Our First Apache Feast

We were invited to a four day blessing feast for the school. The Apache's hold blessing feasts for almost anything, the school, a person's birthday, wedding, military, rain, home, anything they want to bless. So the school holds a cultural feast each year at the end of school. They hold a fun day for the kids at the school which we did not attend. But the next day the official feast began. It began with a FEAST! They provide food for anyone who comes to the feast. There were about 500 in attendance and the school provided a feast of Brikets, potato salad, green chille and a soup of some kind, FRY BREAD (which is at all celebrations) and cake and punch. I was stuffed!!!! They have several tepees around the feast ground but only the crown dancers are able to go into the tents. This is a religious ceremony and only the men are allowed. The women do the work for the feast. You can't take pictures of the Crown Dancers so I took a picture of a picture of one that was paintd for us by a friend. The Feast Arbor is made up of a tent covered with pine trees for shade. Notice the wild pony running in one picture. I loved it! The singers are the religious men that sing at these feasts.