Citizenship ceremony, hockey go hand-in-hand

‘CANADIAN AT LAST’

KEVIN MITCHELL He hails from Nigeria, moved to Saskatoon five years ago, remembers vividly the first time he touched snow.

Adesina Adeyemo likes this strange sport of hockey — the Boston Bruins are his favourite team, he says — though he has never attended a live game. Fighting, he says, is the only thing he doesn’t enjoy.

You can tell he was not born to the game: He wields a hockey stick with both sets of knuckles up high and facing his body and he readily concedes he could use a few pointers.

Adeyemo is one of 20 people who will formally become Canadian citizens Sunday on the ice at SaskTel Centre. They’ll make it official prior to the 2:05 p.m. Western Hockey League game between the Saskatoon Blades and Swift Current Broncos.

“I’m so happy to be a Canadian at last. Something I’ve looked forward to since I came here,” said Adeyemo, who lives here with his wife and young boys, aged three and one.

As he notes, what’s more Canadian than taking on citizenship at a hockey game?

“For the very first time, I’m going to be on the hockey pitch. I’m really excited about that,” he said.

The day will be soaked in hockey and Canadiana. Before the game, Blades officials will hold a Hockey 101 class with Canadian newcomers. They can put on gear, if they wish; they’ll learn the proper way to hold a stick while shooting the puck. It comes naturally to Canadians born in this cold-weather climate, but not so much to those coming in from abroad.

And when the game itself has ended, they’ll all lace ’em up and go for a skate — which is something the Blades did last year, too, minus the citizenship ceremony. More than 400 newcomers attended last year’s game and the Blades expect that number to exceed 500 Sunday.

“Oh, my goodness,” Blades president Steve Hogle says when asked about last year’s wobbly on-ice session. “Every chair imaginable that you can think is in SaskTel Centre, we had them leaning on it. I held a couple of them by the hand, encouraging them. It’s a real beautiful scene; something we’ve grown up with and at times take for granted . ... To see somebody try it for the first time is very moving.”

Ecologik founder Bob Behari, who moved to Saskatoon from India in 1976 and became a successful businessman, is working with the Blades to take care of tickets and transportation for the newcomers.

Adeyemo, who narrowed his choice of countries down to Australia, the U.S. and Canada before choosing the latter five years ago, says he does not regret his decision .

“Most people who live in Nigeria have never even seen ice,” he said. “They don’t know what ice looks like. Coming here for the very first time, I saw snow and said ‘Oh, so this is it!’ And I touched it ...”

Which takes him to Sunday and a ceremony and a game.