Pillajutit Week celebration days set for Kugluktuk
Second annual event designed to inspire, bring people together as a community
The second annual Pillajutit Week events are scheduled for Kugluktuk from Jan. 22 to 26. (File photo)
Winter blues, move out of the way.
In Kugluktuk, planning for the second annual Pillajutit Week is underway. Organizers say the five-day event is a chance to embrace connections and be inspired to be a happy, healthy community.
Running from Jan. 22 to 26, the schedule includes live entertainment, traditional drum dancing and throat singing as well as a community feast.
Part of the reason for holding the event is to provide a boost for people during the down time following Christmas and New Year’s, said Byrne Richards, healthy living director for the Hamlet of Kugluktuk.
The second annual Pillajutit Week events are scheduled for Kugluktuk from Jan. 22 to 26. (Image provided by Pillajutit)
“The event is to foster a better feeling in the community with events,” he said.
A community feast kicks off the celebrations on Jan. 22, followed a performance by hypnotist and comic Scott Ward.
Then on Jan. 23 there’s a stew and bannock making contest, followed by drum dancing and throat singing. The next night, Jan. 24, features a performance by hip hop artist Pooky G. and a dance party.
A busy schedule is set for Jan. 25, with another bannock-making contest, traditional Inuit games like the one-foot high kick, and a napoos-making contest (traditional Inuit sled).
That evening, singer Jeff Straker, from Saskatchewan, will perform with Kugluktuk High School students.
Richards said youth activist and actor Dakota House, a regular on the North of 60 TV series in the 1990s and most recently in the movie The Epidemic, will help close the ceremonies with a community feast on Jan. 26. House will also teach martial arts to young people and speak to students at schools in Kugluktuk.
More information on Pillajutit Week is on Kugluktuk’s Facebook page.
This seems like a great idea, hopefully the events are well attended. But why do buildings in Nunavut all look so decrepit and run down? Look at the picture in this story. Can the Hamlet not paint the front doors and the posts every summer? Or is vandalism so bad that it doesn’t matter? Entering a building that looks like that would take away from whatever event is going on there.
Must be problem with short staff again nobody ever wanna do work in kug man easier stay at home puff up and get SA
” Pillajutit” am I reading it right? I feel insulted.
I’m confused already! Pillajutit ? not in my inuinnak vocabulary ! never heard of the word in Kugluktuk either.
Kitikmeot don’t understand or speak inuktitut. Maybe they made the word pillajutit up. Lol.
You mean Cambridge Bay and Kugluktuk don’t understand or speak Inuktitut.
Maybe if the three last commenters did some research and not be so demeaning, they would find the definition from some elders. I did. There are plenty of folks in Kugluktuk who speak Inuinnaqtun.
So what does pillajutit mean?
A person who is easily offended, overly sensitive as in anger etc.
A word translated into one big sentence? How does that work? I wanna know.