I Can Get There From Here

The idea is to circumnavigate the Arctic starting in January of 2006, interviewing residents of the far north about the way climate change has affected their lives, their culture and environment. And up till now the plan had been to start in Alaska and then work my way around the planet.

I picked Alaska as a starting point because, having lived there for seven years, I know it pretty well and because as Arctic regions go, it's easy to get to.  Alaska Airlines flies to Barrow at least once a day, year round.  And even places that Alaska Air doesn't fly to, like Chicken, a microscopic blip on the Yukon border, can be reached by chartering a bush plane -- taxi cab of the last frontier -- flown by a uniquely Alaskan individual -- the bush pilot --who lives on stale coffee, Piper Cub exhaust and adrenaline. I went out with a bush pilot once. Just once.

I love Alaska.  But it doesn't feel like adventure anymore. And as much as I want to aid in the understanding of Arctic climate change, I also want wring some adventure out of this project. So I've changed the plan.  The Aujaqsuittuq Project will be initiated in a place much more remote than Alaska, a place without its own airline.  Or bush planes.  Or stale coffee.

Next winter I will go to the Nenet Autonomous Okrug in north central Siberia.

The Nenet Autonomous Okrug -- or NAO as it's known among the locals -- is a district to the east of the Barents Sea that's shaped like a bent index finger. The shape of the region reminds me of the Wicked Witch of the West in the Wizard of Oz, who pointed her finger at Dorothy and said demonically, "I'll get you my little pretty."  Which is apropos since climate change is playing the Wicked Witch to the Nenet's Dorothy.

But I digress. 

The NAO is home to the Nenet reindeer herders, one of the last nomadic peoples on earth. Or at least they try to be.  Between invasive oil and gas exploration and development, the loss of much of their land at the hands of the Russian government and climate change damage to the forest and taiga habitats where they breed and graze the reindeer, the Nenet culture is gravely endangered.  I mentioned in an earlier blog entry that in the 1930's Stalin made a concerted but ultimately futile attempt to wipe out the Nenet. Russia's version of ethnic cleansing. Sadly, climate change is succeeding where Stalin failed.

Anyway, next winter I'll take a series of Aeroflot flights from New York to London to Moscow to Murmansk to Narjan-Mar. Then I'll hire a helicopter and fly north several hundred kilometers.  And if I'm lucky and can find a guide and translator, figure out how to contact the Nenet, get permission to travel with them and actually find my way to a winter camp, I may collect a few interviews on my little digital voice recorder. I may actually begin documenting the impact of climate change on an Arctic people.

Note to self: Batteries don't last very long in really cold weather. Consider buying stock in Ever Ready or Energizer.

Comments

[Malin Jennings]

Dear "Talent Man",

Thanks for your note. The answer is yes, I have other material. But rather than a blog, I now have a web site. The address is www.aujaqsuittuq.com. (The word "aujaqsuittuq" means eternal snow in the Inuktituk Inuit dialect.

Basically, I travel as often as possible to the two most northern communities on earth, Qaanaaq and Siorapaluk, Greenland and interview the hunters on the impact that climate change is having on their lives,culture and environment. Their answers are quite stunning.

Best wishes,
Malin

[Travel Man]

I love this article, do you have more recent up to date posts?

[FreeStoring]

hay!!
good project :)
senks :)