My bizarre and wonderful trip to Uummannaq

Greenland - and the arctic - is a lot like a small town. If you know somebody that knows somebody that maybe heard of somebody else, then all of a sudden you have new friends and a place to stay.

Example:

Last Tuesday I flew to Uummannaq, a wonderfully beautiful little town on a little island surrounded by sea ice. By mid-afternoon I had seen the town and was wondering how I would spend the rest of the week. The next morning I knocked on the door of a Ann Andreasen, a Faroese woman who runs an orphanage in town and is famous for her hospitality. My motivation for meeting her was that I thought it would be nice to talk with the children at the orphanage about the changes that are happening in Greenland. Anyway, her husband/boyfriend Ole-Jørgen Hammeken, a famous Greenlandic adventurer invited me in for coffee. (It turns out that I had read about Ann, Ole-Jørgen, and their daughter Pipaluk in the book "This Cold Heaven" by Gretel Ehrlich.)

Ole-Jørgen has some pretty amazing stories. He has/is circumnavigating the Arctic Ocean in phases, was the first person to climb the northernmost mountain in the world, pioneered a new dogsled trail from Uummannaq to Ilulissat, and is planning on dogsledding to the north pole this winter to "commemorate" the 100th anniversary of Robert Peary reaching the north pole.

Side note: I may have discovered an interesting piece of family history during my discussion with
Ole-Jørgen. I share the same surname as the polar explorer Roald Amundsen (changed by my one of my ancestors to Amundson), that branch of my family comes from the same small town as Amundsen (Borge, Norway), and supposedly the Amundsen surname did not come into existence until the mid-1800's. Although we haven't yet proved it, there is a good probability that we are somehow related to Roald Amundsen. We know that we aren't direct descendants, especially since Amundsen supposedly didn't have any children - at least not in Norway. However, Ole-Jørgen told me that he met an Inuit person in Gjoa Haven, Canada, who claims to be a direct descendant of Amundsen. So maybe we have long-lost Inuit cousins! What makes the story even more interesting, if its true, is that supposedly Amundsen's shipmates didn't talk about women in his presence - he didn't approve. He was so focused and determined during his expeditions that he didn't want there to be any sort of distractions to him or his men.

Okay, back to Uummannaq. While drinking coffee Ole-Jørgen's house was suddenly filled up with a French film crew! Ann and Ole-Jørgen were in the middle of filming a feature film in Greenlandic, the first such film in 80 years. So now I had a bunch of French friends. They introduced me to yet another French filmmaker who was working on a project with the children at the orphanage. He then introduced me to a French painter, who immediately invited me over for dinner... I think you get the point.

It was a fun and somewhat bizarre week. I ended up seal hunting by dogsled (didn't see any seals) and also gave a short and somewhat unsuccessful presentation at the orphanage (technical difficulties). The hospitality of the people I met rivaled those of Fairbanks. At times I felt like an intruder, but they kept inviting me along. I turned down a couple of offers only because I felt uncomfortable. I probably could have gotten a place to stay if I had been more pushy, but as I already felt like an intruder I decided to stay at the hotel instead.

The dinner with the French painter, his wife, and one of the filmmakers was also very much fun. I'm not sure why the French get such a bad rap. Every French person I've met has been really generous and fun to be around.