It'll be a full day of Indigenous fun and education, capped off Juno Award winning singer Leela Gilday as the City of Niagara Falls and the Northwest Territories partner up for the Canada Games 13-for-13 Festival
The awards, broadcast Friday evening on CBC and APTN, are Canada’s largest annual prize. It provides seed funding to new and innovative projects that improve the lives of people in the North.
Posted: Dec 21, 2020 7:00 AM CT | Last Updated: December 22, 2020
Former N.W.T. premier Stephen Kakfwi has been celebrating at the solstice for decades, but says this year s ceremony carries special importance.(Hilary Bird/CBC)
Many years ago when Dec. 21 rolled around, Stephen Kakfwi would pop off his socks and shoes, dash out into the freezing darkness of an N.W.T. winter, and do a jig, barefoot, in the snow. The two youngest ones started crying, because they didn t know why I was outside in my bare feet dancing, Kakfwi said.
It was Kakfwi s way of marking the winter solstice, the darkest day of the year and the day when the sun begins its long return to the North.