DUE NUNAVUT: Part 3

Thursday, September 14, 2000.
1:40PM

Yesterday was quiet. It started out very sunny in the morning… around dinner Joanna and Sam, two midwives from Ontario…invited me out to walk Sam’s Labrador. It was great talking to them. By then it was drizzling rain but we walked down to the rocky shore—seaweed abounded. Rocks. We saw an abandoned boat that someone had spraypainted “Love Boat” on the side. …I went over to their apartment for tea and ginger cookies and we talked about any number of things. They asked me a lot about my novel. …This morning [I went] to see the Northern store. Pretty much like any other store. Life here really doesn’t seem all that different though I suppose come winter I will really see the difference then. …The people seem to be generally very friendly. The noise of the ATVs going past my window during the day. You get used to it, like the airplanes over us [back home].

Sunday, September 17, 2000.
1:35AM

…[went] “out on the land.” It was pretty neat. I saw the old remains of Thule settlements—from around 1200 to 1600 AD—the Inuit predecessors. The land is so barren—with a lot of little lakes, a lot of rock and scrub with some patches of red, orange, green…pretty in its own way. The day started out very sunny and pretty warm, but got overcast and drizzly…

I babysat for a lady—her 5 yr old son Dylan. Cute kid and nice mum, but when I asked where in NFLD [Newfoundland] they had lived, he replied “We live there because there’s only white faces.” I said, “Only white faces?” He said, “Yeah, no brown faces.” I said, “Did your mama tell you that?” He nodded. So then I pretty much despaired.

10:10PM

…Joanna invited me out for a walk…me, Jo and Sam took Seamus [the dog] and a kayak, which they had to deliver to some guy. Then we walked—over many rocks and sand that was wet from a receded tide—in the heavy wind. A gale. Cold, but not freezing. If it weren’t for the wind it would have been pretty temperate. We walked for an hour or so along the rocky beach. Sam told me about how in the winter these ice walls form from the receding tides. That will be interesting to see. We also saw some huskie puppies out there, little furballs with mewing cries. The adults were chained up. They were all just there by the shore, the male adult in a cage, the two females chained and the pups let loose. One was sleeping. Awww.

photos by Karin Lowachee