Hopedale to Postville

It was really windy the day we flew into Hopedale. Mara was clinging to the seat in front of her, while the man in the next seat was kind enough to offer up some reassuring words: "That's normal" and, "These planes do that all the time" were his responses to major jerking back and forth and steep drops that we all felt deep in our stomachs. No worries, the Twin Otters we've been cabbing around in were designed specifically to be able to land just about anywhere. With lots of open mountain tops surrounding us, I wasn't too worried...most of the time. We touched down safely and helped the co-pilot cast our ever more tiresome load onto the runway. Already I could see differences from Nain in this not so far off community.  Hopedale has roads - real gravel roads, that people were driving trucks on. With hardly any snowfall this year, skidoos are only free to roam on the ice, unless they want to risk damage to the undercarriage and skis. I commented on this to the guy who picked us up and carted us to the hotel.  He raised his eyebrows and solemnly said, "Yup, not much snow this year, unfortunately. Weird, isn't it?".  I imagine so.   In Halifax we're quick to bitch about 5cm falling on the sacred grounds of Spring Garden Rd.  God forbid we should get a "blizzard" that unleashes 10-15cm on us.  Close the schools!  Cry for pity!  Curse the winter, and wish for spring, right?   It's not like we live on the North Atlantic, us poor snowed in fools. Imagine wanting the fluffy white stuff.   Imagine relying on it to get from town to town without flying, or to get out hunting.   It's tough to live off the land when the land is changing so dramatically all around you.  "It's gonna be a tough winter for a lot of folks up here" one woman quipped at us. With no snow or sea ice comes no seal hunting, with warmer temperatures comes less incentive for the caribou to migrate along their traditional routes, which pass by these settlements. Less hunting means people have to buy their food at the Northern Store, which sells the least healthy foods you can think of at exorbitant prices. Hmm, seal meat or Kraft Dinner? Are you so sure you fully understand and are opposed to the "cruel slaughter" of pinnipeds now, Pamela Anderson?

Hopedale.

Hopedale was cold. In Nain we were sheltered in a valley set back from the open North Atlantic. Hopedale is right on the ocean, thrashing Arctic winds in your face everywhere you walk.  A thirty minute stroll around the town to take pictures and buy tape at the general store left all three of us frozen to the bone and happy not to leave the comfort of our hotel rooms for the rest of the day. Hopedale is damn cold.

It would have been nice to see more of the town, but all three of us came down with either food poisoning or a stomach flu that ran rampantly through our systems. The last 10 hours spent in Hopedale were not pretty ones. There was a lot of napping, and then we had to catch our flight. Luckily Mara held the group together since her sicky times ran their courses the night before, but Cody and I were in bad shape.  We dragged our gear to the plane and I rolled into the first seat I saw at the very back of the plane.  The fifteen minute ride to Makkovik couldn't have felt longer, and I almost made it, but just as we swept in for a landing, BLAH!  "Are you OK?" asked Ben, the diesel plant worker sitting beside me, "I'm feeling pretty sick," I weakly replied immediately before expelling all of the contents of my stomach, upper intestines, and I'm convinced even more, into the barfy bag from the seat pocket in front of me.  Ben, who I had just met that day, was nice enough to pat my back - diesel plant workers are more sensitive than I thought.  One stop over to let a few people off in Makkovik and me out to drop off my barf bag, fifteen more minutes of flight landed us in Postville, and I was feeling shockingly better: sweet relief.

Moravian Church.

Wood Pile.

Hopedale School Coordinator of Hospitality.

A woman named Candy picked us up in Postville. She had one skidoo with a sled behind it - a hilarious prospect for all of the crap we're towing around, but we made it work. Four of us, including Candy, got on the skidoo and we strapped my trusty backpack to the wheelchair which was wedged between the bins, and nothing fell off!

Postville at Dusk.

Something in the universe heard our gastro-intestinal woes, because we were blessed with a fully equipped kitchen in our hotel suite (read: pseudo flat in a weird, multi-purpose warehouse).  HALLELUJAH! More napping and oatmeal made us all feel better. We cooked rice, which was a very welcomed change after a week of restaurant meals that almost all fell into the category of "meat + your choice of (insert food) deep fried or mashed potatoes".

Now, I know that I'm spoiled, what with living in a city that has a well supported farmer's market that's open four days a week, where I can buy beautiful locally grown produce, pasture raised meats (now that I'm an occasional carnivore), and delicious breads, but I've grown accustomed to it, and I will not apologize for that. This is a privilege that I hope never to have to give up...unless I move to the Arctic, in which case I'll be paying premium dollar to ship Hutten Family Farm CSA boxes up every second week - Amen.  I'll figure out how to work it into my environmental footprint somehow.  

Postville was a nice little town.  Again I wish I'd been feeling up to seeing more of it, especially now that I've found out there's a proposal for a uranium mine circulating the community.  Most of these north-west shore towns are very anti development, but I fear that the prospect of jobs and money in a land proving ever more difficult to live off of will sway the popular vote.  Not to mention the propaganda the mining company, Aurora Energy, is spreading e.g. "Living next to a uranium mine is no more dangerous than standing in front of your microwave."  Call me a crazy, leftist, privileged environmentalist, but something tells me that standing in front of your microwave all day, every day for as long as the mine is active wouldn't be all that great for you, and something also tells me that the effects of a uranium mine on a remote northern, traditional Inuit lifestyle-based community are far more complicated than this simple analogy.  Fucking bastards.  

Heed the sign.

Once I was feeling less barfy, I did manage to get out and snap a few shots of the town. It made me sad to think that this is the second to last stop of our outreach trip. Makkovik is next, then a night back in Goose before heading home to Halifax. These last few days will truly have to be savoured...like the last few precious weekends in February when kale is still available at the market. Did I miss it while I've been here?