IQALUIT
First Air's "Amazing 40" contest last fall asked entrants to "tell us why you and a group" deserve 40 free return tickets between Iqaluit, Montreal and Kuujjuaq in northern Quebec.

Sarah Maniapik won First Air's "Amazing 40" contest for 40 tickets between Iqaluit, Montreal and Kuujjuaq in December. She's now seeking worthy individuals to receive the tickets. - Stewart Burnett/NNSL photo

Contest winner Sarah Maniapik offer to give them away to people in need clearly struck a note with the airline as she is now getting set to do just that.

"It just kind of came out of me," said Maniapik, recalling the day last November she was browsing Facebook during work and decided to enter the contest.

In her submission, the Iqaluit resident wrote she wanted to find people in Kuujjuaq or Montreal who deserved a break and perhaps hadn't seen their family in a long time. A First Air return flight to Iqaluit from Montreal can cost around $2,600. A flight to Kuujjuaq is about $2,400.

"I thought of people who have lost loved ones and have no means to go out of their community and regroup," she wrote.

"I thought of people who give so much of themselves without ever asking for something back. The selfless individuals, who see other people's struggles and give them hope from their hearts, by either just listening or giving them the warmth of their hearts or homes just because they can."

She said it would be her dream to give these people an opportunity such as this, and now her dream and soon to be theirs, is coming true.

"I know what it's like when you need to regroup and find your little light and I know how great it is to eat country food with your fellow Inuit and know how revitalizing it can be, so those were the things I thought about when I wrote my submission," Maniapik told Nunavut News/North.

Maniapik has been soliciting nominations for the tickets through the Iqaluit Public Service Announcements page on Facebook. First Air declared Maniapik the winner on Dec. 15.

"Sarah touched our hearts with her suggestion that the 40 tickets be given to individual members of the communities in Kuujjuaq, Iqaluit and Montréal who are, despite their different circumstances, all deserving of a break," wrote First Air on Facebook when the company announced Maniapik as the winner.

The contest is limited to the three communities but Maniapik is hoping businesses or other groups will step up and give these travellers something special - by providing lodging or a day at the spa.

"I would like to see a few children also go on a trip of a lifetime, children who may or may not have means to go on a trip," she wrote in her submission. "I would like to see elders and youth share a trip and then hear what their thoughts and expectations were before and after their trip."

Maniapik hopes to get the best bang for her buck and is considering using some of the tickets to bring motivational speakers or camp teachers to Iqaluit to have more reach with Nunavummiut.

"I'd really like to see that," she said, adding this way children who do not get a ticket can benefit from the opportunity by having someone brought to them.

She has been receiving ticket nominations through e-mail and said submissions have been picking up. She has set a deadline of May 25 for all nominations.

"The selfless act of somebody nominating someone other than themselves - I didn't see how wonderful that would be to receive these," she said.

Maniapik will then go through the nominations and decide who to choose, with the goal of having selections completed by the end of August.

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