HIgh in the Arctic .. .. Eskiimo !!

Wow. I look forward to reading this thread in full as soon as possible.

Tom.

Sorting Everything out

Each crew receives its shares by taking into account by : in which order each crew reaches the whale after it has been received.

After those shares are given out, then people deliver more shares to each and every house in the entire village, Everyone has fresh maktak and small amount of meat in their house. We received a share each time the whale was divided this year (2) so far. with 6 strikes left to go. if we cannot use our quota due to weather changes or wind shifts then our remaining count is added to the next village's quota and passed on upwards until that number of strikes has been achieved, if possible, but we can never go over that limit imposed on us by the International Whaling Commission.



Absolutely nothing is wasted on a whale, nothing, all bones are carefully cleaned and kept for uses in many ways.



Everyones shares are carefully packed, transported back to the freezers, and then go back to pick up more, 48 tons is many trips by every snowmobile in town. all sleds are packed to the max. This is a happy time, this is all these people want, we just want to eat our food. that is all we want!

The skull is thrown back into the ocean with much rejoicing more so it seems, than when they first received the whale, they rejoice for the "new" whale that will grow, from the skull, this is their tradition or belief.



Whaling Festival is held in June each year. The captain that first strikes a whale successfully, sets the date for this Grand virtual non-stop event.
People from many villages around Alaska, Japan and other countries attend this open invitation to celebrate and feast on the Bowhead whale for 3 days.
Fun games, blanket toss, and you simply will not believe what blanket toss is really all about !

Simply Amazing.
A real insight into another world.
Thankyou for sharing this with us.

Outstanding !

Welcome to APUG.

/Clay

-=[Whaling Festival ]=-

Every June whaling Festival is held, but only if we have a successful whaling season.

Last year we had no festival, we did not get any whales, not even one.

Greenpeace is against us whaling for subsistence rights, that we have enjoyed for thousands of years, they claim that thre is a VAST SHORTAGE of whales, Then how is Japan possibly haresting 1000 whales this year ? and In just one spot in Antartica.??

Now greenpeace (oxymoron) is publishing on the internet, that 300,000 whales & dophins die each year, from "accidents".

The people of point hope are allowed 10 attempts, THAT IS VERY LOP-SIDED

The Festival starts with the cutting of the flippers, plenty of food for everyone for 3 days, virtually non-stop

The oldest elders are honored at the center umiaq, which serves as a wind block as this wind is never ending.


Elizabeth Oviok (postmaster) handing out "Mikiaq" for everyone to eat: DANGER: This is "fermented" whale meat. THINK ! Did YOU have any sugar at all today?? THEN you better not eat this, it will KILL YOU.

No fruit - No sugar - No candy -No soda Pop. NOTHING that contains any sugar, or this food WILL KILL YOU. Fermented whale meat "boils" in your stomach releaseing "toxic" gases that will not harm you. UNLESS you have had sugar, the sugar will harden that "boiling mass" in your stomach so that the "gases" cannot escape, you die from botulisim !

NO THANKS I will pass on that .. I have in my backpack a two day old piece of pizza, fermenting between two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, I am playing it safe.


Again, these women work so hard all day long preparing all of this food, Visitors arrive from all over the state, other parts of the world, and from many villages throughout the state of Alaska. INupiat from other villages such as Kotzebue which can't go whaling due to their location, come up here to go Umiaqtaq "lets go whaling"!


Baleen is given out to special visitors as "gifts". Baleen is a prized gift of the whale, Baleen has many uses as it is strong, plastic like appearance and texture with long fine hairs on it. Each whale has 300 slats or more on each side of the lip. On some of the bigger whales those strips can be as tall as 12 feet or more, depending on the size of the whale.


During the late 1800's and early 1900's Sears sold womans corsets, baleen was the substance or material used for the slats to keep that woman's stomach pushed in. Ballen is very strong and flexable, at the thicker end it is not so flexible.! that is why is was so hard for these gals to breathe.! ha ha.



Patrick Attanguana is showing Whaling Captain Ernie Frankson how to divide the flippers according to tradition of the elders.


Cutting the flippers of the whale is hard work, these knives have to be sharpened constantly, it takes many hours to cut all of this up. The flippers are considered the best part, then they are handed out according to family name(s) & Visitors from other villages.



The sun is high in the sky at midnight and at 12 noon, it is difficult to tell the difference in the time of day, who cares, lets just have fun. We have just the best summers in the whole world, The temp is above zero, but it is still cold with that never ending wind north wind, but on this day, the wind kept shifting constantly, Ernie Frankson said to me, this is my ancestores weather, This is how it always gets when I catch a whale or any of my ancestores, he is smiling as he says, this is my weather, the weather of my ancestors!
to me it is just windy ! and it keeps changing directions all day long. I have never seen that before. Amazing. how these people are just so ONE with nature, the land, the sea and the animals of their domain.

Majik, this is a wonderful story about the constant battle of he people against the cold. One problem I have with the "Green" people in general is their inability to understand the difference between subsistence and greed in human nature. The people must live and work in a very inhospitable climate. In order to live, they must have enough food to last through the winter (which seems to last for 9 months up there).

To me there is a huge difference between the people's use of their world to live and survive, and the greed exhibited by the whaling countries who have decimated the great whales over the last several hundred years. Whaling was done commercially to provide "train oil" for lamps. It used a small portion of the whale and left the rest of the flesh to rot. After several centuries, the result has been terrible. The use by native peoples has not done any harm to the whales. The use of marine animals by commercial ventures has killed off entire species. Too bad the greens can;t understand simple concepts. tim

Absolutely marvelous photos and stories. I have no use whatsoever for greenpeacers. The best description I have heard for animal activists is "The further one lives from the wilderness, the more of an animal rights activist one becomes."

We have a small black bear problem in Northern Ontario. I think the bears should be live trapped, and released on Bloor St in downtown Toronto. Wouldn't be fair to the bears though.

David: You have posted some interesting photographs, many of which I have enjoyed.

Could you tell us a bit about the "handle"/name you have chosen to use here on APUG? Is it an Inupiaq phrase, or something else?

Cheers

Earl Dunbar said:

...Could you tell us a bit about the "handle"/name you have chosen to use here on APUG? Is it an Inupiaq phrase, or something else?

Cheers

Click to expand...

http://www.majikimaje.com/About.htm

Just as I thought.

The Inupiaq peoples are now facing extinction.

This lifeystyle / culture must not die out and disappear.

The Inupiaq people need their food to survive. We have 10 attempts now

we landed 3 whales out of the ten attempts. 3 whales cannot feed this village.

10 attempts ? Greenpeace just posted on the internet . 300,000 whales & dolphins die each year from accidents.

Japan is currently harvesting 1000 whales, the people of point hope got 3 out of 10 attempts.. this lop-sided double standards must stop.

The Inupiaq people must be allowed to continue their subsistence rights to eat their traditional food. Thousands of years steeped deep in traditional values. We only take that which we need to survive. we waste nothing.

My purpose for posting on 30 different photo forums is to let the world know that one of the oldest cultures is about to become extinct if the world doesn't take notice and help stop these hindrances placed on their lifestyle.
All these people want or need is their food! The climate requires the use of blubber for food, this is there way of living for over 2,600 years.

That is the reason, the sole reason. to share with you this unique lilfestyle.

to let people know the incredible amount of work involved Just to eat.

" Just as I thought"... you don't have to pay $135 dollars for a small turkey.

you don't have to sleep outside @ 50 below zero to obtain your food.

No one is harassing your family and preventing them from their right to eat.

YOU HAVE NO IDEA how much these people have to suffer. just to eat.

What John Denver did to these people is the ULTIMATE in lying & greed.

prevert the truth, just to hurt some people who can't understand our way of living.. The Inupiaq people have never depleted any of the resources.

American Photojournalism is a web site devoted to Professional journalism. they have reviewed my submissions and much to my surprise they granted me membership and graciously allowed me to upload a dozen images for their review. Their staff of professional editors, writers, and publishers. read my plea for the help we need to make the world stand up and take notice .

THIS CULTURE MUST NOT BE WIPED OUT. by greedy animal rights groups who place a higher value on an animal than people.

thank you so much for all your interest in my work and the wonderful comments.

I have pages and pages of images with amazing text, to make you aware.

to dispell the myths, lies and outright deception that "others" have perpetrated through various forms of the media. I am just one person, doing his best to help a people(s) that I love with all my heart!

These people are in desperate trouble, This culture must survive!

As a representative of another culture with a long history of whaling (not all of it sustainable, I have to admit), I sympathise deeply.

Anyone who is interested in the culture of the "northern peoples" and their plight would be well served to read some of Farley Mowat's books (People of the Deer, Snow Walker, others). While he has been taken to task on some of his insights and journalistic license, the stories of the hardships of the people are a tribute to human endurance. A movie was made about one of his short stories and is worth watching "Snow Walker" was taken from a story called "Walk well, my brother."

Ole, another book about the marine environment in general was written by Mowat. "Sea of Slaughter" deals with the atlantic ocean primarily and the last few hundred years. As far as a cultural problem with whaling, there is already enough blame to go around. tim

All american indians origin are Turks. There are more than 2500 languages in north and south american continent and extreme big portion of these people call father as ata , apa and mother as ana. This is pure Turkish. If you look Hungrian , Finnish , Etruscan and Sumerian , they are all Turkish origin.
You can read a Sumerian text better with Turkish. Turkish people at eastern siberia developed a written language on to the rock in the caves 40000 years ago. All shamanic tradition of american people come from Siberian Turkish people.
I advise you to read 800 pages book of Selahi Diker , he draws the history of Turkish language in 10000 years. I am an archaeologist and expert on post neolithic cultures . Many people reject this for political reasons but this is stand like a mountain.
And my intention on alaska. I read Ned Gillette article at National Geograpgic Magazine at 1989 about stormy voyage of sea tomato.
They had been built a 8 meters rowing aluminium dory to cross the same route of shakleton. I impressed with the idea but i was too young and didnt know anything about boats and engineering and i started to look for a designer who can design me a steel dory for to cross the north atlantic from east to west. It is too much basic , you can create your design with paper model and apply on steel 9 square meters 6 meter wide 4 mm thick st 40 steel.
I learned welding , i got a ASME cerificate on inspecting weldings with sound and i lost my job. Every effort sinked , money gone .
Than years passed , i learned that a small even a 117 cms to 115 to 90 cms boat can cross the ocean. I spent years to understand and learn the variables , food , water need , fiberglass engineering and production techniques and i changed my mind. I am not crazy to risk my life in the middle of ocean , even a small crack could sink the boat and no one can see you , find you because i had had not money for satellite telephones , epirbs , and survival equipment.
Than I discovered Russia , I am a Turkish man from Istanbul - Republic of Turkey and i thought if i could go to eastern siberia and cross the bering strait to Nome Alaska USA , I could reach my goal.
As you know Russia have secrets and they love to make people far from them.
I dont have money for passports , visas , etc. I thought , if i build one boat for to cross the one of the wildest sea in the world , blacksea and cross it from istanbul to sochi - sochi is the second widest city in the world - russia , go to moscow , train to pasific coast vladivostok , fly to kamchatka , fly to the north magadan , fly to providenia , i reach to bering strait. Than , i build my 100 cms boat for nome alaska and bring them hello from istanbul than fly to usa as a american , cross the all borders until cape horn and write my recipe for the russian immigrants that how you can go from east berlin to cape horn.
Majik Imaje , you are not the only person who left his mother soil and go to nome where his ancestors invented there thousands years ago.
It is sad to hear that my ancestors live a hardship at all america and asia.
If Majik Imaje wants and pm me , i can send this huge , english book to him.

Best ,

Mustafa Umut Sarac

Well I kindly thank you

.. all of the books I have read.. tell the same story that the people that who settled here were from upper mongolia. These people "walked" across from Russia to Point Hope some 2,600 years ago.

Archeologisits have conducted many digs in the area with supporting evidence, unearthed.

All children when are born here. have what is refereed to as the Mongolian Spot a "bright big blue patch" on their backside that eventually goes away.

Many people here in Point Hope have relatives in Coastal Russian Villages. and many times, decades ago they would walk across that vast span of frozen ocean ice.!

I am born and raised in Boston, I flew to Alaska. I have listened to stores by Russian Eskimo's who tell how they WALK across on the ice in the winter to visit relatives Russia ? Alaska - Alaska - Russia

Earliest human remainings goes back to 40000 years ago by californian man. There are people lives in siberia for many ten thousands years. It is not prechrist 600 . If you visit national geographic society , there is a web page and service for to learn your ancestors , you are sending 100 dollars to them , they send a kit which designed to take cell samples from your mouth , this is not a painful operation , only a cotton ball wipes your inner mouth. Than you select who - your mother side or your father side - and they send your genetic past.
If you want to learn your cultures and parents , friends past , it cost you to few hundreds dollars.
If you have no money , you are the man they are looking for and may be they send free kits to you , write to them .
Dead Link Removed

Dead Link Removed
if you look above listed map , you see , first man went to america 60000 years ago with crossing the bering.
You are living in a culture 30 times older than you think , ngs says this not me.
Did you switch to digital and a printer ? You dont need to melt and filter tons of water anymore. I think electronics perform better at cold but it will be a problem when you go inside the house. I think you need a digital underwater camera like ng explorers used nikonos at jungles.
Can anyone donate waterproof digital cameras to this brave man ?

Best ,

Mustafa Umut Sarac

Mustafa Umut Sarac said:

Earliest human remainings goes back to 40000 years ago by californian man. There are people lives in siberia for many ten thousands years. It is not prechrist 600 . If you visit national geographic society , there is a web page and service for to learn your ancestors , you are sending 100 dollars to them , they send a kit which designed to take cell samples from your mouth , this is not a painful operation , only a cotton ball wipes your inner mouth. Than you select who - your mother side or your father side - and they send your genetic past.
If you want to learn your cultures and parents , friends past , it cost you to few hundreds dollars.
If you have no money , you are the man they are looking for and may be they send free kits to you , write to them .
Dead Link Removed

Dead Link Removed
if you look above listed map , you see , first man went to america 60000 years ago with crossing the bering.
You are living in a culture 30 times older than you think , ngs says this not me.
Did you switch to digital and a printer ? You dont need to melt and filter tons of water anymore. I think electronics perform better at cold but it will be a problem when you go inside the house. I think you need a digital underwater camera like ng explorers used nikonos at jungles.
Can anyone donate waterproof digital cameras to this brave man ?

Best ,

Mustafa Umut Sarac

Click to expand...

Mustafa,

Please get a grip here. The guy is originally from Boston on America's east coast. He is of European heritage.

He went to Alaska 30 years ago and lives there now.

As he told you, he is NOT a native Eskimo!

Geez!

I know it , he talks like a eskimo and he defends their rights on whaling , finding food etc. He defends their cultural heritage and deceasing traditions , daily life etc.
He is a part of the comunity and tries to learn more , documents the culture .
He needs to know more and i wanted to help him.
May be he thinks he is a eskimo or may be he thinks he is a antropologist living with them. He says eskimos coming from siberia 2600 years ago , they came there 55 to 40 thousand years ago.
You get a grip , ...... of europeans

Mustafa Umut Sarac said:

I know it , he talks like a eskimo and he defends their rights on whaling , finding food etc. He defends their cultural heritage and deceasing traditions , daily life etc.
He is a part of the comunity and tries to learn more , documents the culture .
He needs to know more and i wanted to help him.
May be he thinks he is a eskimo or may be he thinks he is a antropologist living with them. He says eskimos coming from siberia 2600 years ago , they came there 55 to 40 thousand years ago.
You get a grip , ...... of europeans

Click to expand...

Maybe you should visit his web site:

http://www.majikimaje.com/

BTW: Majik Imaje is an acronym of his children's names - it's not an Eskimo phrase:

Dead Link Removed

Coincidentally, it is also a misspelling of an English phrase that could mean photography: Magic Image

This is the Web - few things are what they seem.....

The photograhs have all disappeared ??

I have no idea why all of these photographs have disappeared.

they are still on other forums but none of my images are showing up here now. I have no clue as to why!!

AND FOR WHAT IT IS WORTH.. I am not concerned what happened 2,600 years ago or 50,000 years ago.

I am concerned with today and what can be done to prevent this people from becoming extinct as a culture.

Majik_Imaje said:

I have no idea why all of these photographs have disappeared.

they are still on other forums but none of my images are showing up here now. I have no clue as to why!!

Click to expand...

I checked a few of your posts and the links are still there, even though the images aren't coming up. I suspect a server problem.

It could be that the images are still in your browser cache for the other forums, but maybe you haven't checked in here for a while, so they've been cleared from the cache. Try clearing your browser cache and see if they still show up for you elsewhere and on your website.

I get a:

403 forbidden
Server configuration does not allow access to this page

error when attempting to access http://www.majikimaje.com/ or any of the images on the site.

Possibly you have hit your monthly bandwidth allowance? If so, it's not surprising given the interest they have attracted.

Cheers, Bob.

hallo

great pics and good storys
really great

more,more more

good light

thomas

Whaling Festival continued

and forgive me for not getting back sooner.. I found out the problem with the images disappearing. My host had one of their servers hacked, and it just happened to be the server my site was on.. 100's of web sites went down. The next day my e-mail was overwhelmed with filth mail for a subject line. and someone took the time and courtesy to send me over 50 dangerous viruses. This all happened at the same time. so I am inclined to think they are related.
I was banned form a photo forum, Mike Jordan a member of NW photo forum decided to lash out, admin thought it was funny and did not care. this developed into quite a scene as this individual insisted I was lying about everything. No matter how much proof I provided I was insulted and ridiculed in ways not acceptable for professional people.

I have taken the advice of some of the members here and started a "blog" I don't know what a blog is.. I started one.. the name of it is.. ..

"A blog of ice" the photo of this blog must be seen to be appreciated. I could not think of any other appropriate name, not after seeing the image I picked as a header this new feature.

A Blog of ICE

but back to whaling festival.. hundreds of visitors. 800 residents.. how would you like to cook for that amount of people for days ?? 3 days non -stop celebration !!! This year we had visitors from New Orleans.

You are all welcome to whaling festival next June. stay tuned for the date of the event.. usuallly about June 10th is the norm.

Cooking all this food is quite a chore but these women can perform such incredibly hard work in such little time.

One thing I just love about the arctic.. .. "no bugs" !
We have mosquitos, but they just can't fly in that strong north wind.

In fact in the state of Alaska the state bird is.. .. the mosquito !!

I have seen two inch wing spans !! When that wind stops and it does occasionaly.. it is impossible to go out on the tundra, the thick black blanket of mosquito's descends on caribou like I have never ever seen a black cloud like that before.

They rarely if ever present any type of problem in the village.



The wind is just right today and insects will not be a problem.. Other than house flies and mosquitos.. those are the only two types of insects or bugs I have ever seen.. good!


A lot of women work all day two days straight to keep up the pace for providing food for all the guests at whaling festival. This is a time of great joy for the success we had during the hunt out on the ocean ice.



Cooking for a thousand people ha ha ha.. what a chore.!! who does the dishes ??? ALL OF those women do it all, cook, clean, and work all day for very long long hours. But no one ever complains of anything here.. that is another thing I just love about these beautiful people. How much they appreciate the simple things in life.


See how dark that plywood is.. .. Oil... flammable oil from the blubber melting, out in the hot sun. Great care must be taken around this substance. blubber is extremly flamable as is seal or walrus! Food sure is different up here. but I cannot eat this type of food.. I always make sure i have an extra bag of M&M's with peanuts in my backpack or in my jacket pockets!!

Whaling Festival means .. .. New parky's

This is the one time of year, everyone receives a new parky, a fancy dress parky.

This young mother proudly displays her handiwork as she made new festival parky's for the entire family. In the very old days. The woman of the house would have to make all new clothes for her entire family, before she was allowed to go to sleep.



The fancy trim at the bottom of the Parky is called Kupaks (coo pucks)
Each year the women compete as to see who can create the fanciest kupaks.

I was honored so much, these women put so much work into making these fancy kupaks. Irma Oktollik came to me when she saw me working on my needlepoint. ! I want that for my parky she stated. I love that design, (bargelo) I want it in blue & yellow. It took me over 40 hours to design and create her kupaks,using colorful perl cotton. women were fighting over these. I was offered $500 for the Kupaks I made for Irma, Her sister was visiting from Pt. Lay and she wanted those for her Parky. !! sorry, those belong to Irma !!



This little fellow looks right proud of his new parky made out of muskrat. There are so many designs and patterns and ideas that go into making these parky's that cannot be purchased in any store.

Write to any of these women and they will create a parky for you for about $150.00



This future whaling captain is mighty proud of his new parky, Native Pride!
These people impressed me so much, all that hard work in such terrible conditions.. just to eat! And they never complain !!!!