The light at the end of the tunnel.
Hello Everyone,
Well I'm almost at the end of the long road that leads to a Northern Christmas. Tonight was Moonlight Madness, and it lived upto its name. Sales were incredible. usually the best night of the year will be ladies night but we blew that away tonight. The Co-op held Mens night tonight against us and I think they gave up and closed early (not a small task as they have 5 times the sales floor we do).
Friday will be a good day, a lousy sales day but its Elders day, so I'll get to sit with the Elders drink tea and hear stories. I think I'm going to play "Lets make a deal" with them and that will also be fun. Its a fun way to end the sales season. I feel sorry for all the teachers who run home to the south every Christmas. they miss the town celebration, once Christmas has gone by the games will begin till New Year. I've been invited to compete in some of the traditional Inuit games of the season (which I don't think I'll participate in). One of the games is called finger pull, it involves what I consider fish hooking your opponents mouth and pulling as hard as you can till they surrender, or you surrender as they are doing the same to you. You sit back to back and reach back and fish hook your opponent. Other games are one leg high kick
and two leg scissor kick, the actic games record for one leg high kick is 9 feet 7 inches, not bad for a race that has a average height of 5 foot 6. I've seen it casually played nd its amazing how they can kick, I haven't seen martial artists rival thier performance.
Which leads me to question about this particular game. Ok I understand how if your living in the land of the long winters, you'd make games to relieve the boredom during the long winter, or to prove strenght when another family is met upon the tundra traditionally. However,how could a game evolve that involved kicking alot higher than the roof's of traditional housing. It doesn't seem to be a skill building game as traditional hunting techniques don't seem to involve alot of personal combat. No real point in triing to kick a bear in the face, its likely to tick him off. There aren't alot of obsticales that you would need to focus a skill set in order to build jumping skills. Anyone with any answers or guesses?
Anyways, Bed Time,
Take Care
CG
2 comments:
Certainly enjoyed your last postings and find all your descriptions quite delightful. As for learning jumping skills etc. - perhaps they use this type of activity to launch themselves from one ice floe to another in the warmer seasons??
Welcome to my world of "slowness". I too live in a zone that does not yet have access to high speed or cable. I cringe when I see an array of pictures attached to an email, knowing that it will take forever to view them.
According to the weather info at the bottom of your blog, you also are enjoying warmer than usual temps. I think it said that it was +1 there - is that true? We are having rain and have been told that there will be no white Christmas here in southern Ontario.
Glad to hear that things are falling into place and that you are settling into your new house. I wasn't aware that you had animals - just exactly what kind do you have? Or where you referring to your Innuit carvings?? They must be very heavy and hoped they made the journey intact.
Hope you have a great holiday season and wish you more good things for 2007.
Later --------- Rosalie
I don't know about the ice floe thing, but thats the point isn't it, I don't know. I would have expected a version of pole vaulting for such a purpose. Also the kick is a very unique one, it has almost no forward movement (compared to a Martial arts kick), its a very vertical movement with the body rolling so the back is to the ground at the pinnicle of the kick, the a quick spin for the landing. I've watched it done quite a few times but I can't figure out the launch move, there seems to be three leg pivots involved but they happen so fast it's difficult to see. I hope to video it at this years games and watch it back in slow motion.
As for the temp, I'm currently reading -18 C and I just finished working cargo at the airport and I can tell you I was cold. we still haven't found my mits and it took me about 15 minutes to get any feeling back in my hands (other than burning). I also got "braino" (that pain you get in the center of your head from eating something cold too fast), I've only had that feeling from external temp once before. That being said, I was poorly prepared for frieght, it came right in the middle of the Elders games, so I saw there was only 11 peices and just went as I was. Although I had my Parka, I was lacking real gloves, a toque, snow pants and my boots. It gets pretty cold waiting on top of a mountain while they unload 1,000 pieces to get to my 11.
we have two animals now, we had 2 cats and a dog when we came, but one of the cats adjusted poorly to the north and became too sick to him go on, He lost 18 pounds in 6 months. The dog (Juneau) is a "american Eskimo" so the only real problem with her is getting her to return to the house and quit rolling in the snow. We've had her 10 years and I don't think she's ever been happier with the weather. She is a indoor dog though and sometimes forgets that. She'll run outside at -40 and stop dead in her tracks and yelp as her feet hit the snow. Soon enough she gets over it, I think its just the northern version of culture shock.
Take Care
CG
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