Darn it all I missed the sports

We ended up cancelling our trip to Kingaaluk at the very last minute because everyone had gone out on the land and there weren't enough skidoos and kamitiks to carry everyone around. The students spend the afternoon doing more crafts. One of the neat things that a few of them have made are little purses made out of fish skin. They are small (about 7 cm by 5 cm) and have a folded flap like a woman's pruse. They are tied by little pieces of rope and they have a tiny "shoulder strap". One of the Sanikiluaq kids' boyfriend Jobie is an apprentice carpenter and he made four little framed just for these purses. I'm amazed at the skill because they are very nice. Skill like that would cost a lot of money in Toronto.

I'm kind of sad because I missed the Inuit sports. I met up with Lisi to help with the tent set-up but of course everything is on northern time so it happened in bits and pieces over the course of the evening. Since I was totally useless I went home for dinner. Brian and I had arranged to take shifts supervising tonight's activities at the school at the games demonstration started at 7pm. There was no way I could make that and still make dinner and since I'm sleeping in the tent tonight with the girls, I decided to get some dinner. I also prepared tomorrow's dinner for Margaret as a kind of thank you (although cooking for her is intimidating because she is so good). So anyway, by the time I got to school it was 9pm and I had missed the demonstrations. I had kind of hoped that they would continue until the school closed at 10:30 but I was disappointed. Brian tells me that they were mostly endurance games and one game was like a tug of war. There was another where they had to kick at and do other acrobatic-type things to a piece of fur hanging from the basketball net. The demonstrator Jasonie was apparently very athletic so I'm pretty sorry I missed it and unfortunatly Brian didn't have the camera for that one.

I'm just killing a little time until all the girls have to be in the tent by midnight. It was a gorgeous day today. Much more like the weather I was expecting. Clear blue sky and it is still as light as day out right now. We should be able to see the northern lights tonight.

I think I'll go check in with the gym now and see what everyone is doing. Nice to hear from you Kurt. You are clearly better at web logs than I am.

Leslie

Sunday was pretty uneventful

Brunch was served at Margaret's. Brian and his two hosts, Terry and Marilyn, came over as well and brought a really good lemon pie. Margaret is a great cook and there was plenty of honey garlic spare ribs, chicken legs and sushi! No traditional food in sight. I was so full by the end of it all at 2:30 that I had no room for dinner. There was a potluck at the school last night and there was tons of pasta dishes and other hearty staples. Somebody brought some cooked lake char but I think the winning entry was frozen raw lake char served in a green garbage bag. Brian took a piece and I think he hoped that it would melt to sashimi by the time he had finished the other food. I don't think that happened and I can't report whether or not he ate it because I actually didn't see. After the pot luck, Lisi literally escorted everyone to church. The church is in the shape of an igloo with a domed shape and white inside. There was a lay minister and assistant minister who read the entire service in Inuktitik. Brian tells me that other than the fact that it was in Inuktituk, it was a comepletely typical Anglican service with readings and hymns. The choir was three old women in teal and red choir robes over their boots. The church was packed to capacity and there were little kids rolling all over the place. The community really needs a bigger space to worship. There are only wooden chairs and when they are supposed to kneel, they can only bow in their chairs and cover their eyes with their hands.

Today we were supposed to go on an all day trip to Kujaavik, Kataavik and Kingaaluk. Unfortunately, there is no more seafood so we are only going to Kingaaluk in the afternoon. Lisi was hoping that we could split the group and take them on overnight trips to some cabins not far from town that are owned by one of the families. After a lot of last minute organizing on her part I'm sure, the plan had to be scrapped because one of the cabins is occupied and it would have been too much trouble to straighten out all of the necessary paper work. But instead, Lisi is setting up a tent outside of the school and we are going to sleep there in two shifts. The first group along with Brian will the there the first night (tonight) and the second group along with myself will be there Tuesday evening. There is a live auction fundraiser Tuesday evening and apparently they are a lot of fun so I'm looking forward to being able to go.

To people who are posting comments, thanks again and remember to put your name somewhere in the message so I know who you are. Maree! So nice to hear from you!

Leslie
T

Forgot the geese...

Now, our students are strictly forbiddent to touch fire arms...and so far so good despite many "they'll never know" temptations. Today, the three Sanikiluaq boys NOT OURS of course went off on skidoos to hunt a goose. And a goose they hunted. It sat on the Canadian Shield rock for the duration of the afternoon until we could bring it home. I was watching little kids play with it. They would expand its wings, poke its eyes and nostriles, pound on its chest to make it squawk ( that was brilliant). During this time I played with rocks and contemplated the golf potential. Everything is bog and rock Guy. You would have to drill little holes with TNT.

I'm beginning to get comments now and thanks to everybody who is saying hello and sending greetings and advice. Keep it coming. And I'm the only one writing this blog because Brian only wants to sleep all the time (I wonder why..........) and it's my password. But I'll pass on all the greetings and encourage him to start his own. Cheers. Leslie

Ice Fishing and Seal skinning

After yesterday's teacher fishing expedition, there was movie night at the school. They show movies projected onto the wall of the gym using and lcd projector. They typically show 2 movies. The first movie was Peter Pan and I caught the last bit of that. Little kids were running around and slinking around under my chair and grabbing onto my feet. I'm constantly being asked what my name is because all of the students only begin to learn English in grade 3 and I suppose that conversational English starts with "Hello What's your name"? The second movie was Scary Movie 2 and I, like most of our students, decided to give that one a pass.

Today we took the students out on the land to go fishing. This time I rode both ways on the Hamatik which is a large sled that the skidoo drags behind it. The students had a great time lying on the ice looking for fish and jigging their lines. I don't think any of them ever caught anything other than each others lures. Our hosts lit a campfire and cooked us up some hot dogs on sticks and a kind of stew prepared in tightly wrapped aluminium foil. One of the packages broke and spilled its contents onto the grate over the fire. Lisi started to rescue pieces of food as quickly as she could and flicked them onto the lichen-covered ground next to the fire. She called the students over and I had a great time videotaping the kids while they picked pieces of chicken off the ground using sticks and feeding them to each other. We all got a little sunburned. My nose is pretty red (again) despite three applications of sunscreen with spf 45 today. And it has been very overcast the entire time we've been here in Sanikiluaq. Imagine if I hadn't worn any at all.

After we returned and freshened up, it was another night at the school. Lisi had hired a hunter to go out onto the land a kill a seal. We all watched while the seal was skinned and butchered in the skin room (aptly named). I got some great video footage. She cut through the skin and then scraped the blubber away from the meat. Each of us were offered a piece of the raw liver (a delicacy meant to honour guests). And I gotta say, our students for the most part were receptive, and excited and ate their liver. I've also got some great video of them eating flesh from ribs, drinking blood, and eating brain. I even have footage of the squeamish one shyly looking over the others from outside the doorway. I tried the flesh from the rib myself and well, it tastes like...blood. But you have to expect that and seal is the stape bread and butter food of the Inuit. They eat it, use it for light, heat, games, cloths and all kinds of things. An elder explained the importance of the seal at the end of the evening.

Tomorrow is church day and I plan to spend it relaxing and hunting down some nifly inuit soapstone. Best to all.

Leslie

Crafts, fishing, snowmobiles and tundra

It is now the end of the school day on Friday and again I'm writing from the Sanikiluaq school. Yesterday was spent doing crafts at the school. The co-principal and trip coordinator Lisi Kavik had been telling Brian and I that she was looking forward to paying her craftspeople as professionals and they were worth every penny. Students signed up for workshops for yesterday and today. I have to admit that that structure pretty much fell apart yesterday afternoon but it worked out very well regardless.

Our students got to try their hand at Ulu making. An ulu is a traditional moon-shaped inuit knife with a wooden handle. Considering the problems we had coming up (did I mention that a student almost made Brian miss the Montreal flight because he packed - yes - nail scissors in carry-on.), we had better make sure to tell them to pack the ulus in cargo. They also got to make and polish wax cast silver rings, grass baskets, bolas, duffel socks and soapstone carving. I tried my hand at basket weaving and MY GOD do I have a new found RESPECT for women who do this and do it well. It takes a huge amount of skill and patience. The instructor Sarah has been to native art conferences in Ottawa and she makes fabulous baskets with soapstone carvings on top of the lids. It must take days and days.

Now speaking of soapstone carving, since we got into town, I have been solicited by 7 different soapstone carvers who want to sell me seals or loons or walruses. It is getting to the point where I'm afraid to answer Margarets' phone anymore. It doesn't help that I can't remember anyone's name because there are ten carvers named Simeone or Isaac for example and their last names all sound the same like Tukaluk or Iqaluk or something like that. I've decided to search out a couple of carvers who do original and interesting work, and then after that make my purchases of small loons or ducks or whatever. My luggage is going to be full of rocks. Everyone is getting soapstone. By the way, if you want me to pick something up, post a request and I'll see what I can do.

Last night, the students had the chance to experience a cultural night at the school with one of the elders and they tried on traditional clothes.

Today, while the students were at school doing more crafts, some of the teachers went out on the land to go ice fishing. So Brian and I got ourselves bundled up by our hosts (me more so than he) and we met at the edge of town on the lake. Well, the snow was blowing and it was an absolute white out. Apparently this only happens a couple of times a year. They kept asking each other "do you have gps"? "no. do you"? "no". But of course the Inuit teachers led the way and everything was fine. My ride was a teacher called Mike from Saskatchewan. We travelled on skidoo for about half an hour to the first fishing site. This is hard to describe. The terrain is kind of rolling bog with absolutely no vegetation other than juniper like trees and lichen. The inuit drill holes in the ice, fish out the slush and lie down on their sides or stomaches. They peer down into the hole and do jig fishing meaning they dangle the hook and lure and jiggle it. When a fish bites, they pull the fish out. Got some pictures. Looks really impressive. I did try fishing for arctic char but after aboout 20 minutes, the line came loose and I lost my hook. Lucky for me Betsy fished it out again later. But anyway, you can see all the way to the bottom of the lake and I could see little minnows swimming around but no large fish for me. Betsy caught three somewhat impressive sized char. Pretty cool. At around noon they made a fire and everyone shared bread, munchies, rice crispy squares, tea etc. We headed back around 1:30 or 2pm and now I'm back at Nuiyak school. The students tell me they are having a great time and knowing them I'm sure they didn't give the teachers any trouble. This evening is another cultural evening with elders and tomorrow we go out on the land with them.

The whole thing is so surreal. It's not like the Yukon where there are trees and mountains. This is really, really barren land. But we saw geese and Mike is pretty sure he saw a fox.

Anyhow, I'm going to swing home now for dinner. My hostess is a wonderful cook.

So we almost didn't get here...for so many reasons

Writing from the staff room of the Nuiyak school in Sanikiluaq.

The flight from Toronto to Montreal was uneventful despite a couple of students going to Terminal 2 instead of Terminal 1. Terminal 1 smells like new terminal and looks like it was ordered out of the IKEA "design your own terminal" page of the catalogue.

All of the things that went wrong yesterday with the trip from Montreal to Sanikiluaq will take too long to write out so I'll only hit the high, and low, points. Some students took off to downtown Monteal without telling us and thus were were late leaving the next day. We couldn't all take the airport shuttle because it was booked by another group. Our itinerary said we were flying First Air and I discovered after I got to Dorval that First Air had no idea who we were and the employee suggested I try Air Inuit. The other half of the group took cabs and we got ourselves checked in with 30 seconds to spare before she had to close her wicket. Brian had to take his boots off at security four different times. A student lost his boarding pass so I had to drag Brian off the plane to buy him a new ticket on his VISA. The flight itself was the most relaxing 4 hours of the past 48 hours. We stopped in La Grande and then Kanijjuaraapik (on the hudson's bay-lots of ice-it was here that I started to think "I didn't bring enough cloths"). We then landed in Sanikiluaq. There were stunted trees in the other communities but here there is nothing...the landscape looks lunar but with tons of snow. It isn't actually too cold (hovering above zero) but the wind is a killer and there are always flying ice pellets. Before the plane left, Brian and I had to run up to it waving our arms at the pilots until they lowered the stairs. All this because we forgot a large stuffed easter rabbit that a sanikiluaq student had bought in Toronto and then had not brought home. Little did we know at that time that not all of the luggage had been loaded off the plane. Luckily, the same plane returns at 4:30 and it all worked out alright.

Some students were picked up in all-terrain-vehicles and the rest of us were chauferred around on the school bus. There are no paved streets and everything looks very frontier as they call it. Very few buildings are more than a single storey.

Sad to report that found alcohol in the luggage of a couple of students and as a result, Brian and I spent a rather unpleasant evening last night dealing with that. There have also been a couple of other things that we have had to deal with.

There are only a couple of trucks in Sanikiluaq. Everyone drives aroun on atv or skidoo. Honestly, trucks would have a very, very hard time getting around on these roads.

The school is very nice with all kinds of crafts and photos on display. This community is full of artists. As I was settling in yesterday afternoon, three soadstone carvers knocked on Margaret's door to meet me and sell me carvings. I will be coming home with a lot of rocks in my luggage.

The kids all had an absolute blast driving the Honda atvs. Honestly, they could go home happy right now. Last night I had cariboo and am looking forward to a few days of clean (freaking freezing) air and snapping photos. Hopefully, our major mishap quota has already been spent getting here an I anticipate some great times ahead. Can't wait to go out on the land and go seal hunting and seafood collecting. I'll try to get over my fear of all things marine.

I'll try to post as often as possible. See everyone soon. Leslie

are we comment enables yet?

well are we?

Pre-Nunavut

It's the day before I leave for Nunavut and I just realized that I'm confused over the dates. I can seem to figure out why we are returning on Wednesday the 2nd of June instead of Tuesday the 1st. I had better figure this out fast and I hope that none of the students find out that I have no clue what's going on...