From One Raven's Eye

Page 7

Ahneen, tansi and yo. Say do you happen to know what tribe of Indians the Shoshoni called the "hair in backwards motion" people? Give up? Well, it was the Bannock Indians that's who.

You never heard of them either eh? Where do they live? What do they eat? Are they typically sort of round? One thing we probably know is what color they are, anyway.

How about this one. The Cheyenne used the "Omaha dance" to do what between husband and wife? That little number was used to finalized d-i-v-o-r-c-e proceedings. How would that dance go anyway? Would the couple start off waltzing then drift into some passersby arms or what? Thee is a tribe of Indians called Omahas. Were they kind of known for their shaky marriage statistics or what?

So did you know the answer to any of those questions? Nah, me neither. Those are taken from the North American Indian trivia game called Shaman. This game sort of goes like the Non-North American Trivia game called Trivial Pursuit.

Anyway, we finally got a chance to play the game over the Christmas holidays. You can play as individuals or as teams. We, of course, took the tribal route.

Seated across the kitchen table sat one team that consisted of Herb, who has a M.S.W., and is a social worker and a non-Native. On the other, George, who is working on his master's degree, and another non-Indian. Later on, each side was reluctantly joined by two skins with a national average education. For them, school had been a trivia game they got sick of playing by Grade 8.

Now the game itself comes in a square blue box. Next to the word Shaman, a feathered up cousin dances. He's drawn in white speckles. Next to his moccasin is printed the words: "Every journey begins with a single step," which sounds more Chinese in origin than it does Objiway.

Inside the box is a folded up game board. On that is a map of Norther America in green. The starting point is at Alaska? Why? Do the game makers believe in the migration versus created here theory or what? While we argue that, someone reads the rules out loud. We all agree the rules are too complicated. We Indianize the process by doing it our own way. So there. Who says self-government is complicated?

How the game goes is you follow these blue, white, red and yellow footy prints all around North America. This colored trail ends somewhere around Pierre, South Dakota. This is called the centre of the earth by the game makers. Whoever arrives there first becomes the Shaman, the Learned Person and the winner, all at the same time.

Someone tears open the plastic bag that holds the markers and the di. I wonder why there aren't any brown playing pieces. "Roll the darn di, Charles," is the only reply I get to my question.

Okay, okay. You move your marker ahead by whatever number shows on the dice. In this case we land on blue.

There are two rectangular boxes that contain blue, white, yellow and red question cards. As long as you keep answering right, you keep going unless of course you follow the rules, which can slow you down somewhat.

On each card are four questions. You get to choose a number between one and four and that's the question you answer.

The question on that blue card we landed on went like this. What season does the red star represent according to the Pawnee? Who said, "I prepared for death. I painted as usual like the eclipse of the sun, half black and half red?" A) Sitting Bull? B) Rain in the Face? or C) Crazy Horse? What month is "Moon When Cherries Blacken" according to the Lakota? And what tribe lives on the Fort Apache Reservation?

The answers are summer, Rain In the Face, August and White Mountain Apache. If you guessed plain Old Apache, then you were wrong, just like our entire team was. Apaches come in at lest three brands which include Mescalaro, Jicarillo and White Mountain ones.

On the season question, you have a one in four chance of guessing right, on the month one, one in twelve. In the multiple choice, one chance in three and o the Apache one, well that kind you pretty much have to know for sure.

What that means if that in lots of cases even the non-Native players and those who haven't read lots about Indians generally had as much fun and got as many correct answers as the degreed ones.

There is a questionnaire included with the game. It asks whether you learned anything. Well, yah. There was once a detective series set in New York city with an Indian as the star called "Hawk." And Charles Curtis, another skin, was once vice-president of the United States. Now information like that won't put mararoni in the cupboard or gas in the tank, but if you have a head for trivia, or "insignificant and unimportant matters," as the dictionary defines it, then you do learn some things.

Everybody around that table ended up having fun. We'll probably drag the game out every once in awhile. We found it in a major department store. So if you get a chance and are at all interested, give it a try.

Well that's it for this week. See you all the next time. Adios.