Black skiers and snowboarders hit the slopes in Japan to enjoy the awesome powder and cultural exchange for the 2016 Japow powder party and it looked like an awesome time! Now plans for the 2017 and 2018 Japow events are underway.

Ja stands for Japan and Pow for Powder, that’s where Japow comes from. This annual event is set up by snowboard powder junkie Fanon Wilkins. Fanon is an associate professor of African-American and African Diaspora studies at Doshisha University in Kyoto.

He is in love with the gorgeous powder at Niseko, located on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido, and decided to start the event “to encourage and expose his friends and other black skiers and snowboarders to Hokkaido’s unique powder snow” and to share Japan’s modern, rich and long cultural history according to a story on The Root.

The event started in 2013 and now plans for a small 2017 event and a bigger 2018 event are underway.

Many attendees also spent time in Tokyo where they applauded the awesome welcome and help from locals and were deinitely helped party late into the nights!

It looks like a hell of a time!

More can be read here http://bit.ly/21t0u3Y or you can contact [email protected] for more info.

Here are a couple of images from this years trip!