Postcards from the Edge Episode XI Part XI

I didn’t really expect to write another one of these before I left the territory, but a few more interesting notes, and another corny joke:
What do you call a half order of bison? Unison! Har har har… groan…

At any rate, I’ve had the privilege of taking care of the Anglican bishop of the Arctic in the hospital last week. This is important as he was, and still is, very respected by the Inuit people, as he was sent here from England over fifty years ago, where he has spent his entire adult life, working in the North. Indeed, he’s written his memoirs in a rather well-known book (well, well-known for modern Inuit culture etc at any rate) published several years ago called “Igloo Dwellers Were My Church”, which he and his family gifted to me for taking care of him in hospital. I’m now busily reading it, as it also records how life has changed in the North since the 1950s… at any rate, I’ve just been struck with this gentleman and his legendary exploits in the North when he was younger, including dogsledding (!) over 4500km (!) every year (!) through the Arctic to visit his parishioners and translating the Bible into Inuinaktun single-handedly…
Furthermore, the last few days have been windy and very very rainy up here, flooding the gutters and sidewalks… it just kind of reminded me of Katrina, bearing down on the southern US, though not nearly similar in its ferocity or damage…
Now that’s really it… heading home in five days now…
julia

Postcards from the Edge Episode XI Part X

I’m heading home really soon, so there’s not that much to report: I’m working loads, trying to eat as much fish as I can before I go back and trying to visit people on their houseboats or in their homes before I skedaddle out of town. BUT, I wanted to share my new favorite joke: Did you hear about the Inuk who was told to move to Toronto? He would have Nunavut… har har har! OK, even people up here groaned when they heard the joke….
So one of the more curious things I’ve noted since I’ve been up here is my exposure to skills that have little to nothing to do with my work. I’ve learned how to scrapbook, make jewellery, run a day-care and home-school my children while I’ve been up here. Strange set of skills, but perhaps handy in a pinch. I think. Maybe. Not particularly useful if my car runs down, or my pants need hemming, but skills nonetheless…
One thing that struck me walking on the way to work this morning, and, I know I’ve written about this before when I was in Iqaluit, but ravens are very huge birds… they are the size of car tires! And they ‘caw caw’, like our blackbirds do, but it’s an ominous sounding cry… It’s almost kind of scary walking by them on the sidewalks, cause they really do look like they could fly up and gobble up your eyeballs… Actually, I think they would, given the opportunity… I understand the darkness in the choice of Poe’s The Raven…
I’ve encountered another “questionable intelligence patient” story, but it’s not really a story that I can write about in a family column like this… but certainly, new heights in ‘rolling my eyes’ have been achieved… If you’re interested in being grossed out or sickened, you can write, but otherwise, I guess you can just leave it to the imagination…
I’m heading home in the next two weeks, so I suspect I shall see a few of you in the next little while. Love you all!
julia

Postcards from the Edge Episode XI Part IX

So, it’s starting to get noticeably darker up here. The sun actually does go down, and the sky actually gets ‘dark’ now for a few hours every night. I don’t have to cover up my windows anymore at night in order to sleep (or maybe I’m used to sleeping with the lights on now?). I suppose being almost two months from the Summer Solstice (and, conversely, four months from the dead of winter), it’s not surprising that the sun changes so quickly up here. Incidentally, it’s also starting to get a bit chilly up here. Admittedly, being the cold wimp that I am, I haven’t exactly been ‘hot’ this whole summer. I brought up some shorts to YK for the summer heat…. Well, suffice it to say that I never actually got them out of the suitcase… ☺ People note up here at least I come home where there will still be summer-like weather, when they’ll certainly be entrenched in autumn.
Despite the non-hotness, I’ve still managed to get out on the rocks, lakes and trees of this landscape. I’ve eaten more roasted marshmallows and s’mores over the past few weeks than I think I ever have my entire life! And, the coolness causing me to cover up certainly protects from the insane mosquitos and black flies that are up here! (Really insane! They don’t even buzz, so you can’t hear them coming, and then you blow up like a balloon when they bite you, so it looks like you got beaten up by a baseball bat!)
The teens at my church up here are awesome (well, OK, so are the kids! ☺ ), and I’m totally loving them. It’s good to see such potential and childish hope and the NON-know-it-all-seen-it-all attitude that distinguishes them from many teens that I’ve met. I think in contrast with a lot of the messed up kids and equally messed up teenage moms that I have to work with up here, it gives me great hope to get through my workdays. I first met them back in June at a dinner the grown-ups had prepared for them. They had assumed I was one of them, and started chatting with me, until their parents pointed out that I was one of the doctors at the hospital… hee hee hee… they had me pegged at about 17 or 18 years old…. At any rate, it’s funny where the flowers are found when you go walking along the fields of life…

Love you all!
julia