FOOTLOOSE 3

Dance of the auroras K.V. KRISHNAN

In a world that goes without light for months, the auroras come as a dazzling relief.

Dazzling colour: An aurora over the Arctic Circle. Oversized mosquitoes were slowly eating me alive as I flailed my arms in an attempt to escape their incessant stings. At well over 35 degrees Celsius, the sun beat down mercilessly that sweltering August afternoon. I was surrounded by a few small bui ldings — a school on stilts, a liquor store, a rundown post office. Across the street a few snowmobiles lay scattered in disrepair.

Where were those smiling Eskimos clad in sealskin boots, commandeering dog-sleds through blizzards impregnable? Whither those womenfolk with smiling babies huddled in baskets patiently cutting up reindeer meat with their keen ulus? Nor were there any signs of those unimaginably tiny igloos snuggling with large families.

Isn’t this what our school textbooks had us believe life was like above the Arctic Circle? The reality of it all soon dawned on me. After all, these were today’s human communities in contact with the Western world since the late 16th Century.

It had all started with the Westerners’ quest for the Northwest Passage — a route that would cut down a voyage to Asia by over 5,000 miles, chipping through barriers of ice and snow along the polar caps. When obstinate walls of ice made this impossible, “civilised” Man stumbled upon another Arctic secret — its marine life. A ruthless hunt for whales and walruses, seals and narwhals then began in frenzy. When plastic and petroleum eventually replaced the need for whale baleen and seal oil, the intruders’ greed shifted to mining and drilling, unleashing plunder and pillage on a community steeped in innocent tradition.

The conquest of pristine Arctic lands and its peoples was inevitable.

Stark beauty

We had taken an hour-long flight from the Alaskan town of Fairbanks to the village of Fort Yukon above the Arctic Circle. Our twin-engine Piper Navajo chopped above the vast tundra — a stubbly yawn of green mountains, stunted spruce and sparkling streams. Mottled white upon those ridges below grazed herds of tenacious Dall sheep. Just as in the last few months, the sun wouldn’t set today — it would just dip shyly to soon rise again, heralding yet another morning.

Our guide who welcomed us at the airstrip, Richard Carroll, was an Athabascan Native American who spoke impeccable English. One of the oldest settlements in these parts, Fort Yukon is the largest Athabascan village in all of Alaska. The village was established in 1847 as a Canadian outpost in what was then Russian territory. Contact with Christian missionaries had started with the Russian occupation of Alaska before the land was sold to the United States for a mere eight million dollars.

The priests had then set out on their mission with zealous frenzy, relegating the Eskimo shamans and traditions as savage beliefs. The lore of the Bible and the advancements of technology had to be grasped but with English — their Gwich’in tongue was systematically banished over the decades.

A typical bush village surrounded by swaths of water and wilderness, Fort Yukon is inaccessible by road — airplane and barge are the only means to get there. Satellite TVs and that rare Internet are their windows to the world outside. Joblessness here is a way of life, even with the exodus of the younger generation to promised lands beyond. Groceries are too expensive to fly in. I noticed that basic necessities of life cost over three times more than what it does in the rest of the United States.

The cheaper option

During those mercilessly harsh winters, subsistence living is a cheaper option. A hunting expedition rather than a trip to the grocery store may precede dinnertime, for, wilderness is only too close by; Bears go raiding these villagers’ cabins as far as 180 miles away across the Porcupine River to where a boat ride is the only option. Ancient tribes knew no boundaries. In today’s world of international lines and permits, Richard would have to pick his hunting grounds based on territorial treaties and international borders.

As our plane chugged the hour-long trip back to Fairbanks. I looked below at a humble settlement of 500. Had the march of modernisation stifled a tribe that should have been best left alone, steeped in its ancient traditions?

The sun would soon sink into torpid slumber as winter would bury this village in months of secret darkness. However, there was hope — the cheerful auroras would return, dazzling the nights in their ancient dance of light and colour. Graceful caribou herds would roam the plains again even as the winds howl along the tundra, clothing evergreens in white robes.

With those indelible smudges of oil spills and pay dirt, ulus and igloos may soon disappear from our textbooks. However, Nature’s wondrous sway will last forever here in a very different world — in the Land of the Midnight Sun.

Fact file

There are but a few small Eskimo villages above the Arctic Circle that are visitor friendly. There are several tour operators that fly to these villages — though typically each operator is affiliated with a particular village.

The Alaskan city of Fairbanks is a good base to take these tours from. Fairbanks is best accessed by flight from Minneapolis or Denver. Fort Yukon is located 140 air miles northeast of Fairbanks and eight miles north of the Arctic Circle, at the confluence of the Yukon and Porcupine Rivers.

Fort Yukon and Bettles are popular Arctic destinations as is Point Barrow at the top of Alaska facing the Arctic Ocean. Though Barrow has accommodation facilities, Fort Yukon and Bettles are typically done as day trips, though cabins are available in Fort Yukon for a night’s stay.

Costs range from $299 to $450 per head round-trip depending on distance and overnight stay options. The daytrip includes transportation, guided tours and snacks at the destination.