Show notes
Nahongvita! Askwali! Kwa’kwa! Just some of the words you may hear if you ever run a race at one of the Hopi villages. Wendi Lewis describes her running journey which ultimately influenced her to become a cross country and track coach. Now a head coach at Tuba City High School, she incorporates the cultural aspects of running for her team. She also tells us about her apparel business and how she uses it to help the community through fundraisers. ---TRANSCRIPT:--- [Wendi Lewis] The whole point of me starting the apparel company was that I wanted to do things for the community. I wanted to help, you know, people, like she said, kids need to go somewhere to run. I'll try to fundraise for them through the apparel, hosting races, with the apparel being, you know, the prizes that people tend to really like. And I finally was able to establish my own nonprofit based on the experiences that, you know, I was given when I was little. [Lakin] Hello everyone. Welcome back to Grand Canyon Speaks. This is Lakin. [Meranden] And this is Meranden. [Lakin] We really appreciate you all for tuning in to this podcast, especially this season. [Meranden] Today's episode is about Wendy Lewis. She is Hopi and from the village of Kikotsmovi, who is the boys cross-country and track coach at Tuba City High School. [Lakin] She talks about her business and how she uses it to help fundraise for her runners, how time culture into running is part of her coaching philosophy, and tells us about what you may experience if you ever run a race at one of the Hopi villages. [Meranden] It was a pleasure to speak with Wendi this past summer, and I'm excited for all of you to hear her story. [Lakin] Here is Wendi Lewis. [Wendi Lewis] Good evening, everybody. My name is Wendi Lewis, and I am from the village of Kikotsmovi. I'm Hopi. I'm Tawawungwa. My Hopi name is Kuwanhaysi That was given to me by the Coyote Clan. I'm very honored to be here, so. [Meranden] Awesome. [Wendi Lewis] Yeah. Thank you for inviting me. [Meranden] Of course. And in similarity, I am also Hopi as well. My clans are Piikyaswungwa and Tsuwungwa. Those are my Hopi clan, so both corn and snake. And then my Hopi name is Siikyatsumana, which means yellow snake girl. So those are some of our relations here with our tribes, and I'm very welcome to be joined here with Wendi because she's actually someone that a lot of people in our community look up to. But first of all, have you been to the Grand Canyon before? [Wendi Lewis] I've actually lived in the Grand Canyon for a brief period of time. I went to school here for part of my fourth grade year. Yeah, so my family has all of my grandma and grandpa raised their kids here. So I still have family that live here in the village. [Meranden] Nice. Yeah, and then you reside in Tuba City, which is also where I'm from. But you are a coach at Tuba City High School, and I just wanted to ask, how did you start your running journey? [Wendi Lewis] I've been running for as long as I can remember. I feel like my running journey started when I got entered into a race and won it when I was like six years old. My mom married a coach for the Hopi High girls cross country team, and I had no choice. I just ran with them all the time, and that's been my life. That's how it started. And then you ran in school throughout high school? [Meranden] How far did you run? [Wendi Lewis] I ran all the way through junior college, Paradise Valley Community College. [Meranden] I ran two years there. Nice, and then that running seemed to have stuck with you to where you are now a coach. But what made you decide to coach high school cross country and track? [Wendi Lewis] I had a rocky journey trying to attain my bachelor's degree. In between all of that, I did coach at Hopi High School. I was an assistant coach for the junior high track team, high school girls cross country team, the team I used to run for, and then took a very long break. About four years ago, I started volunteering at Tuba City High School. The last couple of years, or I want to say last year, I finally got hired as the head coach for the for the boys program, and I just recently got approved to be their coach again this fall. [Meranden] Nice, and I know through this school, it's on the reservation, and you've been able to coach a lot of indigenous students. Through running, has it helped connect your runners to their culture? [Wendi Lewis] Yes, that's a big part of my coaching philosophy because that's how I was coached. And I just had this conversation. I was just volunteer coaching at a Hopi running camp out home, and you know, talking to them about how I was coached by my stepfather. I didn't realize until way later how important it was, the connection between life, between our culture as Hopi people, and the underlying reward of being a good runner. Like, you know, the emphasis was not on winning trophies. It was always about being respectful of tying in our culture into what we did at practice, and that's what I try to do now. As a head coach, it's a little bit tricky because I was raised traditionally at home, and coming into this this new community where there's a village right across the street from Tuba City, or two villages I should say, and so we have a mix of Hopi and Navajo, and it's, you know, I have to pay attention. You also have people who go to church, you know. Out home on Hopi, it was just Hopi, and it was easy, you know, but now it's about like finding a balance and trying to learn about their culture too, and trying to, you know, make those connections between how I coach the Hopi kids. I mean, and I try not to single them out, but I try to make that connection with all of them. It's a little tricky, but I'm trying. [Meranden] Yeah, and I know you said there's emphasis on the culture, and you were able to do that with the kids in Hopi. What is the importance of running to Hopi? [Wendi Lewis] The importance of running for Hopi is just getting our kids, our youth, our people to understand that we don't run for ourselves. We run for life. We run for rain. It's an interesting cycle of, you know, land farmers, and we rely on the rain to grow our corn. Our corn is very important for us in ceremony. Like all of the things we do, we rely on those things, and then just the respect for life, all living things. These are all like key things that we try to emphasize to our people on, you know, when we go out to run. It's a form of prayer. It's not physical activity, and so I think that's what makes it so important and special to us. There's so much more that we want to get out of it, and we recognize that just in general, and Hopi, I mean, you could be running down, just going for a run, and you know, we thank, we always thank. You ever run on Hopi, they'll thank you in our language, because we recognize that as prayer. So, Askwali is the version for a female, and Kwa’kwa is the version for a male. Anytime, you could, you don't even have to be racing. They'll see you, and somebody will yell that out to you, because that is what we believe running is about. [Meranden] Yeah, we see that really often when we have like any kind of race that's happening back home in Tuba, or pretty much, yeah, also there's another race that happens out more in the Hopi villages, whether it's the Lewis Tewanima race, there's people scattered all over thanking you for running. So, like she mentioned, it's prayer, and it's, we tried to continue explaining the importance of running, and what it means to us, and I know that you also are a business owner, and it does incorporate a lot of the importance of running, and what running means to us. Would you be able to explain a little bit more of what your business entails? [Wendi Lewis] Yeah, so I started a long time ago, and I have to give credit to, you know, someone who I know, I think I have to mention a little bit later, but I grew up running with her from high school on, and one of the comments one time was that, you know, I wish, you know, because we're so prideful in our running, and what we run for, and when we make it to another level of running, it was like, I wish we had something that we could, you know, that would show that we're Hopi, if we're running in California, or in the Boston Marathon, or, you know, anything like that, and it was, it was just something that stuck in my head, and then one year, my daughter was running high school, Hopi High, and they wanted me to design a shirt for them, so that they could wear it at state, and I really wanted that shirt to be something that, if any Hopi could see that shirt, they would know without words that it was Hopi, so, and I wanted to symbolize the strength of females, because females have this really strong role in our culture, especially our youth, you know, we consider them at their purest, in their youth ages, so I wanted to incorporate all of that. I came up with a shirt with some Hopi girls, all in the position of, like, holding hands, their eyes closed, and that was just based on my upbringing from my coach. Prayer was a big part of, in, in running, and so it's supposed to, like, symbolize that she's in prayer, and there's seven of them all in a circle, because seven compete in a race at the state meet, and so I just kind of put them all in the circle, and that's kind of what started it, and you guys can pass that around, that's her right there, just call her the mana, and so that kind of started everything, and from then, I just kept trying to figure out ways to make different types of designs that reflected our culture, trying to explain, you know, the importance, there's the shirt there that, you know, talks about prayer, or running is prayer, and so it's in the formation of a rain cloud using feet and heart, because there's a word of encouragement that you'll also hear people yell out to you, it's, you know, Nahongvita, it's a, it's a word of self-encouragement and strength, and so the heart, it talks about, you know, digging deep with your heart, and so that's why I wanted to incorporate feet and heart in that design, as a symbol of prayer that we hope would bring the rain, so that's my company now, it turned, I try really hard to keep it going, I do also have a little boy, so I wanted the female to represent Hopi, certain aspects of Hopi female strength, and it took me a few years to do a boy, to figure out how I wanted to represent the boy, and like I said, you know, farming is so important to us, it is our culture, and I wanted the boy to reflect that, I hear, listen to stories about the history of our, the strength of our men, back when they used to run to the fields instead of drive their trucks, back when they ran from village to village, but ultimately highlighting the importance of farming, so the little boy there is, you can see him, he is represented carrying a soya, which is a planting stick, and then in his hand is posume, it's a bag of seeds that is used for planting, so I shared this with my boys cross-country team this past year, and I explained to them the importance of, you know, even the Navajo, my Navajo boys, I don't think I have, I think I just have Hopi and Navajo boys running for me, but, you know, explaining the importance of the strength of what you believe in, and the things that you're taught and raised, giving them that to use as a reminder for what they're running for, more than just time and medals, yeah, but that's the business, I have little accessories and stuff that, I have a, I opened up a shop in Tuba City across, at the Tuuvi Travel Center, and when I'm able to open it, it's open, but yeah, so that's my business in a nutshell. [Meranden] Yeah, and I noticed that you have a couple different things in there, you sell shirts, leggings, what are some other things that you sell? [Wendi Lewis] Stickers, everybody loves stickers, I have running tops, some lightweight jackets, pullovers, girl pullovers, I do have running shorts that just have the design, whether it's the logo, or if it's a little boy, with the word run on it. A funny story, I forgot my running shoes a few years ago when I was running, registered to run a 10k in Sedona, and I had to run in my Crocs that I was wearing, and it was not an easy course either, it was very technical, but I just decided to make Croc charms, you know, if I, in case I ever have to run in my Crocs again, I will represent my apparel through, with the Croc charm, so I have those two, just keychains, little accessories, and things like that, yeah. [Meranden] I actually do own one of your leggings, because you do a lot of fundraisers for the students too, like that you're athletes, and I ran one, I wasn't supposed to, I wasn't going to, and then my mom's like, you should just go run, it was the morning of, and it's, my sister, I was supporting my sister, and then my mom's like, you should just go run, so I was like, okay, I'll pay the, I paid the fee, and then I was like, I don't have any shoes, and then my mom's like, I looked at my mom and she had tennis shoes, I was like, let me use your shoes, so I used her shoes and I ran, and then I did pretty good to where I got one of the prizes, which was one of her leggings, so yeah, I have something that's hers, but yeah, there's a lot of inspiration behind your business, and the clothing that you make, and running all together, who are some runners, or people that you look up to? [Wendi Lewis] Well, like I said, I, you know, my, my friend, her name is Caroline Sekaquaptewa, she's been running for, I mean, like, I met her in junior high, because, like I said, my stepdad dragged me to all his practices, and she, she had graduated already, but she started helping him, and I really connected with her at that young age, and she would take me everywhere to run with her. She runs to this day, I think she was, this past year was her 14th consecutive qualification for Boston. She's done three Ironman triathlons, and she's just, like, you know, she's just such a hard worker, so she's a big inspiration to everything I do, like, everything I want to make, I think of her, like, will she wear this, you know, would she wear this when she's running? Yeah, I have to say, like, I have to give her credit as, you know, my biggest inspiration for the apparel line, and things that I come out with. I run ideas by her. I have brothers who are artists. I really value their artistic skills, so I, you know, reach out to them, and then my coaches, you know, my coaches that have supported me for as long as I can remember. Every time I do anything associated with running, I think of them, and hope that I'm making them proud. [Meranden] It's good that you have those people that you look up to, and then also, like you mentioned, she's helping you figure out items that you want to have included in your business, which is really nice. Much like how running is very important to Hopi, what importance does the Grand Canyon have to Hopi? [Wendi Lewis] The Grand Canyon is, it's very important to us. For me and, I mean, for Hopi, of course, but there was a lot of Hopis that grew up here, here in the village. I remember looking at my mom's yearbooks, and I see all these Hopi last names in there. I don't know what made them, you know, settle in this area, but I feel like, you know, they kind of were taking care of the area, and I, my grandpa was kind of like my father figure, and he raised me, but, you know, I feel like when I come here, I'm kind of connected w…
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