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Date Posted: 10:02:33 04/09/01 Mon
Author: Adv Reporter
Subject: Indians make ready for 2002 Olympics

Area Indians make ready for Olympics
State heavily involved in 2002 Winter Games


Associated Press


SUN VALLEY, Idaho -- The Shoshone-Bannock Tribes, official Indian Nations host for the Salt Lake City Olympics, plans to have a flotilla of cedar canoes paddle up the Columbia and Snake rivers to American Falls Reservoir this summer.

The paddlers, traveling 1,000 miles in 300-pound canoes, will join representatives of other Great Basin, Plains and Pacific Coast Indian tribes who will journey by horseback to help plan American Indian involvement in the 2002 Winter Games.

The week-long gathering is tentatively planned for June 25 through July 2 at Ross Fork Creek Valley on the Fort Hall Indian Reservation near Pocatello.

The canoe odyssey is aimed at focusing attention on the plight of dwindling salmon runs and highlighting Indian culture, Garth Powersat, who is leading the Shoshone-Bannock Tribal Host Committee, said on Thursday.

"We want to show that we're not dead and we're not going away anytime soon," he said. "Our goal is to make sure the American Indian is part of the United States while at the same time maintaining our native ties."

Powersat said surveys indicate visitors to Salt Lake City for the Winter Games next February want to see three things: Cowboys, Indians and Mormons.

Indians are happy to oblige, he said. But they also want to dispel some myths.

"Not everyone, for instance, knows that there are 600 tribes in the United States. We want to show that American Indians as a whole are not monoculture. We don't all have totem poles, we don't all live in teepees and we don't all make silver jewelry," Powersat said.

The tribes also are designing a Shoshone-Bannock line of T-shirts, jackets, caps and pins to sell at the Olympics.

Also on Thursday, state officials coordinating Idaho's involvement in events surrounding the Winter Games outlined some of their plans, including:

•The Western Folklife Center, which puts on the annual Cowboy Poetry Gathering in Elko, Nev., wants Idaho's help hosting a hospitality center in Salt Lake City showcasing Western culture.

•The Filipino figure skating team is interested in using the ice arena in Idaho Falls for training.

•A U.S.-China women's hockey game in Boise still appears to be on, despite political tensions between the United States and China, said Carl Wilgus, director of the Idaho Travel Council. The Jan. 26 game would be the day after the torch relay passes through Boise.

•The Ukraine, whose Nordic and biathlon athletes have been training in Sun Valley, plans to have its hockey team train in Idaho and also is looking for a place for its freestyle skiers to train.

•The Swiss have visited Sun Valley and are very impressed with its Nordic trails. Sweden and Norway also have expressed interest in training in the state, and the Czech hockey team may train at the Bank of America Center in Boise.

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