Kamloopa Powwow 2019 (image credit - CFJC Today)

By Michael Reeve

POWWOW RETURNS

The return of the Kamloopa Powwow brings visitors from across North America

Jul 29, 2022 | 4:16 PM

KAMLOOPS — The Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc are prepared to celebrate as a community again. After two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, and a year since the confirmation of un-marked graves, organizers are ecstatic to bring the Kamloopa Powwow back this weekend.

“We are really excited to have people back in our community, we know it’s going to be one of our largest events. Everybody is excited,” said Kamloopa Powwow Society President Delyla Daniels.

Tonight (July 29) the grand entrance is at 7:00 p.m., on Saturday and Sunday it will be at noon. Approximately 700 dancers are expected to compete.

“We start off from the youngest, you’ll see our tiny-tots, our teens and junior divisions, to adults, right to golden age. There is seven categories per age. We pretty much dance to midnight and beyond,” added Daniels.

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Visitors and dancers have come from across Canada and beyond to take in the powwow. For many it’s become an annual tradition.

“Me and my family have been coming here since I was 5 or 4. Now I have a family of my own, my youngest is 7. It’s been a long time since we’ve been coming to Kamloops,” said Bo Hunter, who travelled in from Calgary.

“You come here – it’s like a ceremony, a real good ceremony. To get some good medicine to heal ourselves from all of what we’ve been through,” stated Darrell Francis.

Along with the dancers and drummers, the arbor is lined with First Nation artists, showcasing their unique works. Angelique Levac is one of just three birch bark biting artists in all of Canada.

“Have you ever done when you were a child, snowflakes? How you fold it (the paper) up. Same thing, but I don’t cut it, I do it with my teeth, I make designs with my teeth. I do hummingbirds, butterflies, basset hounds, and I do an inuksuk,” described Levac.

“It’s largely important, our way of life from pre-historic was trade. So, this is just an extension and form of who we are as Indigenous people and how we contribute to the economy,” said Daniels of the vendors around the site.

The Kamloopa powwow is on all weekend at the Tk’emlúps Arbor with dancing beginning daily at 12 p.m.