pede. This is where it's at. Normally festivals like this only exist to suck money away at every opportunity and invariably detracts from the experience as you're fishing for extra money to pay for marked-up parking,

food or entry to the show.

Not here. You could have spent the entire week-end entertained, eating muktuk and reindeer stew, learning how to hoop dance, making quilts and lan-terns and even your own snow

sculpture, watching several movies, taking your children on dogsled rides and enjoying concerts without having to spend a dime.

But even if you did spend money, the prices of food or at the market were no different than any other time of the year.

How is this possible? Best I can tell, it was the long, long hours put in by the festival's organizers — who are far too numerous to list here. But I can say with absolute certainty there were a lot of faces I saw at every single event, making sure things ran as smoothly as they could with daily highs of -30 C or colder.

If you know someone who put in some time to help out at the festival, be sure to give them a pat on the back. This place does festivals right and the enthusiasm organizers put into their craft should be encouraged.

I have attended many festivals throughout Canada. Never have

I seen one so strongly oriented towards the people it was being put on for. A town with such high cost of living could easily price-gouge an event like this to bring in revenue. But that doesn't happen. Instead, the community gives back to its mem-bers.

Looking forward, it seems like upcoming festivals have a similar grain — come enjoy our hospitality, try something new and check out what we've been up to. Compared to the marketing monstrosities of K-Days or the aforementioned "great-est show on earth" this is a wonder-ful breath of fresh air.

Some feedback was passed to town council that the festival was too spread out. Personally, I thought it was just fine, considering you can walk just about anywhere here in a matter of minutes. Though I can

appreciate being outside in -40 C winds for any length of time is less than desirable.

If I were to suggest any feedback, I would say the Arctic Village could have used some better lighting and signage or some outdoor heaters to make the activities more accessible, since the amount of daylight is at a minimum (as implied by the name of the festival).

It also would have been nice to see more participation from some venues and more acts. Reuben and the Dark did an excellent show at the Igloo Church — perhaps there could be a second show, or maybe the Mackenzie Hotel could host a show. I do believe the Mad Trapper brings in musical acts as well.

Ideas for next time if possible. But regardless, it was a fantastic festival and the organizers should be proud.

Northern News Services

What a party! Published Thursdays

SEND US YOUR COMMENTSLetters to the editor are welcomed by the Drum, especially new contributors. We attempt to pub-lish a cross-section of public opinion. Not all let-ters will necessarily be published. Preference is given to short letters of broad interest or concern. Letters of over 200 words, open letters and those published elsewhere are seldom used. We reserve the right to publish excerpts, to edit for length or taste and to eliminate inaccurate or libellous statements. We may also choose to use a letter as the basis for a story. All letters submitted must be signed with a return address and daytime phone number. Opinions expressed in letters and by columnists are those of the author and are not necessarily shared by the editor or publisher.

NORTHERN NEWS SERVICES LIMITED 100% Northern owned and operatedPublishers of: • Nunavut News/North • Inuvik Drum • Kivalliq News • Yellowknifer • NWT News/North • Hay River HubMember of:• Manitoba Community Newspapers Association• Canadian Community Newspapers Association• Alberta Press Council

INUVIK OFFICE:

EDITOR: Eric Bowling

Phone: (867) 777-4545 Fax: (867) 777-4412

Toll free: (855) 873-6675 E-mail: inuvikdrum@nnsl.com

Website: www.nnsl.com/inuvik

FOUNDER (1934-2018): J.W. (Sig) Sigvaldason PUBLISHER, CEO: Bruce Valpy

valpy@nnsl.com CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER: Judy Triffo

MANAGING EDITOR: Mike W. Bryant bryant@nnsl.com ADVERTISING

advertising@nnsl.com Call collect (867) 766-8233

PUBLISHING OFFICE: Box 2820, Yellowknife, NT X1A 2R1

Phone: (867) 873-4031 Fax: (867) 873-8507 E-mail: nnsl@nnsl.com Website: www.nnsl.com

Contents copyright. Printed in the North by Canarctic Graphics Limited. No photos, stories, advertisements or graphics may be reproduced in any form, in whole or in part, without the written approval of the publisher.Subscriptions One year mail $65 Online (entire content) $50/year

Also read in Aklavik • Fort McPherson • Ulukhaktok • Sachs Harbour • Tsiigehtchic • Tuktoyaktuk

We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada.

Nous reconnaissons l'appui financier du gouvernement du Canada.

Nun

avut

Wes

tern

Ter

ritor

y

NWT

CANADA

ALASKA

UNITED STATES

Arctic Circle

Arctic

Circle

Baker Lake

Kimmirut(Lake Harbour)

Iqaluit

Snare Lake

DawsonCity

Kugluktuk(Coppermine)

Whitehorse

ALBERTA SASKATCHEWAN MANITOBA

QUEBEC

BRITISH COLUMBIA

YUKON

ALASKAHerschelIsland

YELLOWKNIFE

Hay River

Fort Smith

GreatSlave Lake

GreatBear Lake

Beaufort Sea

Arctic Ocean

Baffin Bay

Hudson Bay

Hudson Strait

Foxe Basin

NorthMagnetic Pole

GREENLAND

Baffin Island

Victoria Island

BanksIsland

Mackenzie

River

Treeline

Treeline

Cambridge Bay

Arviat

Rankin Inlet

Nahanni Butte

Tulita(Fort Norman)

Deline

RaeEdzo

Fort Liard

Wrigley

Fort Simpson

Bathurst Inlet

Kakisa

Jean Marie River

Trout LakeEnterprise

Sachs Harbour

Ulukhaktok

Umingmaktok

Dettah

Rae Lakes

Wha Ti

RelianceFortProvidence

Fort Resolution

Lutselk’e

Igloolik

Clyde RiverPond Inlet

Resolute

Nanisivik

Grise Fiord

Taloyoak

Pelly Bay

Hall Beach

Arctic Bay

Gjoa Haven

Whale Cove

Chesterfield Inlet

Cape Dorset

Pangnirtung

Broughton Island

WatsonLake

Fort Nelson

Repulse Bay

Coral Harbour

Sanikiluaq

AuyuittuqNational Park

Reserve

KatannilikTerritorialPark

AulavikNational Park

Nahanni National Park Reserve

WoodBuffalo

NationalPark

Thelon Game Sanctuary

EllesmereIsland

National ParkReserve

IvvavikNational

Aklavik INUVIK

Fort McPhersonTsiigehtchic

TuktoyaktukEskimo

Lakes

Anderson River

Horton RiverMackenzie R

iver

Peel R

iver

Mackenzie

Bay

Cape Bathurst

Youth of the week

LEO CHERNIWCHAN-HELLER

Our youth of the week is Leo Cherniwchan-Heller. seen here showing off a paper lantern he helped his mother make during a workshop Jan. 4 as part of the Inuvik Sunrise Festival. At just two years old, Leo is wasting no time getting to know his creative side.

ERIC BOWLING

6 INUVIK DRUM, Thursday, January 16, 2020 sports & recreation

SPORTS CARDJUDO

MAHLIN MACNEIL BARNES

Our athlete of the week is Mahlin MacNeil Barnes, seen here practising his rolls into side-breakfalls – without hands. Barnes is in pursuit of his yellow belt at the Kuzuri Judo club, which will be hosting the Arctic Open for the first time in Inuvik. The competition will be fierce, but Barnes seems pretty focused, so we're sure he'll do fantastic.

Eric Bowling / NNSL photo

Pearl and Mataya Gillis, Tyanna Bain and Adrianna Hendrick work a rock down the lane during practice as the team gears up for U21 National Curling champion-ships in Langley, B.C. Jan. 18 to 26. Missing from the photo is alternate Tyra Bain and coach Tyler Bain.

It's been a series of deeply emo-tional ends for Team Bain, who spent the lead up to the Christmas holiday in back-to-back competitions, first vying for a spot at the Arctic Winter Games and then in the Territorial U21 Finals.

In the end, Team Bain showed they could compete with the best of them, though they were eliminated from the Arctic Winter Games in the very last throw of the trials.

But the girls are taking it in stride."We blame it on Adrianna," joked

Tyanna Bain. "She has way too much muscle.

She almost made a hole in the ice.""Yeah, I swept too hard guys,"

mocked Adrianna Hendrick, flexing her biceps.

However, they placed second in the Territorial championships and were the highest placed U21 team, which was enough to get them on the card for the New Holland 2020 Can-adian Curling Junior Championships in Langley B.C, which runs Jan. 18 to 26. The team took to the air Jan. 16 and won't be back until the end of the month.

It will also be the last tournament for Mataya Gillis, who will be hang-ing up her broom next year to focus on Grade 12.

"We have a fifth, Tyra, who is Tyanna's sister," she explained. "She'll be coming up in my place. She played two games with us in Yellowknife."

"We're going to rock on," said Pearl. "We're going to take them to a U15 event and play with them. That's a good way to start."

Mataya noted she wasn't going to be too far away from the team.

"She's my sister, so if they go to nationals next year, 'woop woop', I'm the cheer squad," she said. "I'll be the one with the painted blue face in the crowd holding the blue finger."

Life on the road has been chal-lenging but rewarding for the group,

who are now juggling the year-end bonspiel with their end of semester exams. All four athletes have exams the day they get back and all four admitted keeping both their games and grades at an 'A' level takes max-imum effort.

"It's a lot of school," said Adri-anna. "But it's a lot of fun."

Combine that with a rigorous schedule over the championship –the girls are slated for 9 a.m. and 7 p.m. games for three days straight with the entire day in-between – and the team expects to be pretty tired by the time they get back to town.

They won't have much time for rest. Pearl and Adrianna are helping

coach the next crop of curlers and helping with the Inuvik Curling club's U12-U15 bonspiel Feb. 1. The girls took the occasion to invite anyone interested in learning the sport to come out and give it a throw.

"Come try it!" said Pearl. "You might get to nationals."

In the meantime, you can follow Team Bain's progress at the tourna-ment on their Facebook page.

All four girls expressed their thanks to their supporters, families and coaches for all the help getting them this far, though Tyanna wanted to highlight one stalwart in particular.

"Thank you to Sam Skinner, our ice maker," she said. "He's a saint."

Jan. 18 to 26 U21 National Championships in Langley, B.C. will be the last competition for the team's current roster

Team Bain aims to sweep away the competition one last time

by Eric Bowling Northern News Services

INUVIK DRUM, Thursday, January 16, 2020 7

8 INUVIK DRUM, Thursday, January 16, 2020 news

Vành gòonlìh.Drin gwichìl'ee gòo'àii. Sriinii'àii.Drin gwiheezàa gòonlìh.Translating to "It's morning. It's a

beautiful day. The sun is shining. It's going to be a good day," the opening lines of the new children's book Drin gwichìl'ee gòo' àii or It's a Beautiful Day sets the stage for a fun way help families teach their language to their children.

Hot off the presses just in time for the New Year, the book is free from the Gwich'in Tribal Council and includes a CD recording of the story in Gwich'in.

"It's a story for getting ready for the day, which is something everybody does," said language revitalization spe-cialist Andrew Cienski, who wrote the story and translated it into Gwich'in with the help of Mabel English and William Firth. "Ultimately, we would really like to help families have language in the home. These books will help for the families of students of Gwich'in to do that."

Illustrated by Myles Debastien, the book depicts a normal morning in a household and uses strong repetition to help teach sentence and word structure. In Gwich'in, verb tense changes depend-ing on the context, including how many people are involved.

Intended to be both part of East Three Elementary school's Gwich'in Language program and as a tool at home to help families connect, Cienski said it was the first of a line of books that are in the works.

"There's some nice old books that were developed by the Gwich'in language cen-tre in the 1990s, so we're updating those," he said. "There's the traditional flood story, there's Goldilocks and the Three Bears, those are in the final stages.

"There's another book like Drin gwichìl'ee gòo' àii about a boy trying to deal with a wasp and the misadventures that stem from that that we just finished the illustrations on. So there's a few books in various stages of development."

Also available is an online diction-

ary for the mobile app "Anki-app" — flash cards that show sentences and verbs and gives their proper pronunciation and usage. However, the dictionary is not yet listed, so Cienski said anyone who wanted access to it should contact him at andrew.cienski@gwichintribal.ca.

"It's a nice little app, it doesn't require data. You download the deck and you can use it," he said. "People can practise all of the sentences in the book, listen to it and read it. It gives them an opportunity to learn.

"If there are people in the community who would like to contribute to our work, either by helping with writing or spell checking, translating, illustrating, making recordings, dropping in to the language nest for a visit to share the language, or help with teaching a community class, we would love to have their participation."

Anyone who wants a copy of the book and audio can pick one up for free at the Gwich'in Tribal Council office in Inuvik. It will also be available for download at https://www.gwichinlanguage.ca/.

Inuvik's Sunrise festival was many different things for many different peo-ple, but for Mozhdah Jamalzadah one thing stood out among all else.

"This is one of the rare communities in the entire world that's matriarchal. I think that's why there's so much spiritual wisdom and so much calm, caring and love," she said. "It must be mind boggling for Indigenous people to see women being treated so horrifically in much of the Islamist communities."

An Afghanistan-born women's rights activist, broadcaster, singer-songwriter- and actress, Jamalzadah was in town with co-star Shafin Karim Jan. 4 to 5 for two screenings of the upcoming film Red Snow.

Written by Marie Clements and star-ring Asivak Koostachin, both who are part-Gwich'in, the film tells a story of a Gwich'in warrior serving in the Cana-dian Forces who gets caught up with an Afghan family trying to get out from under the thumb of the Taliban.

Referencing back to the social issues and traditional knowledge the warrior grew up with in Northern Canada, he and the family of three find a deep connec-tion as they fight to survive in a war zone.

"Every time I watch the movie, I see the humanity alliance Marie has built and the throes of cultural exchange in their journey together," said Karim. "I think that's what drew all of us to the script. It was so rare to find a story that teaches about the Indigenous world and ties it into another culture. It was really inspiring.

"Each time you watch the movie, you get something else."

Filmed in Kamloops, Cache Creek and Yellowknife, the film casts a lot

of extras from communities across the North. One observant audience member noted a cameo from elder Lillian Elias.

One of the more rewarding parts of the film was exploring the language, with actors speaking Gwich'in, Inuktitut and Pashto throughout the film. Karim, who originally hails from Tanzania, noted he learned a lot about both Gwich'in and Pashtun culture.

Jamalzadah, who escaped Afghan-istan with her family when she was five, only knew Dari, the other national language of Afghanistan, so exploring new languages and cultures was also a big reward for her in her first acting role. One thing that struck her was the small amount of Gwich'in speakers in the world, at roughly only 1,200 world-wide.

Better known as the "Oprah of Afghanistan," Jamalzadah was actually handpicked by Clements for the role nine years ago when the project was first con-ceived. Jamalzadah's main work is both as a singer-songwriter, writing protest songs for women in her motherland and hosting a talk show speaking about his-torically taboo subjects in Afghanistan such as family violence and corporal punishment, empowering women to take back their own lives.

"I used media as a tool to try to bring a change into that country and I've been very successful because I use music," she said. "Through protest lyrics, I pro-mote women's rights and issues and raise awareness about them.

"I think we could do the same thing with Indigenous cultures. After working with Marie, I'm determined to work with Indigenous communities more to pro-mote the language and culture."

But for her, the biggest reward of being in the project was meeting Grand Chief Bobbi Jo Greenland.

"Because I have read so much about Indigenous culture, I have been want-ing my whole life to meet a Chief," said Jamalzadah. "I am so honoured to be in her presence.

"And she's a female!"

Drin gwichìl'ee gòo' àii, or It's a Beautiful Day, is the first of a line of books planned to help families keep their language alive

Film receives ovations at two screenings in Inuvik during Sunrise Festival Jan. 4 to 5.

New children's book teaches the basics of Gwich'in

From Afghanistan to Inuvik, Red Snow wows audiences

by Eric Bowling Northern News Services

by Eric Bowling Northern News Services

Eric Bowling/NNSL photo

Gwich'in Grand Chief Bobbie Jo Greenland answers ques-tions alongside actors Shafin Karim and Mozhdah Jamal-zadah following a screening of the upcoming film Red Snow, a story of a Gwich'in warrior in the Canadian Army who gets caught up in the lives of locals under Taliban oppression. The movie held two screenings and was met with standing ovations both nights.