Bush Teaching: Vol. 2

Welcome back friends. This time I'm going to write about the village of Eek, where I've been living for a while. Also, I got a puppy! I adopted her from a litter in the village, and I have named her Scout.

The Village of Eek

Eek is a village of around 300 or so people. This number is constantly changing. People move from village to village often, especially the villages of Quinhagak and Tuntutuliak, which are very close to us. On clear days you can see the lights from these villages.

When you come to Eek, you'll land at our airport, because air travel is one of the only ways to get to the village. No roads connect Eek to anywhere else.

Take all your notions about what an airport is, and throw them away. Our airport is a gravel strip. When the plane lands, you get out onto the gravel next to a big blue shed, which houses the machine used to keep the runway in good condition. There are no TSA agents, and all the waiting for your flights happens outside in the elements, whatever they may be.

A short ride later, you'll start to enter the village. You can see the village from the airport. The school is a huge red building, and the teacher housing is right beside it.

The houses are painted bright colors, Barney Purple, Sprite Can Green, and a blue that reminds me of those glass orbs you tie to fishing nets. I know where a few people in the village live by now and have visited their homes, and the bright colored houses always serve as landmarks in my mind. To get to a friend's home, I know to walk toward the airport until I get to the second purple house, the one that is the color of lilacs, not the Barney purple one.

There is one store in town. The store has canned goods, some cleaning supplies, candy, and a small assortment of frozen goods. You would not believe the prices people have to pay in the bush. I know most people are used to seeing Ramen noodles for like, .28 per package. Here, they're almost $3.00. A small container of Downy fabric softener might run you $40. The store also handles ammunition and a small financial institution that can cash checks. We even have an ATM!

Eek also has a slushie store! A gentleman from the village sells slushies and rents movies from his porch. It's a great treat, and we teachers often go just to chat and walk around the village.

We have a very small health clinic that can treat minor health issues and refer to Bethel for other things.

Our post office is always a hub of activity, because everything has to come in on an airplane through the mail, now that barges can no longer travel on the river.

There are two churches in town, an Orthodox and a Moravian. The services are in Yugtun. Hearing the church bells ring always makes me happy!

Each night, a siren sounds for the curfew. Kids have to be back in their homes right after the siren sounds. 9 on weeknights, 10 on weekends.

On the opposite end of town, we have our old airport and the town dump, where all garbage is disposed of. There is also a washeteria for laundry, a tiny hardware store, and the office of the Coastal Villages Regional Fund.

I'm sure there are other parts of town that I will learn about later on, but that's it for now!

xoxo