Hudson Strait

"Hey, can I go inside?" I asked.

"You want to sleep here tonight? Go ahead."

The school's centre director, shop teacher, and maintenance man had built two snowhouses for Culture Day, which took place a couple of weeks ago.

I went in, and it was beautiful. It was the first time I had been in an igloo.

For me, the morning began when I woke to find that a blizzard had rolled in. It wasn't one of those bitterly cold February windfests which keep you inside, but the wind was strong and the snow was not falling so much as going somewhere else.

The first part of Culture Day took place in the gym, where students performed traditional Inuit drum dancing and throat singing, and something which they named "Cuba Dance".

A couple of teachers had gone to Varadero a few years ago to a Club Med and learned some dance moves, which 1) are not Cuban, and 2) are not suitable for young girls to do in front of elders. One song, which had some pretty cute steps was from Pakistan, I'm sure, but everyone had neglected to tell the students that they don't speak Urdu in Cuba. The other song, entitled "Movimientos sexy" well, you can imagine how that went. I wish I had brought my camera. I thought it was fantastic that students had led this project to learn these steps by themselves, but it wouldn't have hurt for the girls to have a little tasteful guidance.

The afternoon turned out to be fantastic. The wind had let up a little, but the snow hadn't. Now, it came down in huge, wet flakes at a 45-degree angle. It was beautiful.

We walked over to where the igloos had been built the day before, and there were already dozens of people there. Almost immediately, I went inside one f the igloos for tea, which was made on a qulik, a stone stove fueled by seal fat.

The qulik was tended by one of the village elders. The igloo was packed with people, and I began asking her questions about herself, through one of my former students as an interpreter. and she was eager to answer.

"Were you born in an igloo?"
"Me?"
"Yes."
"No, a tent."
"In the summer?"
"Yes."
"How old were you when you moved from an igloo into a house?"
"I don't know."
"How old are you now?"
"I don't know."

Sophie and Noah joined me in the igloo. Noah was safely snug inside his favourite place: his amautik. You should see how happy he is when I put him in his pouch on his mom's back. Seconds later, he does this:

Out cold.

After tea and bannock, I went outside and checked out some of the other things. Unfortunately, the dog teams didn't make it, but the Inuit teachers who organised the day were making up for it by having their own fun. We had an Inuit wrestling tournament (I lost to the phys. ed. teacher), and the kids slid down the mountain.

Then out came the fish and the misirak, the stuff I taped Jean Charest eating when he visited Wakeham for the Pingualuit Park opening.

This is a big bowl of misirak, which is fermented beluga fat, the Inuit equivalent of blue cheese. Every other time I've had it, I've had to hold my breath and choke it down, saying some banality like, "It's different," or "I could get used to that." Maybe I have, because I took scoop after scoop, using pieces of frozen char as a spoon and stuffed it into my mouth.

Mamartuk. Sophie and I walked away, satiated.

"Why is there only one Culture Day? Why does the school only pay lip service to Inuit culture?"
I asked Sophie.

"I think schools have to ask themselves what their purpose is. Should it really be the school's job to pass on the culture, or should it be to teach arithmetic and literature? I think schools everywhere are trying to do too much. Shouldn't parents show their kids how to build igloos?"
She answered.

That's why I made a baby with this woman.

In airports and schools all over Nunavik, there are pictures of elders with texts that pass on some wisdom. One features a stoic looking picture of Johnny Annanack from Kangiqsuallujjuaq (not here; George River) riding in his boat. He argues that today's Inuit leave too many things to the qalunaat and their schools, including raising Inuit children. Sophie and Johnny are right. If it is left to the schools, the bastion of imperialism, to perpetuate Inuit culture, then perhaps in a generation or two, no one will be able to make igloos. That would be a shame.