This week Fr Tim and I drove in to Rapid City to watch some of our local teams from the mission play basketball at the Lakota Nation Invitational. This annual event is the biggest cultural and sporting event of year for Lakota people, so it was good to be able to watch it.
It wasn't easy to get to - one road to Rapid City was closed due to weather (cars and even semi trailers had jackknifed off the icy road) and we had to take a detour, in which we got caught in a ground blizzard, which is there even when it has stopped snowing, strong winds drive the snowcover sideways, resulting in a whiteout. We had almost zero visibility and drove at 10 mph. A three hour trip took more than 5 hours, and it was getting dark. I wasn't too worried until Tim tuned off the music and started praying the rosary. THEN I got worried.
But we made it, and saw the ceremonial opening featuring the traditional dancing and drumming which comes to mind when you think "Cowboys and Indians".
It was good to see healthy kids playing their sport or dance passionately. There is such a lot of boredom, drug use and obesity on the reservation here, that sport is a real Godsend for the local kids to keep them focussed and give them a reason to try, much like AFL or League can be for Australian aboriginal kids.
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