‘It helps you carry yourself’: Basketball meet was about more than games – Nunatsiaq News

Nov 12, 2025

Nunavik organizers hope Spirit of the Odeyak event helps youths get a positive outlook on life

Around 90 teenagers from nine different Nunavik communities met in Kuujjuaraapik recently for two things — to play some basketball and make friends.

Still, organizers say, the four-day Spirit of the Odeyak event has a far deeper impact on youth.

The gathering, which ran from Nov. 6 to 10, was named after the Odeyak, a unique vessel built to merge the appearance of a canoe and a kayak as a symbol of the Inuit and Cree cultures.

In 1990, the Odeyak was used to transport a group of Cree and Inuit on a 2,000-kilometre journey to New York to protest the building of a hydroelectric dam near Kuujjuaraapik/Whapmagoostui.

Read More: https://nunatsiaq.com/stories/article/it-helps-you-carry-yourself-basketball-meet-was-about-more-than-games/