Three lovely links from my frozen friend Penny

This is a Canadian Culture post for my Australian readers.

Bits of Canada are frozen bits. Actually, the majority of the country is pretty cold, although not where I’m from. My friend Penny, originally from Vancouver, now lives in Iqaluit, in a very frozen area called Nunavut (as opposed to Therestofut, where everyone else lives). Nunavut is a brand-new Province that most people from Southern Canada (otherwise known as Therestofut) forget about. Penny’s up there trying to fix this problem by working for the Tourism ministry. I’m helping out by linking to her website. Three times! (That was one).

Here’s two: she’s reprinted a fantastic poem by Robert Service called The Cremation of Sam McGee , a poem that every Canadian schoolkid learns off by heart, or at least hears a few times. It reads like a Nick Cave song:

There are strange things done in the midnight sun

By the men who moil for gold;

The Arctic trails have their secret tales

That would make your blood run cold;

The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,

But the queerest they ever did see

Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge

I cremated Sam McGee.

(It goes on…)

The third link to her site is the reason I went there in the first place, and is a major piece of Inuit (the First Nation of the Canadian frozen bits) culture: An iglu (or, more commonly and incorrectly “igloo”). There’s some kind of a contest to make them during some kind of a festival. I’m a bit vague on the details, but Penny’s posted more knowledgeable words and pictures on her site.

After all that snow talk, I’m feeling cold. I think I otter go to Darwin.