A Quick Aside...

I think this would be the only way possible for a Jane Austen book to be entertaining.

http://www.chroniclebooks.com/index/main,book-info/store,books/products_id,7847/title,Pride-and-Prejudice-and-Zombies

My fun experiences today

So today I rounded with a doctor specializing in pediatrics and women's health. I got to do the following:

1. See a newborn taken from a Caesarean section and cleaned up. He turned from a dark purple to a bright pink after about 5 minutes on oxygen. Baby's doing fine.

2. Play with a 6 year old girl in the doctor's office. This cute little girl read my name badge and started going, "Erik! Erik! Erik!" and hiding when I looked at her. Then she'd stick her tongue out at me and run away when I made monster noises.

3. Explain to a native pharmacy tech all about the "native traditions" of the Lower 48, to which she was absolutely dumbfounded.

Nine days until I hop on a plane!

The Zombie Apocalypse Approaches

Now, this is just fantastic.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,484326,00.html

Also, a volcano is going to erupt near Anchorage in the next few "days to weeks".

http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/science/01/29/alaska.volcano/index.html

Current temperature with wind chill: -35F

Temperature after volcano erupts: AAAAAAAGGGHHHHHH! IT BURNS!!!!!!!

11 Days to Go

Last night my preceptor invited me and the other pharmacy student over for dinner. He and his wife made caribou lasagna with home-picked blueberry cobbler and ice cream for dessert. Fantastic food. After dinner, we played Uno with his kids. And I won at Uno.

That's right. Six-year olds beware, for I am the Uno Master!

Weather's calmed down again, ranging from 20 to zero, so it's downright balmy here right now.

Looking forward to seeing everyone again.

More Pictures from the K-300

Howdy all!

I've got 20+ pictures being uploaded right now to my photobucket account I took at the K300 sleddog race. The internet connection is slow, and I can only upload a picture about every 5-10 minutes, but I'll try to get them all up in the next hour or so.

To view the pictures, you can click on the ridiculously large photo below.

Pictures!

Photobucket Album

Puppies Postponed Again

Well, because of all the ice the Fiddle Dance was a bust. There were about 5 people that showed up, and twice as many people volunteering so I headed out after about an hour. The ice on the roads became so bad that the cabs stopped running. The picture of the iced-over parking lot is the parking lot of the Cultural Center where the Fiddle Dance was last night. After slipping and sliding home, I watched a bit of TV and headed to bed. Or at least I tried to despite the wailing banshees attacking the city.

About 10pm last night, the wind in Bethel picked up to 54 miles per hour with gusts up to 67. The entirety of Prison Row was shaking and rocking back in forth. As a reminder, all buildings in Bethel except for the hospital are built on wooden pilings. So with the wind whipping above, at, and below the house, I didn't get much sleep. Every so often something would break off of one of the other houses and skid/slide/scrape down the road past my place. So, that was exciting.

Waking up today, the sky is blue but because the streets and everything else is covered in a layer of melty ice the K300 was kicked back again to start noon tomorrow.

New pictures have been uploaded to the Flickr account, and should be showing on the column to the left.

Also this morning I went to Saturday Market, which is a big crafts fair held every month or so where Native Alaskans can sell their wares. I took a picture of the row of furs and myself holding a blue fox fur, which are both posted. The furs include foxes, badgers, mink, rabbit, muskrat and lynx. It was all I could do not to stand there all day and pet them.

So here I am again at the Armenian Pizza Place, uploading pictures and posting to the blog. Tomorrow, if the K300 starts up, I'll make sure to take a bunch of pictures.

Stay warm everybody!

Puppies Postponed

For the last few days it's been pretty warm here in Bethel, getting up into the high 30's. This would be a welcome break from the Hoth-like cold, but the increase in temperature during the day made it warm enough to rain. Then, at night, the rain froze. This has been going on for the past two days and nights, the result being a thick layer of smooth-as-glass-knock-you-on-your-keister ice covering all the roads and walkways. To begin with, not many roads other than the main highways are paved, so the layer of ice makes it terrible to drive on. Two nights ago, the cabs stopped running and I had to walk/slip all the way back to the house from the library. This morning, it was really bad ice so I took a little fieldtrip and bought a pair of ice-cleats called "Yak-tracks" which has to be the cutest name in pedal traction enhancement.

Also because of the ice, and general melty slushy ick that the city has become, the K300 has been pushed back to tomorrow with the hope that more snow will fall to give enough traction to drive on again.

There's a fiddle-dance tonight, so I'm going to get my groove (?) on there. I'll try to get pictures, too.

The Weekend

This weekend was pretty relaxing. I slept alot and watched the entire first season of The Wire, which I had downloaded a few weeks ago. On Sunday I went to the local Unitarian Universalist church, which is held in a log cabin next to a park. Including myself, there were 16 people in attendance. Apparently, the local UU's aren't an official chapter because they don't have non-profit status or a minister. It's more of a group meeting and discussion than religious service and a little more left-wing than I'm used to, but the people are nice and most of them work at the hospital. All the same, I don't think I've even seen so many hippies wearing fur before. When the service ended, I stepped outside and it was snowing (it had been too cold to snow for the past week) and I said, "Oh, look! It's snowing!". At that point, the few people around me gave me a weird look. Apparently, snow is not as interesting of a thing for the denizens of the tundra as it was for me. Anyway, I took a few pictures of the inside of the building and the park. Afterwards, we all went out for brunch at....the Armenian Pizza Place! Needless to say, the restaurant choices here are limited. Either way, it's hard to mess up corned beef and hash. Mmmmmm.

The sled-dog race starts up this Friday, so I'll try to get pictures of that for everyone.

In Soviet Russia, Pizza Eats You!

I found a wireless signal in a Russian pizza restaurant, and so I'm hunkering down here trying to do some work for my rotation. There's a group of 4 guys sitting at the booth next to me speaking in Russian, and I just keep thinking of the line from Simpsons or Family Guy "In Soviet Russia, car drives you!". Apparently, the democratic freedom granted by the fall of the Soviet Union 20 years ago has given Russian citizens to move to Bethel and bake calzones. Hooray democracy?

Tomorrow I'm going to check out the local museum and cultural center, and Sunday I'm going to the local Unitarian church service. Yes, there is one here, although it's not listed online with the main organization website or in the yellow pages. Apparently they meet every Sunday in an honest-to-god log cabin in the middle of a park. Sounds a little too Ralph Waldo Emerson for me, but it could be interesting. Of course, it could be full of left-wing Unitarian revolutionaries that are so vegan they only lick the lichen off of rocks for subsistence. Either way, I'm taking pictures.

I uploaded some more pictures of the hospital and my housing and can be found at:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/piratepharmd/

The sled-dog race is next weekend, and I'm volunteering for parts of it, so I'll make sure to take a bunch of pictures. The cold snap should end by Sunday, and bring the ambient temperature back to zero degrees (it's currently -22 F).

I miss everybody and will try to get more pictures up when I can.

My Cultural Presentation

Yup’ik Seal Hunting

During the spring season, young boys and elders fish by the river while watching for seals to appear. The seals are difficult to find because when they surface for air, they do so in the middle of the river and come up nose first. Then, the seals slowly bring the rest of their head to the surface. To the casual observer, the seal’s head would appear to be a log floating along with the current. Because it is difficult to spot the seals as they come up the river chasing schools of fish, the elders who have great experience, do so. When a seal is spotted coming up the river, or entering the river mouth, CB radios and other high tech communication devices are used to keep in contact with the village and other hunters.

Many boats will be launched from the village when a seal has been spotted, with everyone working together to successfully hunt it. Small harpoons called “bladder darts” will be fired from the boats by use of a “throwing board”, which is a specialized length of wood measured to be the length from a hunter’s elbow to the tips of their fingers. This throwing board increases the speed and velocity of the thrown dart. Bladder darts are used to capture smaller seals, and are composed of a short round shaft with light fletching at the butt end, and a bone or ivory nozzle at the tip into which a harpoon point is inserted. A bladder, which traditionally is made of dried and inflated seal intestine, is attached to the shaft. The harpoon point is connected to the shaft by a line and when a seal is struck, the harpoon becomes embedded beneath the layer of skin and blubber. The remaining shaft and bladder are dragged behind the seal on the surface of the water and serve to tire the seal into being more easily caught.

Villages have traditional food-sharing protocols to make sure all members have a fair distribution of the fresh seal meat. In some villages, the bladders of the bladder darts are individually marked to signify which hunter has completed the successful hunt, and although many people will help in the capture, the entirety of the seal will go to the individual hunter. Other traditions hold that the first seal of the season taken by a hunter is divided and given away to members of the village.

When a young man brings back his first seal, it is a cause for great celebration and is a type of rite of passage ceremony. The seal is skinned and butchered and a designated woman in the village (usually the wife, mother, or grandmother of the hunter) will divide the meat and seal blubber among the rest of the village, with large portions given to the village elders who no longer hunt. The young hunter is not allowed to eat or come in contact with the meat during this time. The young man’s family will save up for many years to prepare for this occasion, and on the day of the ceremony the family throws various objects to the rest of the village to show their wealth and pride. These objects can include gloves, mittens, pieces of cloth, cookware and others.

Traditionally hunters will save the bladders of the hunted seals and hold a Bladder Festival, which can last from 6 to 14 days. This festival takes place every winter, and is a time to thank the spirits of the seals that have been killed, and to release their spirits back to the world. It is believed that if the spirits of the seals have been treated respectfully, they will allow themselves to be killed again by the hunter. Because the inflated and dried bladders are believed to contain the soul or shade of the animal, at the end of the Bladder Festival the bladders and put below the ice so that the seals may be born again and have a new existence.

New Employee Orientation

Yes, it's that wonderful time of the rotation where I get to go to new hire orientation for two days. Got to sit through the standard sexual harrasement talk; apparently it's not OK to grope your fellow employees.
Who knew?

Other than that, my first project is to present a report on Alaskan Native culture this Friday. I chose the traditional seal hunt as my topic. No, this isn't clubbing baby seals or anything. The clubbing is done by the Canadians and Japanese. The actual hunt, which is for subsistence, is done with very strict cultural and spiritual significance. Subsistence hunting, for those who don't know, is hunting for the meat of the animal. There aren't many Walmarts in the native fishing villages after all, and they must hunt to survive. The primary diet is dried fish, supplemented with berries, moose and caribou. I'll post my little report later on, because it's pretty interesting.

I'm trying to get internet hooked up in the little house I'm staying in so that I can upload some pictures and be available to check my email more than once a day, so hopefully that will happen in the next few days. Also, today I got ahold of some taxi vouchers so I might take a little trip this evening down the the Bingo parlor (the epitome of excitement in this area).

Scotch reserves are holding steady.

I've also put my name in the hat to volunteer for the big dog-sledding race coming up next week. You can find some info on it here: http://www.k300.org/core/

In Bethel

I'm in Bethel at the hospital right now (the only place with internet) and it's -45 degrees with wind chill right now, which I know for a fact because I walked here from the house (short walk, but parts of me are frozen). I'll try to get some pictures later this week, because my camera may freeze if I turn it on outside with the temperature the way it is. Also, I'm staying in a row of houses called "Prison Row" because I'm about 50 feet from a prison complex. I went to the grocery store last night and bought some bread, peanut butter, oatmeal, lunch meats and cheese and some stuff to make jambalaya........$69.42. I'll get my cab and meal vouchers tomorrow, so that'll be nice. I have a roomate for the next 3 weeks named Quang. He's from Vietnam and a really nice guy. Well, I'm going to head on back the the house now, which we keep warm at night by setting the oven to Broil and leaving it open. Hope everyone is doing well!

Off to Bethel!

I'm off to Bethel this afternoon, and have added some world clock and weather info on the left hand side of the blog. That wind chill advisory warning means this:

Statement as of 4:56 AM AKST on January 03, 2009

... Wind Chill Advisory remains in effect until 4 PM akst Sunday...

Sub zero temperatures combined with north winds of 10 to 25 mph
will create wind chills as cold as 55 below zero through Sunday.

A Wind Chill Advisory means that very cold air and strong winds
will combine to generate low wind chills. This will result in
frost bite and lead to hypothermia if precautions are not taken.

Wish me luck!

Pictures!

Hey everybody!

I've added some pictures from our (Rose and I) trip to Austin and Colorado. Here are the links to the photoalbums:

www.flickr.com/piratepharmd

www.photobucket.com/peterman99

Also, I spent the whole day from 10am to 4pm walking around Anchorage. I went through the museum, walked along the coastal walkway and had reindeer sausage for breakfast. Mmmmmm.......Rudolf. I thought I was starting to get used to the cold until my eye froze shut for a few seconds because I blinked too slowly. Tomorrow morning I head off to Bethel!

I'm in Palin Country

Well, I got in last night at 10pm Alaska time. The flight was relatively uneventful, and I got a pretty good meal out of the deal. The only interesting part of the flight was when I started talking to the guy sitting next to me from Chicago to Anchorage. I told him I was going to Bethel, and he said, "Oh, we call that place BethHELL".... about that time I went back to my book and ignored him for the next six hours. Got my bags (bottles of scotch intact thank God) and went to get a taxi to the hotel. When I stepped outside, one of my lungs just about froze solid. Apparently, it's -3 degrees Farenheit here right now, which is colder than it usually is for this time of year. So....lucky me!

Got up this morning about 9am (noon eastern time) and I'm about to head out and get some breakfast. This will also be a nice test of whether I'm going to die of the cold, because I plan to walk there. I'll try to take some pictures on the way.