Education in the Nunivak Bush of Alaska

Sat. August 29th. I woke at 7:30 Alaska time and decided to take a walk alone to reflect about my last two days with the Cup'ig Eskimo people. I wanted to try to remember as many stories and interesting things I had seen and been told. The children have been a delight and as sweet and funny as any children one meets in the world.

I had one last thing I wanted to get done while I was on the Island and that was to walk through the cemetery. I tried during several of my tours with the children to go see the cemetery and the children simply changed the subject or they immediately changed our direction for another destination. I quickly understood it is not the same as my children who grew up playing in our cemetery. They even played basketball over there as the woman who rented the caretakers house had two boys the same age as two of my youngest kids. The cemetery was the playground out in the country as we were 2.5 mi. from town.

The cemetery was only a short walk from the little house we were staying in. So with movie and still camera in hand I began my trek through the silent streets. As I trudged through the sandy street up to the grassy windblown hill over looking the sea I could see the white crosses. The brightest white ones I came to see whee the newest. All the crosses where the same and for the exception of three or four they were all just crosses, no adornments, flowers or other decorations. The crosses all had the name of the deceased, the DOB and the DOD. It appeared they were put up painted and labeled and then they were never repaired or repainted after the time they went in. There were many that had been long stripped of their paint and information by the constant winds, blowing sands and harsh weather.

There was one grave that was heavily adorned with silk flowers, a sitting angel, many little shells and rocks. I looked through the artificial silk flower vine wrapped around the cross which covered the DOB and DOD. I carefully moved the flowers to see the name and information only to find it was the 6 years old girl that Nus and Howard had told me about.

This little girl fell through the ice and went under the water. They said how fortunate they felt to be able to recover the body. It would have been an even more tragic death to have not recovered her for burial. That would have been the case with us all. When there is no body one feels empty and has an even more difficult time with the morning process without a body. This young and tragic death impacted everyone in Mekoryuk as one can only imagine. This entire ordeal was horrible. When something happens to someone in Mekoryuk
I have come away from this village a changed woman. I will never view life or circumstances the same again. I was so richly and deeply touched by all the people I met on the Island. having the precious opportunity to give copies of all my books, audio books and to spend time with each child if only for the time it took to ask their names and sign each book for them it was still life altering.

I only pray they feel a little the same...that would satisfy me. There are actually no words to describe the feelings I felt and the instant and deep affection I feel for the Cup'ig people. Their beautiful faces and gracious smiles are enough to win even the coldest heart. I am still pondering the praying about the emotion I continue to feel about this adventure I so desperately knew I had to make. I had to do more research and see, feel, smell touch, everything I could in my short three day stay in order to finish the last three books for my Nuni of Nunivak Island series.

Beside all this my poor artist Juliann Kaiser said, "you had better take thousand and thousands of pictures for me!" We had both worked on Nuni basically blind and when I walked and came across one beach which looked exactly and I mean exactly like the one in our book I stood and with goose bumps running all over my body I just wept uncontrollably. I asked God how is it possible Juliann and I could have made such an incredible connection without ever seeing this incredible place?

I always say that as soon as we meet another person our lives are altered forever. You can never go back to being the same person as that new person who comes into your life changes you. So I say thank you to Nus for helping me these past three years, and to Howard her dedicated and gentle husband, i will never forget the fast and easy smile of Solomon, the first Cup'ig man who met us at the air strip, I thank Alice, Edith, Annie, Pam, Boyd, Peggy from the school for their warmth toward us. I will never forget Ralph, Stephen, Nathan, Sandra and most of all all those wonderful, wonderful children in the Mekoryuk School. I love you all and pray the Nuni books bring pride to you and enrich your lives.

I want the world to know about this quickly vanishing people. Their language and very existence is in peril. We could actually see them become swallowed up by our present day society. They need to find work, go away for their educations and they marry into other cultures more readily in this day and age. I hope the Nuni series will capture and preserve some of their culture and beauty. Thank you my dear friends.

I will be adding more as I can think back on all this. I will be posting pictures and video after I can get home and get settled.

As they say on Nunivak "tawa piura" my friends.