A distant island, far far away

by Tracy Sachs

I've been back from this incredible journey for about 1 week and am still processing all of the amazing sights, sounds, people and experiences of the week. I realize now that for the past 4 months, I had been so focused on the planning and working out the details, I hadn't really stopped to think about what an amazing life experience the "Alaska expedition" had the potential to be -- a week touring an incredibly beautiful place with an inspiring and wonderful group of people dedicated to learning as much as possible about some of the most pressing environmental and ethical issues of our time - -what could be better?!

We started our week together by making the long journey to Shishmaref on Sunday morning, which meant flying to Nome and then taking a charter flight to this tiny island community. I had never been in a place so wild - so un-inhabited. Looking out the window from the flight, there was no sign of human activity for hundreds, if not thousands and thousands of miles. And yet, we were about to visit a place where the effects of climate change were visible to the naked-eye. I couldn't help but think about this contradiction as we made our descent into Shishmaref, which by the way, was the most unique and exciting welcome I'd ever had departing an airplane.

We were greeted on the airstrip by Nancy, our local village contact, and several members of her family, all there waiting to transport our luggage and us, in tiny wooden wagons pulled by A.T.V.s. I scrunched into a wagon with a couple other folks, along with 2 little boys who were about the age of my son Ben. They were wide-eyed and curious, just like me! When I close my eyes and think about our 2 days in Shishmaref, those are the faces I see - 2 little boys - so young, so curious, and born into a community experiencing incredible upheaval and change. Their faces continue to remind me that the decisions we make today about climate change are going to have the biggest and most profound impact on these boys, and my own children. I came to realize during my visit in Shishmaref that the main reason the village of Shishmaref has voted to move together as a community is to have some hope of preserving their life and community mostly for their children.














I highly recommend checking out Carl Safina's blog entry "Baked Alaska" about Shishmaref and the rest of the trip. Carl is President and Founder of Blue Ocean Institute, a Center board member, and one of the scientists on the trip. For me, his writing about Shishmaref captures the essence of our the visit there: carlsafina.org.

Before the trip, Shishmaref was a logistical challenge of figuring out how to get the group there, what and how to eat, and where to sleep. We brought in all of our own food and prepared it as a group (we divided people up into kitchen crews. We slept on air mattresses (also brought with us) on the floor of pre-school. The 18 of us shared one bathroom and there was no shower. But an amazing thing happened to the group when we were out of our element -- the lack of privacy, fancy restaurant meals, and hot showers didn't seem so bad. In fact, it brought us together and allowed for lots and lots of time of discussing, learning and some fun.

I'll never, ever forget our last night in Shishmaref. We stayed up late playing Apples to Apples and my sides hurt from laughing and finally got to sleep around mid-night, just as the sun was going down. We were awakened 20 minutes later by the high school teacher, Ken, calling out that the Northern Lights were dancing across the sky and there was a full lunar eclipse. We all dashed outside as fast as we could and stood in awe "til nearly 2:00AM. It was a magical night, and even though I was 5000 miles away from my own family, I felt so much at home.