@alinapete.bsky.social
(They/them) Award-winning Indigenous (nehiyaw) cartoonist & writer. Editor Indiginerds, CFFT: North America, Life Finds A Way, creator of Weregeek Pets: Nutmeg, Merry & Pippin, Pico Portfolio: https://www.alina-pete.com/ https://linktr.ee/alinapete
Alberta has refused to exempt Indigenous people from the $100 fee for COVID vaccines.
And though health advocates contend that amounts to a treaty violation, the federal government won't step in.
pressprogress.ca/alberta-char...
Earlier today I checked out artist Annie Maheux's portrait session and we had fun drawing each other!
Quick stop at CBC for a radio interview, then off to Knuckle Hop, one of the most difficult and bloody of the games here.
Think you're tough cause you can do a clapping pushup?
K. Now try jumping on your knuckles and toes while planking across a gymnasium floor
"And so, from the bottom of my underpaid, deeply creative heart: Fuck you." @moryan.bsky.social
SECONDED.
DAMN this is so high energy I'd guess you need the stamina of a marathon runner to compete
Sitting on your heels for long stretches of time, cheering and bouncing and dancing your heart out!!
It's not just boys & men, though. Everyone plays this sport, though here at the games there's separate men's and women's categories
This has the raw energy bourne of bored teenagers who are used to hunting and trapping and running all summer, snow-bound in the dark of winter with too much energy
So they channel it into song and competitiveness and sass
There's modern touches here at the games. Cameras project close ups of the action to a big screen so even those at the back can see every move
One kid has Heath Ledger joker face paint and the energy to match
Missionaries, of course, HATED and feared this untamed energy
They called it "stick gambling" and banned it
It's not about money (tho certainly there's $ on the line when it's played in communities, and sometimes a lot!!)
It's about prestige. Cleverness. Guts and cheekiness and brashness
It's wild. It's feral and I love it
It brings the community together to cheer and laugh and hang on every guess
If your opponent guesses wrong, you wave your empty hands in their face to show off how clever you are
Everyone cheers and whoops and screams
Face paint in wild patterns is a must
Your team make faces, gestures to try and psyche while your opponent guesses
They're doing the same to you
The drumming is a constant heartbeat, keeping the energy strong
Of the surface, it's "just" a guessig game, where teams compete 1 vs 1 to hide an object in their hands and correctly guess where their opponents item is while hinding their own
But there is the spirit of something like the Haka here at the Hand Games
You psyche your opponent out
Anyone who thinks that Indigenous games are silent, sacred things just needs to check out like, five seconds of Dene Hand Games.
This is a wild party!!
Yes, I’m religious. I believe in the Holy Trinity.
This is the energy I'm bringing to the Arctic Winter Games
youtu.be/VwSECWkRex4?...
Update: I ate an entire bowl of goat curry that was larger than my head and it was glorious
Forgot how hungry being out in the cold all day makes you. I could fuck up like three plates of ribs right now
DAMN it is glorious up north!!!
Everything I'm doing is SO COOL!!!!
Friends: You gonna be okay outside all morning in the -30?
Me: I am from SASKATCHEWAN. I got layers for days
The Arctic feels like walking into an Allen Sapp painting
Show Snake is an event where competitors throw a long javelin style stick down a snow runway, to see how far they can make it slide
Top score was 215 feet, I believe!
Up in the snow bleachers, watching the Snow Snake in the -30°C weather!
Seen in email.
2026 Canada Roles Awards
Canada Roles Awards seeks to celebrate the games and art created by the Canadian tabletop Roleplaying Game Industry.
canadaroles.ca/doku.php?id=...
She was incredible because she was one of the only barefoot competitors, and that made her technique so different. No one else had a dancers pose like this.
He was incredible because DAMN he could actually fly. Jumped like he'd never come down again. Astounding!!
Watched the two-foot high kick today during the Arctic Games, and had to sketch these two!
This goes for American comics, too. Take what you think they make, halve it, then halve it again. And if they aren't working for the Big Two, halve it again. And to be brutally honest, if they're writing and drawing graphic novels, halve it yet again.
Arctic Winter Games opening ceremony was amazing!! So excited to be here!