Skippin' rocks in the Arctic Ocean

It's been about two weeks since we've posted. Since then we flew up to Nuiqsut and started getting settled in, flew to Barrow for a week of new teacher training, and came back to Nui to finish settling in and start school. Today is our third day at school; we have a few days of workdays and in-service, and school starts next Monday, the 14th.

While in Barrow, I actually skipped rocks in the Arctic Ocean. I'm not sure it was the fulfillment of a lifelong dream or anything like that, but it was definitely cool.

The principal has had to do some shuffling of personnel, since some people ended up not coming, so several of us didn't know for sure what we would be teaching until we came to school Tuesday morning. I was one of the lucky ones: I will be teaching what they said I would [but the computer network is experiencing some glitches, so I can't use the programs in order to become familiar with them]. Janet wasn't so lucky: she got bumped from fifth grade to special ed ["Once a special ed teacher, always a special ed teacher."]

The school facility is great, and we think it will be a good experience working with the other teachers here. We had a great time in Barrow with the other new teachers, and this week we are meeting the teachers who are coming back.

Already Noticing Some Differences

We've been here about 72 hours, and here are some things we've noticed:

* The sun is still up at 11:10, and is light enough to walk around until almost midnight. The sun comes up at about 5:00. That is changing every day, but it's light a long time. (It will be even worse when we go up to Nuiqsut; they are experiencing 24 hours of daylight right now, and will be for another couple of weeks.)

* People here tend to stay up late (at least during the summer) because it's so light out.

* "Outside" doesn't mean the outside of the house; it means somewhere else besides Alaska. For example, "We'll be going outside for Christmas."

* * * There are others we've seen, but I can't think of them right now (it's 12:15 AM; see #2 above). Check back here for more culture differences. * * *

Made it to Alaska!

Hi from gorgeous Anchorage, Alaska!

(It's been a long time since we've written, so the next one or two posts might be kind of long.)

We got all of our possessions that we aren't taking to Alaska packed into the srotage building (with a little overflow), got everything packed into our suitcases, actually got a few hours sleep last Monday night, got to the airport on time, and made it to Alaska.

It is *really* pretty here. There are mountains to the east of Anchorage; and if you are on the north side of the city, and if the weather cooperates, you can see Mt. McKinley.

Wednesday Janet's cousin and her husband took us to see some sights south of the city. We saw a train engine with a nine foot rotary snowplow on the front; a wildlife conservation park (similar to Exotic Animal Paradise in southern Missouri, or Fossil Rim in Texas, except all the animals are native to Alaska); Portage Lake and Portage Glacier and some other glaciers (but we didn't see the glaciers up close this trip); and several other very interesting sights, as well as several animals and tons of gorgeous scenery.

Thursday and Friday we spent shopping and making arrangements to have things transported to the village.

Over the next day or two, I think we'll be going to Seward, and also I hope to see something called "bore tide" or "tidal bore." There are only a few places in the world where you can see them, and this is one of them. I'll take pictures, but until then you can take a look at this site: www.alaska.org/bore-tides.jsp

All for now.

First Post

This will be our attempt to chronicle our move to Alaska.

We will be moving to Nuiqsut, a small village on the North Slope, near the Arctic Ocean, and teaching in the public school. the village has a population of about 500, and the school has about 131 students.

Janet will teach the 5th grade class of about 12 students, and I will be running the computer lab, and monitoring the students as they use some of the diagnostic and teaching programs.

Right now we are just trying to get everything in Missouri packed up. Last week we finally sold our house in Texas, and took care of everything in order to get some closure on that part of our lives.

All for now.