Qaanaaq

Photos © 2007 Seth White

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Editor's note: There are a LOT of photos and words on this page. But the hell with it - I wrote it all so I'm going to post it anyway. If you actually read the whole thing, well, I wouldn't know whether to be flattered or scared.

So I'm sitting here typing away in my house in Lafayette Colorado, drinking a Santa Fe Pale Ale, listening to Jazz Odyssey with Andy O'Leary on 89.3 FM, and winding down after a day at work in my cube and dinner with some co-workers. And, it's dark outside. A good day, more or less, but a massive change from being up in Northwest Greenland the past two weeks. And in some ways, kind of a bummer. All in all I do have a pretty good life, but in a way it is hard coming back to my real life after being away in a different world. I'm not really complaining, I'm just sayin'...

By the way, this is a photo of the town of Qaanaaq (Esperanza this is "kaw-nock"!). In the vast district of northwest Greenland, this is the largest of the five settlements. The others (Siorapaluk, Moriusaq, Savissivik, Qeqertaq) are much smaller, especially Qeqertaq which has only a few people living there year-round.

When I got hired at UNAVCO, my only real request was that if an opportunity to visit Thule ever arose, I wanted first dibs. This actually happened last year, but along the way I learned more about the history of the area and decided that if I ever got the chance to visit again, I would also see Qaanaaq. This year my boss Bjorn was slated to go to Thule (again with the ICYLANDS project), but since he already had a summer overflowing with travel, he decided it wasn't feasible and asked me instead. I practically cut him off mid-sentence to say "yeah, I'll go". One of the reasons I wanted to visit Qaanaaq was to get a glimpse of the hunting lifestyle of the Inuit of the far north. Northwest Greenland is home to some of the most traditional Inuit settlements on earth. Hunting is the primary occupation of many people, and old techniques like harpooning narwhal from kayaks are still practiced. This is probably due in part to the fact that laws are in place which regulate the use of motorized transport in hunting, but still, these people are the major practicioners of the techniques and skills which sustained their ancestors for thousands of years. However things are changing rapidly in the Arctic, and although I don't really know, I'd imagine most of this knowledge and skill will be completely lost within my lifetime. So having the opportunity to visit a place like this was something I couldn't pass up...even if it cost me an arm and a leg (which it did). Here is a hunter returning with a narwhal in tow and his kayak loaded on front.

The catch, being dragged up on a piece of ice onshore. This is only a small one, but still valuable. The kayak is used for the initial harpooning of the animal, as the sound of motorboats will evidently cause them to dive out of reach. Once the narwhal is harpooned and tethered with a line and a bladder float, men in motorboats come in to finish it off when it comes back up to breathe, then haul it to shore along with the kayak.

I liked this one.

When the narwhal was brought in, people from town gathered to have a look, but also to get a piece of the catch. Among the crowd were these two little girls who were standing around wrinkling up their noses. Nonetheless they still stayed around for most of the butchering, which was done right there on a piece of ice on the beach. Disgusted but curious it seems! Other people came down with plastic bags and stood around waiting for various cuts as the whale was made into small whalebits. Some of them paid the hunters for the meat, some didn't...I guess like everything it depends on who you know. This was going on just a few hours after I arrived in Qaanaaq, and I would have missed it if I hadn't asked Hans Jensen, owner of the Hotel Qaanaaq, for suggestions about what to do that day. He has a Danish name but was actually born in Dundas Village (aka Uummannaq) before the people there were forced to move to Qaanaaq. I didn't ask him much about this though...he was only a few years old when it happened and although he's a nice guy, I assumed he probably didn't want to rehash it with some random tourist. By the way, after visiting Qaanaaq I re-wrote some of this page from last year. At the bottom of the page I had written what I thought about the move from the Thule Air Base area to Qaanaaq in the 1950's, but since then I have learned a bit more.

The fingers of some kids poking at the *recently deceased beast of the deep*. By the way, I never knew narwhal had two tusks (actually teeth), but they do. Only one of them, however, usually erupts from the head to become the giant horn they are known for. This was a young one so it didn't have the long tusk yet, but when the hunters cut open the head I saw two young teeth growing inside...and so I now have this piece of trivia to impart to you.

Another photo of a little guy watching the activities. I looked at him for a while trying to decide what he was making of the whole thing, but in the end he proved inscrutable. I have no idea what he thought of all this.

The whole thing had been cut up and dispersed very quickly, and ultimately not much more than a piece of spine and a bloody spot on the ice remained. While standing around on the beach I ran into Aliqatjak, who I had met just moments before at the "Ultima Thule" store while inquiring about boat trips to nearby areas. He then introduced me to Daniela, an Italian social geographer working here, and we all ambled up to this fellow, who was eating a piece of fresh mattak (narwhal blubber). He offered me a piece which, surprisingly, I found not unappealing. By the way, my spelling of the name "Aliqatjak" is entirely phoenetic, and I probably have it very wrong. But so many words in the Inuit languages are spelled in several different ways that it really doesn't matter. This is how I heard his name pronounced when he said it, so that's how I'm writing it. For example, I have seen the name of the famous Odak written in many ways...Odak, Udak, Odark, and another variation with some weird umlat-thing over a vowel. The point here is that the roman alphabet has been used to represent these words as closely as possible, but the subleties of the Inuit languages do not lend themselves easily itself to uniform spellings with these letters. This seems especially true with peoples' names when recorded by foreigners who have to sound things out!

So about this mattak stuff? Well here is a picture of the narwhal fins. The hunters sliced off the fins first and put them aside, so I presume these are prime cuts. Mattak itself consists of the grey outer layer and about 1/3 of the white inner layer. However in between the two is a very thin but very tough third layer, which is damn near impossible to bite through. So to do it right, you slice a horizontal slab of blubber off with about equal parts grey and white stuff, then cut small vertical semi-slices which you then bite off and chew. The semi-slices are cut through the white stuff and the tough middle layer, but only half through the grey layer.

Here is Aliqatjak and the other fellow, whose first name I unfortunately can't remember. However, the reason I took this photo was that on the left is a direct descendant of Robert Peary, and on the right is a direct descendant of Matthew Henson. I guess it's not that surprising that there are still descendants of those two guys living here. It was only 100 years ago ...and it's a small town. But still, being the student of polar exploration that I am I thought this was pretty cool. I wasn't able to talk with Mr. Henson much, but Aliqatjak's english was excellent and we talked a few times while I was there - an interesting and cool guy. Robert Peary was a renowned explorer and one of the few white men to study and adopt the Inuit techniques of survival. He was, however, a sonofabitch, and was generally feared by the local people. He also did not make it to the north pole (close, but he did not get there). Henson, on the other hand, was very well liked. Also, Henson was one of the few black men to venture north on an expedition. The fellow on the right actually looks a bit different than most people in the town, and it was obvious why once I learned he was related to Henson.

In 1906, Gustav Olsen came to the area near Thule Air Base and started converting people to christianity right and left. There is actually a rock monument to him just to the right of this photo. I am not sure how well christianity really took up here, but there is a very modern and photogenic church in Qaanaaq. Inside is a painting of Jesus behind the altar, represented with Inuit facial features and shown with a couple children. I forget where, but I read that this painting was brought up from the old church at the settlement near Thule Air Base.

As it turned out, there was a confirmation service for several children on Sunday, along with a baptism. I arrived a bit late and was standing in the back vestibule with a few others when the deacon walked back and showed us to the front row. I'm not sure if it was a catholic or orthodox service since I couldn't understand one single word, but it looked catholic to me. After the ceremony they gathered on the steps of the church for a few pictures. These are the national costumes of Greenland, by the way. I was standing there with Finn (more about him later), and asked what the pants were made of. The answer was more than I expected. On the girls' pants, there is both polar bear and dog fur on the waist and inside, the soles are made of young bearded seal skin, and the oustides of the legs are made from older bearded seal. I recall that there were actually five different materials, but can't remember the fifth one. Anyway, the point is that these pants, like all the traditional things, are made from very basic materials but in an exceptionally skillful way, completely optimized for maximum efficiency in the elements. These kids must have been really warm in this stuff though, since it was well into the high 50's / low 60's each day I was in town. And the next week in Thule was even warmer - a real heat wave with nearly continuous bright sun and temperatures into the 70's (no kidding).

So there was this bizarre German guy also staying at the hotel with me and I kept running into him around town, at places such as the confirmation. He really unnerved me. It's hard for me to explain why, but I have learned to trust my gut on these things. Anyway, after the service he was running around trying to get the people to move over and stand in the sunlight for photos, offering such incentives like "I send you a CD". They didn't really listen to him, as witnessed by the above photo taken in the shade, but he did coerce one woman and her son to stand for a shot. They graciously obliged for a few shots, and when they were about to leave he corralled them and asked them to pose again. The funny thing was that I could tell by the way he was shooting that he wasn't any good as a photographer (although he had two *nice* Nikon cameras). Anyhow, the point is that I took advantage of this farcical situation and took a photo as well. So hereyago.

A really little guy, in his first pair of polar bear pants.

After the confirmation, several families around the town put out serious spreads of food and drink to celebrate the occasion. I wasn't completely comfortable crashing the party, but by this time I had met Finn and he suggested I come along with him. Of course I jumped at the offer, so here is one of the gatherings, at the mayor's house. The three people in the center of the photo are Finn in the brown jacket, Daniela with the blue backpack, and Tobias (Finn's old hunting buddy) with the blue/black jacket. On one particular hunting trip, one of Finn's dogs was attacking one of Tobias' dogs (as these dogs will often do). So Tobias took a piece of wood and cracked it over the head of Finn's dog and knocked him out. Finn started yelling "you killed my dog!", but Tobias took a look at the dog and confidently (and correctly) declared "no, he's only a little bit dead". I thought that was hilarious.

Here is a not-so-great photo of the food, all of it traditional. Like almost any place in the world, there is junk food in Qaanaaq. However, no Doritos or Coke were being served today. There was raw seal aged for ~9 months in the open, raw narwhal, raw birds, cooked duck eggs, and other things I don't remember. Yes, I tried a bit of everything. As I learned before in Kangerlussuaq, I don't like seal meat AT ALL, raw or cooked. This is something to be eaten in emergencies ONLY. But the narwhal was not too bad, especially the mattak...I went back for seconds and thirds on this. The birds were also (kinda) good - kept cold on ice but not cooked, just cut open for you to grab whatever bit you wanted from inside. The duck eggs were very good, in large part because they were cooked, but also because they tasted a better than your normal chicken eggs. Another thing was the coffee - Greenlanders are big on coffee. There wasn't any "Greenlandic coffee" though. I now believe this to be a concoction created by entrepreneurial bar owners to generate revenue from passers-by.

Here is Finn, on the steps of his house. And a nice place he has too. He has lived up here for 25 years, until recently working as a hunter. He's one of those guys who has led an incredible life and is immensely capable, but is genuine, disarming, and not full of ego (and I trust my gut on these things too). He is now running a small business doing boat and dogsled trips for visitors. I initially met him through Daniela who, when she found out I was trying to find someone to take me to Siorapaluk, suggested I ask Finn. He agreed, and it turned out to be an excellent day. I also got to know him a little bit during my stay, and I like him a great deal. He also has a website (www.polarventure.com) made by a couple young Britons who passed through Qaanaaq on their quest to travel from north to south magnetic poles. The website was a thank-you for his hospitality along the way, which he also extended to me in great measure. I would have had a great time even if I didn't meet anyone here, as I am perfectly happy to walk around and absorb things - especially with camera in hand. But the chance meetings with Finn, Daniela, and Uusaqqaq (more on him in a minute) really made this trip memorable.

So here are a couple good-looking sled dogs.

This guy was quite the little bastard. One day I sat for a while near a mother and her pups, watching them interact. There was some growling, some nuzzling, and usual dog things. But this one was the troublemaker of the bunch. Finally one of the other pups took off the gloves and they had a knock-down, drag-out brawl. I took a couple shots of them tumbling down the hill with each others fur in their mouths. When all was said and done, this one was walking with a limp. Served him (her?) right.

This one was not quite as cute. When I first was walking around Qaanaaq, I gave the dogs a wide berth and took care to see if they looked friendly or unfriendly. Without exception, they all seemed either indifferent or very friendly...tails up and wagging, and whining as if they needed attention. So I figured they were mostly alright. But later on Finn cautioned me that a few dogs can act very friendly, especially with strangers, and then once you get close enough they will attack you. They are not far removed from being wolves, and as such they also know exactly what parts of your body to dig into. Good to know...but how would one know this beforehand? I was not a Greenland ignoramus before visiting here, having been to the country five times prior, but I didn't really know the dogs could be a serious danger to a man. Anyway, I returned to giving them a wide berth after learning this.


Qaanaaq was an incredibly interesting town, but it is not a place without problems. In fact from my limited conversations with people and limited observations during a limited stay, there are more than a few things here that are not quite right. Here is one small example: dead dogs just left to rot on the beach. Evidently there is some bug going around amongst the dogs these days, and it is a bit of a mystery. However, two points should be made. First, many of the dogs are kept chained up on short chains, out of the reach of drinking water. I saw many dogs straining at their chains to get a sip of some foul wastewater, dumping out from a pipe straight on the beach. Most dogs appeared well fed and well cared for, but a surprising number did not. This was an eye-opener to me, especially considering how important the sled dog is to the livelihood of so many people here. Second, when one of your dogs dies, you really ought to bury it or otherwise dispose of the carcass. I fully appreciate cultural differences, but this is just plain shitty, no matter what language you speak or where you grew up. There is no excuse for leaving dogs dead on the beach like this. And these two were not the only ones - there were several more. These two were, however, the saddest.
And another thing. Qaanaaq has many nice things about it, but even aside from the dead dogs the beach is a damn dump. And Daniela pointed out that the town had recently done a major cleanup on the beach! No telling what it looked like before then. I won't keep harping on the negative things here, but I do want to mention the alcoholism - it seemed to me to be a real problem. And what's worse, beer is ungodly expensive here. At the market a 6-pack of Carlsberg or Tuborg is almost 90 kroner, or around $16 USD. And at the bar, a can of this swill is 40 kroner ($7!!!). I bought a 6-pack of this crap at the store one day without looking at the price tag...and my jaw almost dropped when I got back to my hotel and happened to look at the receipt. And, being the beer elitist that I am, I also have to say that both these beers are extremely shitty Danish mega-brews...in fact I believe "Tuborg" is Danish for "Budweiser". I mean, that shit is BAD BAD BAD.

Back to the good things, of which there were many during my visit. Here is a guy out practicing near the shorleine in the Greenland kayak. This boat is very long and narrow, and as you can see it sits very low in the water. I am told that this is an extremely difficult boat to pilot, even if you are good with other kayaks. Basically, you have to learn it when you're young or you'll never quite get it. It is designed to cut right through waves, and is very fast, even when propelled by the very narrow paddles they use here.

Here is the usual Qaanaaq garage: a dogsled and a kayak. Kayaks and dogsleds are everywhere here. They are not novelties used by the REI crowd on weekend excursions designed to impress co-workers and the opposite sex, they are basic implements in everyday life. Have I ever gone off on this website about REI and the patrons which frequent this abortion of a corporate chain? No? Really? Well alright, I'll save that for another day. I know that when the time comes for that particular rant, you'll bookmark that page so you can read it again and again.

Another kayak. The older kayaks used skins, but the newer ones like this use canvas. By the way, the Thule people had lost the use of the kayak until it was re-introduced to the area by the Inuit who migrated over from Canada around 1860. This seems hard to believe, but it really is true. I also understand that at the same time the people in this area were not hunting caribou, for no other reason than the proclamation of some shaman.

A house, near the beach, with a bunch of stuff outside. Like I say, the routine and mundane always take on a special fascination for me in the polar regions.

A photogenic row of typical brightly-colored Greenland houses. There was a big red Toyota truck parked just to the left of this photo, but I cropped it out.

The very exclusive Qaanaaq Marina. But strangely enough I didn't see too many old-money types walking around with sweaters tied around their necks.

The narwhal is the symbol of Qaanaaq, as shown on this sign hanging on the town hall building. It's strange that they put a "p" on the end of the town's name when it preceeds "kommunia", but I suppose this is one of the many subleties and idiosyncracies of the Thule language, a language which is extremely difficult to learn. Even Finn, who has lived here for 25 years (and speaks excellent english), doesn't have a really good handle on this language. He says he can talk about things related to hunting and the outdoors pretty well, but day-to-day domestic conversations among the locals can still lose him. And Daniela, who is very good in the East Greenlandic language, couldn't understand anything when she came here.

The town power plant.

Just outside of the town, below the boggy area which is home to many peoples' dogs, is this triangular wooden structure made for drying meat. With all the dogs running around town, you need to either store everything (EVERYTHING) inside or else keep it elevated off the ground. Currently, this rack is home to shark meat, which is being dried for dog food. Evidently sharks will come into the fjord every year and kill off the prey the hunters are after...so the hunters kill the sharks and make Purina out of them. I thought this picture and the next one were two of my best from the whole trip.

A closeup of the drying shark meat.

Here is a sledge made for carrying meat around. Just for fun I scraped my fingernails along the bottom of this sledge and nibbled at them for the next half hour as I walked along the beach. Tasted a little weird. Speaking of meat, the entire town of Qaanaaq, especially at the middle of the beach area, smells like meat. It must be hard for polar bears to avoid this place, but they are smart animals and they know they'll instantly end up as a pair of pants if they come into town.

Another custom-made sled that you won't see in too many other places around the globe: a dogsled ambulance! Completely practical though, as what better means of bringing in a sick or injured person in from the wilderness during the cold months than a dogsled? There is even a fur sleeping bag inside.

The cemetery, a half-mile or so east of town. I also liked this photo quite a bit.

A second pic of the cemetery.

When I got to Qaanaaq, I immediately started "free-cycling". I didn't have a job or any other commitments, and with 24 hour sunlight it was easy to just stay up as long as I wanted, then sleep until I couldn't sleep anymore, and repeat. I *really* love doing this, but hadn't done it much since I was writing my thesis in grad school, when I would slowly migrate in and out of phase with most of the others in my lab. Goooooood times! Anyway, one late night I walked out east of town, across a river and up a hill on the other side. Along the way I found a little hut, used as a getaway spot for people when they just need to get out of town. Nice view eh?

A Green Greenland House. This brightly-colored rectangle-with-a-pointy-top is a very typical style for Greenland. Many people actually buy these as kits and put them up themselves.

Here is the same thing, only much older. This is the house of Knud Rasmussen, who built it at the foot of Dundas Mountain in the beginning of last century when he established the Thule trading post. This house was later moved to Qaanaaq, where it now serves as the museum. Cooooool. I'm really glad I got to see this. I went to visit one day with Daniela, but did not linger as much as I wanted to because she'd already been there. But it was very nice inside - a first-rate museum. The thing I remember the most is a photo above the inside door of a very old woman who had died recently. There was also a picture of her as a girl in, say 1910 (she was VERY old). Nearby was a quote from her, something like this: "Because I never learned to read or write, I remember everything". And I'll bet she did.

Another one of the museum. This is probably the nicest spot in town, with a good view and an assortment of arctic flowers growing beside the little bench outside. In the background is the fog, which delayed my return to Thule by one day.

Inside the museum, the genuine articles: an old-tyme kayak and dogsled. There was a lot of good stuff in here, from prehistoric Inuit relics to artifacts from the wreck of the ship Polaris (from Hall's ill-fated expedition). There were even two drawings made by Inuit people in the early 1900's. These are not great works of art by anyone's standards, until you consider that prior to making these drawings, these people had never seen a pencil let along held such a thing in their hands. And looking at the drawings, they are very nice aesthetically, and more importantly, very accurate in their renderings of scenes. The people and animals look *very much* like people and animals. Seriously, most people I know would not be able to make sketches as nice as these. In one of my own books there is a drawing from the 18th century, onboard some ship of some expedition, where the captain is sitting by while a couple Inuit fill in the blank portions of their maps. Of course these people had never seen a pencil before either. And as it turns out, their drawings of the previously "unknown" lands were extremely accurate.

On Saturday afternoon I was walking along near the beach and a couple guys (on the right) who were sitting around having a beer invited me over. One of them handed me a beer - a very nice gesture considering how ungodly expensive beer is - and we talked a bit. They were both pretty hosed, but they each knew a bit of english. The fellow on the right was also a fan of country music and had some old country tunes on his stereo inside. I told him I was from Colorado, and although I didn't expect to hear country tunes in Qaanaaq, it reminded me of home. So he kept the music coming. After a while another fellow came walking along and they dragged him over, telling me that he knew english better than they did. As it turns out Uusaqqaq, on the left, had been a representative of the Thule people and had traveled all over the Arctic, USA, and Europe to various meetings and conferences. I ended up talking with him for about 45 minutes about many things, and he had a lot to say. He told me about how they were forced to move from Thule to Qaanaaq in 1953, about how the changing climate had noticeably altered the weather, sea ice, and animal habits, and spoke about B-52 crash in 1968 as well. He used the term "not funny" about all of these things, especially the B-52. His main point regarding that particular episode was that the US and Danish never told them what was on board...specifically the hydrogen bomb which had ruptured and leaked a good deal of plutonium in the area. He ended by inviting me to his house to watch a movie he had made about Qaanaaq, from the early days to the present. I went over a couple days later to visit, and the movie was really well done, with great music added by another guy from Greenland television or something. It was nice to talk with him, but I wish we could have communicated better as there were a lot more things I would have loved to talk about.

The Polar Grill, open sporadically, and home of the absolute worst hamburger and fries I have ever eaten. But then again, one does not come to Qaanaaq for this reason.

And now, speaking of hamburger, a platform of heads!

This is the house of Odak, who was the last surviving "north pole" Eskimo from the Peary days. He is a legend in these parts, and was a strong advocate of keeping the traditional ways alive. He was one of the people moved up here in 1953, and this is the house he lived in. Notice the small, long doorway. Hard to tell from the picture, but it really is no more than 3.5 or 4 feet high. This must be a tradition from the old dugout houses and igloos, where the entryway was dug down below ground to act as a trap for cold air, keeping the warm air inside. I wouldn't think this style is as necessary in an elevated wooden house with a hinged door, but I guess old habits die hard. Anyway, the intent has been to make this house into a museum or something, but lack of money and/or motivation has kept the town from actually doing it. And one more thing, the word "Eskimo" is kind of an outdated term. I read that the word itself is an English bastardization of a French bastardization of a Cree Indian word meaning "eater of raw flesh", which was a derogatory term they used to describe their more northerly neighbors. And now in many parts of Greenland Eskimo is not a flattering term. However, the people here still proudly call themselves Eskimos, so I will too.

Finally, the hated airport. This airport is hated because, counterintuitively, it has made it much harder for the locals to fly in and out to visit people elsewhere in Greenland, and it has caused fewer tourists to visit. Qaanaaq used to have a dirt airstrip on the other end of town, and they also used to make a runway on the sea ice every year. So the air transport arrangements were pretty informal, and not outrageously expensive. However, when they asked for a new airport, they were basically asking for a longer, better dirt airstrip. Instead, they got a full-on Danish style airport, complete with tower, ground navaids, and a full staff of workers. All this added up to a huge increase in the price of air transport...and people up here are not exactly rich. So this is a problem. And by the way, I was lucky that I was able to fly on a helicopter from Thule to Qaaanaaq. Air Greenland runs a biweekly flight from Thule to the different villages in the district, and it costs ~$700 round trip. Not cheap, but a lot better than the other option coming from the US to Qaanaaq the long way. If I hadn't had official business in Thule, and had my flight from Baltimore to Thule paid for by Uncle Sam, I was told that I would have needed two overnights on the way up and three overnights on the way back...in addition to forking out a LOT more money. I will tell you this: my life is not perfect, and like most people I have many problems to deal with. But I DO have a good job...