Urban Unangax^ Culture Camp

Urban Unangax^ Culture Camp

Day 5 Tuesday

Less commentary than before.  Mostly the pictures will have to speak for themselves.  Make up your own story where commentary is missing.

 What the guy across the hall had for dinner last night.

 How's the renovation on the Golden Lion coming?

 Rattan soaked in water, 7mm, rib stock

 The rain stopped, the sun came out.  The drum makers' tent.

 9:30 p.m. Golden Lion Parking lot.  this is parked next to us.

Urban Unangax^ Culture Camp

Urban Unangax^ Culture Camp
Day 4
Monday

 Start of the day. Golden Lion Best Western. Pack up and go.

 Our ride. Courtesy APIA

Makeover of the Golden Lion coming right along.

 Culture Camp. 20x20 foot tent where it's all happening

 One girl in the class. Doing good work.

 Out near the lunch counter, pictures of last year's kayak building adventure.

 Meanwhile, inside the tent, iqyax^ decks taking shape.

 On the way from the tent to the coffee urn, dancers learning their steps.

 And the drum corps providing the rhythm.

 And back at the next tent over, Patty is teaching bent wood hat making - samples here for students to emulate.

Two hat makers carving away at poplar blanks.

Urban Unangax^ Culture Camp

Culture Camp
Day 3, Sunday
Sunday we get half the day off. Camp doesn't start till one.  We try to sleep in.  Sleep cycle is off what with sun not going down till about midnight.  Each day more bleary eyed and punch drunk.  The predicted rain has started.  Pictures to follow, not necessarily in a good narrative sequence but strictly in the order they happened.

 Heading out, the golden lion after which the motel is named.  Bizarre.  The big game ethos.  Same thing out at the airport, stuffed animals in glass cases.

 John in the lobby posing with the stuffed heads.

 Breakfast at Gwennies another one of those places with stuffed heads. Corned beef hash, eggs, muffins.

 Musc ox on the wall.  The people on the ground are not stuffed.  Not sure about the guy with the sun glasses on the back of his head.

Stuffed bear near the entrance. 

Wooden Indian on the right, John on the left.

Myself in front of the place.

Gennie's outside wall.

Meanwhile, back at the APIA, kayaks we built the last two years.

Our pile of kayak model wood in the hallway.

The kids ripping lumber for kayak hull stringers.

John's Unangax^ hat.

And desert.  The item on the right is a peanut butter and chocolate bumble bee.  Wings of almond slivers. The bumble bee is an icon of Aleut culture.

Urban Unangax^ Culture Camp

Day 2
Saturday
Today we buy materials and any missing tools we will need to build half scale baidarka models.

 The day starts at the Golden Lion Best Western.

 The owner is apparently a big game hunter.  His trophies adorn the stairwell.

 Mike Livingston drives us around to buy out materials.  But first we have to move some stuff into the trunk of his car before we have a place to sit.

 We stop off at the APIA building to inventory what we already have so we know what we still need to buy.  I ask John to hold up the stomach from the seal that we had at the previous year's culture camp.

 After shopping we stop off at title wave books to see if there are any new Arctic books to buy.  Like we need any more of those.

 I have also stocked up on beverages.

 Seven pm.  Time to call home and check in with the family.

On the way back to the motel we stop of at Lake Hood which has Americas largest collection of bush and sea planes.  Then more weird sleep with the midnight sun streaming in the windows.

Urban Unangax^ Culture Camp

Day 1

Flying to Anchorage from Oakland. Much time at airports. I get window seats on the planes and have bought three crime novels to pass the time.

Six hour layover in Seattle.  Even though I brought my own food I grow tired of it at some point and order vegetable-chicken Gyoza and a beer.  Afterward, my mood lightens.  Then onward to Anchorage. I give up my window seat so a family can sit together.  I doze on and off and time passes quickly. Land at 11:30. Still light out.