East Boston Students Travel to the Arctic Circle
East Boston High School, in partnership with the Maple Leaf Foundation, sent five students and one chaperone to the arctic island community of Sanikiluaq, Nunavut Province, Canada for a week in March. The EBHS students, Hemel Gil, Shawn Tortorici, Alejandro Bonilla, Erica Downey (seniors) and Dennis Wright (junior) attended classes at the Nuiyak School, a 270-student, K-12 school.
The students and chaperone learned much from this Inuit community, and came away with a true appreciation for how their counterparts live and work in a harsher environment than which they live. East Boston High School anticipates the arrival of five Inuit students from the island and one chaperone for a visit to our school and community in May.
The following passages were taken from a series of emailed letters from chaperone Nina Gaeta Coletta sent while in Sanikiluaq to family and EBHS friends.
March 17, 2008. The eaglets have landed...we are in sunny Sanikiluaq, temperature of 5F, but more dramatic to say -17 C. Do you remember the Blizzard of 78? We had that last night times 10, and yet, the people walking around were smiling and going about their business as if this happens all the time. And it does.
The last leg of our trip, the small plane to this island, was a little hairy -- I was able to say two Rosaries while flying, and that comforted me. It was so surreal to be flying to an island with the sea frozen as far as you could see.
The families are giving our kids what little they have to share and are sharing family stories. For example, Hemel Gil asked if they ate seal blubber, and they laughed and said yes. They also told him they ate seal meal, and that pregnant women are encouraged to drink seal blood because of the nutrients. In fact, we are going to skin and gut a seal this afternoon. We all saw the little thing at the school, and have accepted its fate as one of being used for food, clothing, etc. The school and its students do taxidermy! You should see the polar bear skins and stuffed bears in the school -- WOW!
I better get going -- school starts at 8:30 and ends at 3:30 p.m. There is a 90 minute lunch break at 11:45 so the students go home to eat and come back at 1 p.m.
March 18, 2008. We learned how the Inuit depend on seal to stay alive, and this also includes the dogs. Many of the dogs are working dogs, sled dogs and hunting dogs, and are not fed every day. They eat when the hunter is finished and eats the kill. This means dogs can do for days without food. The seal we saw was destined to be given to a pack of seven dogs for food. ….after the demonstration, I was immediately taken to an Inuit house and she undressed me and redressed me in Arctic gear. I was given a heavy snow pant to put over my sweats, and another sweatshirt to put over my long sleeve tee shirt, and then the heaviest parka, lined in fur, to go over that assembly.
For my feet, nothing I brought would do...I was given another pair of socks, and then slid on seal skin boots that laced up to my knee. My feet were so warm! It was like walking barefoot on the snow without feeling the cold.
We all meet on a spit of land that connects to the beach, and climbed into/onto 7-8 snowmobiles and wooden sleds that carried us out of town for about 8 miles. The ocean is still frozen here -- there are spots of open water, but they cannot be seen -- only speculated about because of the cloud formations. I was told that a certain type of cloud forms on the horizon because the water just below it is open, not frozen over.
We traveled about five miles out when we had to stop to get "water.' This meant getting out of the sled carrier and chopping blocks of ice out of the fresh water lake. We put the ice into garbage bags and later melted it for tea and hot chocolate.
When we stopped, we got out and chipped an eight-foot circumference sized hole into the ice. It took a long time, and the ice was three feet thick. The ice was carefully popped out of the hole, and the dredging began -- the Inuit elders and hunters took turns scraping the bottom of the sea floor (about four feet down) with a net and scooped up mussels, sea urchins, star fish, sea cucumbers, various "bugs" -- ugly centipede looking things that live in the water. We opened the mussels up and ate them right from the ice! They were so sweet! Then Lisi opened up the sea urchin and we ate the gonads, which were also incredibly sweet. I had a small piece of sea cucumber, which tasted like a slightly salty watermelon, but I could not eat the skin, which was tasteless and rubber-bandy.
While we were scooping, some of the women started a fire on a finger of land and we roasted sausages and hot dogs. I had to lie on the snow to get close to the fire, and never once was I cold! I roasted myself a sausage and enjoyed every bite.
Next, Sarah pulled out a small white garbage bag and opened it to reveal frozen, raw seal meat. I was encouraged to eat a piece because seal meat is best when raw. I tried it - I did not like it. It tasted like fish with a steak consistency.
The EBHS kids were so good! They did everything and most tried everything. We climbed up a hill, and some of our kids went sledding without equipment, i.e., they fell and slid all the way back down the hill we were climbing. At the top of the hill we were shown the burial ground of some Inuit who lived on that spit of land between 1930-1960. The people buried there are buried above ground, with rocks piled on them. Lisi said that in the summer, when the snow is gone, you can sometimes see the bones under the rocks. I think I like the idea of resting on top of the ground, covered with rocks, than buried in the earth or burned. It was terrifyingly stark and beautiful out there, surrounded by snow and ice and the wind.
We looked out over the bay to see a dark spot of land almost out of sight on the horizon. Lisi told us that was the last place the hunter who disappeared two weeks ago was seen, thirty miles away from us. Some of the elders and friends of the hunter traveled out there to put a memorial out on the land -- you can hear the sadness in their voices and see it in their eyes when they talk about him.
No Northern Lights tonight -- the sky is getting overcast.
March 20, 2008. …We made traditional Inuit crafts: I made an uluk, which is a "woman's knife." The uluk requires your whole hand to hold it and cut with -- it is THE essential kitchen tool. I also made a Christmas ornament from polar bear fur. AND I started a grass basket -- it is so hard to make! The woman showing us had much patience and is quite the artist.
The kids also made various things, including a bola, an three-balled throwing weapon made of seal skin and dried sinew to bring down bird and small game. They also made fish bags -- literally, small change purses made of cod skin. The bags are remarkable, looking like iridescent beads, but it is the translucent skin of the fish! I'm sure those bags would fetch BIG bucks on Newbury Street -- now, to get rid of the smell!
Two of our boys started soapstone carving, which a main economic staple of this community. The young man teaching us is a true artist, and helped the boys see the shape in the rock. It is so time consuming to make. No wonder these folks are all so patient....They are very generous, and so friendly.
The dentist comes once every six months. There is a "nurse's station," but it is only good for small emergencies. If someone needs a doctor, a special flight is chartered. But the weather can keep the planes grounded - in the recent past, a five year old boy died of appendicitis because the weather kept the plane on the ground. A boat is out of the question in the winter because the ocean is frozen.
…Let me tell you what it looked like today -- white. White ground, white sea, white snow, white landscape, white sky. I took a picture of a grounded boat near the store just to show the color difference. The locals said the weather has been confusing to them because there was rain mixed in with the snow...it is not the time for rain yet. This wet is causing the grasses and lichens to freeze and die, and leave the reindeer without food to survive. If it were just snow, that can be brushed away, and it insulates the plants. Wet weather this soon causes worry.
…There is no growing season, and I was told that only a handful of people try to plant vegetables, started indoors and planted outdoors. Lisi told me that the swimming season is only one week long in July, and most of the kids stay out of the water because it is cold. I don't think I can complain about our beach water temperatures ever again…
March 20, 2008 (at night). …There is a terrible storm belting this island right now. I had to walk by myself just a few hundred yards from one house to the school, and I got all turned around because of the snow blowing. I managed to see the light from the school, and turned toward it because I could not see the building itself…
March 24, 2008. We made it!…Honestly, for a while, I did not think we were coming home on time because of the howling winds and blowing snow that were our constant companions for three solid days and nights. I kept my eyes on the weather reports and became intimately acquainted with high and low pressure systems. That and the fact that my host kept saying "you might be here for Easter."
…During our last night in Sanikiluaq, we met one of the elders, a woman whose name is pronounced My-nah (I do not have her correct spelling). She is, at 76-years old, still hunting, fishing, living off the land when she camps, and serving as an educator for Inuit children and any visitors who come to the community.
She spoke of the trials her people endured and how they succeeded -- from the climate to government indifference to the Inuit generations ago, and everything in between. She showed us how every part of a kill (seal, polar bear, fish etc.) was used, and nothing wasted. Even sea gull throat linings were used as thread to help sew skins for clothing or shelter. She spoke in Inuit, and Lisi translated every word. My-nah was mesmerizing and inspiring.
We visited the igloo on Friday morning, our last day on the island. I can't begin to describe the cold weather that greeted the day. There were breaks in the sky, and we finally saw some blue streaks. The plane was scheduled to take off as usual, and I finally relaxed. The EBHS students had wanted to sleep in the igloo during our stay, but the previous wet weather made it unstable, and Lisi and some of elders did not feel it was safe. I managed to crawl inside the structure and take a few pictures before leaving. I have a shot of the kids at the igloo -- it looks like we are on some distant planet, and that's what it felt like as well.
When we left, a lot of the Nuiyak students came to see us off. The waiting room at the airfield was filled and students were shaking hands, and taking pictures, and saying good-bye. And that's what touched me the most, the good-byes. We are all so used to saying "see you later," or "I hope to see you again." But the Nuiyak students just said "see you in heaven," or "goodbye for forever." There was no pretense of seeing each other again, and that was sad, eloquent and true….
Some student comments:
One thing that was difficult to adjust to was the fact that they spoke a different language. You could tell that they were more comfortable speaking in Inuit, and that they were quieter than Eastie kids were. Their school is tiny compared to Eastie! Even though it was pretty cold, it was not that bad to be outside and doing stuff. The family I stayed with was really generous, and let me borrow a pair of snow pants. My overall favorite part of this trip was when we went out on the land and went ice fishing, and when we were walking around the town. This trip was really fun, and I learned how to make a lot of different things, like sterling silver rings, and was able to make friendships with people that I would have never known about. It was fun to learn about a different culture, and I cannot wait until they get to Boston to see and learn about our culture.
- Erica Downey
This trip was a one-of-a-kind trip. It was an experience of a lifetime. How often am I going to be able to go to the Arctic Circle? The place we went to was called the Belcher Islands. The people on the island are indigenous people. They showed us their culture and how they live and how they live in this tough environment.
I expected to see people living in igloos, but they live in houses just like we do. I loved staying in his (Jason's) house; his family was very nice, and hospitable.
I had a lot of fun there. I enjoyed the day we went out on the land and went ice fishing, sliding down that big hill, and eating food from the fire. I also enjoyed listening to the elder speak to us about how their people have survived all these years...The elder kind of inspired me that no matter what if you believe in something during hard times you can make it.
-Shawn Tortorici
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