A white orb shimmers in and out of watery focus, framed by liquid blue that shields this pale sun from reflected clouds in the silvery, mirrored surface of the sea. The inlet that leads to the old settlement of Kangeq narrows as we approach, rocky walls closing on both sides. Irridescent green vegetation clings to the ground, smattered with yellow wildflowers. The colours are vivid against the heavy grey hummocky landscape. As we crawl along the blue-green channel, old houses appear up in the hills around us. Like people, watching, they seem tall, solid, stoic against their rocky backdrop. But the windows are dark. The glass is broken or gone. We come nearer and I see that daylight drifts through the places where rafters once were. We pass a squat, stone building and I see that it hides a fallen wall, a pile of stones, as if it had suffered some ancient battle.
Kangeq is a town with many ghosts. People have lived in this part of Greenland for thousands of years. Relatively recently, almost three hundred years ago, the arrival of the missionary Hans Egede marked the first settlement of the Danes in Greenland, just north of Kangeq. And within a few years he had moved his mission to Nuuk, now the capital. But Kangeq continued to be an important centre for trade for hundreds of years. And the record of the people who lived here remains – for the moment – in the relics preserved in the soil.
But those relics of the past are not the only ghosts.
In living memory, Kangeq’s hunters were reknowned. It was a proud place. But that changed in the 70’s when the Danish Government closed Kangeq and many other small Greenlandic settlements. Reluctant to maintain the services – the store, the power, the church – the Danes closed them all and everyone moved to Nuuk, the big city, from settlements up and down the coast. Instead of living in small communities of tens to hundreds of people in family homes, people were crowded into apartment blocks – blocks that still stand today. It was only a short distance – an hour’s sail – from Kangeq, but it was a cultural clash that was too much for many. In the city, being a hunter was no longer something to be respected. And so came the new ghosts of Kangeq. When it closed, there were 50 or 60 people still living there. In the few years after it closed, at least ten people from Kangeq – around twenty percent of the population – killed themselves. Almost all of them were young men, a generation of men.
As we continue into Kangeq, we pass the bridge that once stood between the two parts of the settlement, now fallen into the sea. But I am surprised, and pleased, to see new summer houses where last year there were only ruined foundations. An old woman shuffles on stiff legs from a bright yellow house and starts the long process of organising her fishing nets. She waves as we anchor our boat. Then children burst from her front door, tearing along dilapidated paths between the buildings, old and new, and I feel a crooked smile growing on my lips. Perhaps it’s not much to smile about but, unexpectedly, Kangeq seems like a place where life is possible again.
