A pair of teams defended their titles at this year’s National Aboriginal Hockey Championships (NAHC).
The Saskatchewan boys’ squad captured its third consecutive NAHC crown. Saskatchewan thumped Manitoba 8-1 in this year’s gold-medal contest held on May 8 in Ottawa.

The Manitoba girls’ side won its second straight national championship, edging Ontario North 2-1 in the final, also held on May 8.

Iroquois team prepares for worlds
The Iroquois Nationals will be one of six teams participating in the highest division at the men’s world field lacrosse championships this summer. The tournament will run from July 15 to 24 in Manchester, England.

The Iroquois Nationals, who will feature players from both Canada and the United States, will compete in the Blue Division along with Canada, United States, England, Australia and Japan. A total of 30 squads will take part in the world tournament. They will be split up into seven divisions.

Store association VP jumps into the smoke shack debate

The Canadian Convenience Stores Association (CCSA) wrote to the federal Minister of Health, Leona Aglukkaq, in April, challenging her to enforce Bill C-32 on Native reserves. This was in reaction to an investigation proving that it was a easy thing for a 15-year-old teenager to buy flavored cigarillos on the Kahnawake and Kanesatake reserves.

Life is now a little sweeter for an Aboriginal comedian who is in the process of filming episodes for her new television show.

Candy Palmater of Halifax is on cloud nine now that she is living out her childhood fantasy of hosting a program that combines her love of music and her natural ability to make people laugh.

The Candy Show is now in production and will air on APTN in the fall. The half-hour variety show will feature everyone from visual artists and musicians to Aboriginal leaders.

Artist—Tumivut
Song—Love Song
Album—Movement
Written by—Tumivut
Label—Arbor Records

Tumivut was created in Montreal, when four talented artists discovered each other’s yearning and quest for musical expression.  The word Tumivut when translated in English is ‘our footsteps’.   They blend Inuit throat singing to contemporary sound and have mastered something that only we as people can cherish. 

Windspeaker: What one quality do you most value in a friend?
Sammy Kent: Trust

W: What is it that really makes you mad?
S.K.: Ignorance

W: When are you at your happiest?
S.K.: On a beautiful bluebird day in the mountains with a good friend skiing 20-plus centimetres of fresh powder.

W: What one word best describes you when you are at your worst?
S.K.: Bitter

One of the most obscene aspects of slavery as practiced by the slave system in North America consisted in the enslavement of unborn fetuses. This assault upon the unborn child was an act of sheer greed, seeking to assure that any baby born to a mother designated as a captive would also be a captive and saleable; in short, a commodity.

In fact, a pregnant mother and her unborn fetus were treated as saleable “chattel” (property) in the white slave states.

Just a few weeks ago I attended the Calgary Spoken Word Festival. Several dozen poets and other such spoken word artists gathered together to extol the virtues of speaking aloud to entertain an audience, just them and their words. So, the immediate question was ‘What the hell was I doing there?’

I am not a spoken word artist. I am not a spoken word anything. I once ran a theatre company for three years and never once felt the need to get on stage and speak aloud words of emotion and knowledge to enthrall a paying audience and dazzle them with literary somersaults.

Nathan McQuabbie’s home used to be filled with a child’s chatter and giggles during weekend visits with his daughter. Now, there’s silence. His daughter, Makyla, who is almost three years old, has been deported with her mother to St. Lucia.

The story is both complicated and messy.

The deportation order came down April 16. The mother, a 29-year-old failed refugee claimant, had custody of Makyla. McQuabbie, 26, had visitation rights under a temporary order. But, despite that, the young girl had been staying with him since mid-December, with little or no contact from her mom.

The clock is ticking. The controversial Harmonized Sales Tax (HST) has a scheduled implementation date of July 1 in both Ontario and British Columbia. HST is the combined tax of both the Provincial Sales Tax (PST) at seven per cent and GST at five per cent. The new tax will now apply to purchases that were previously not covered by PST.

Despite protests and petitions, First Nations leaders say their concerns about the HST are being brushed aside by both the provincial and federal governments.