The back of our house looks on to a rocky mountain slope. Now and then we hear the bird-like cries of an Arctic fox calling, a sound half way between a howl and a bark. My son loves it. He calls back to the fox and sometimes gets a reply. And every once in a …
This is a recipe for Greenlandic salad. Three of the five ingredients are meat – ‘mattak’ (whale fat and skin), seal meat, and seal intestines… That’s a salad. Greenlandic cuisine is heavily meat-based, for obvious reasons; there isn’t a lot that grows here. Berries – yes, some mushrooms (though these aren’t popular), and angelica, which …
Until a week before our journey, we hadn’t decided if we would sail north or south. In the end, the lure of Evighedsfjord – Eternity Fjord – drew us north. If our nebulous, go-where-the-wind-takes-us summer holiday had a destination, Evighedsfjord filled that fuzzy role, particularly fuzzy because we knew virtually nothing about it. “Beautiful,” “stunning,” …
Glaciers kind of freak me out. They’re beautiful, even awe-inspiring. But also freaky. Huge silent walls of frozen water that sit around doing nothing and then break unexpectedly and frighteningly with a sound like a gunshot. I’ve read too many stories of people who ended up in crevasses, and mostly didn’t get out again, to …
Last week was the longest day of the year, June 21, when in Nuuk the sun rose at 2:53 am and set four minutes after midnight the next day. This strange phenomenon – the setting of the sun after midnight – happens for just a few days around this time of year. But then something …
June 21st is Greenland’s National Day and the longest day of the year. It’s celebrated in every town and settlement in Greenland with cultural festivities. In Nuuk the celebration centres on the colonial harbour with events through the day – speeches, bands, singing, drum dancing, traditional kayaking. Women don their stunning national dress of fine …
Much as I love it, I seem to have plenty of criticism of Greenland. But the Bank of Greenland? No complaints. For one, check out my bank card. It has swimming polar bears on it. Nice. But there are plenty of other plusses. When I first arrived in Greenland, I needed a bank account to …
A Qivittoq is a frightening, often evil creature – a ghost man living in the mountains. Like all good scary stories, the story of Qivittoq is rooted in truth. In days gone by, if a Greenlandic man was guilty of some crime, he could be banished. If that happened, it was a death sentence. No one …
‘The road to hell is paved with good intentions,’ they say. Greenland abounds in good intentions. Mine included. Last year, the Government of Greenland decided that English should be taught from year one in all schools, instead of from year four, as it was at that time. Great idea. English is the international language. English …