The House & other Arctic musings

Going down in (Olympic) flames

I'm not sure why this story about the Olympic Torch's trip through the north struck me as funny. My first thought when I saw it was "Sure, an open flame on an airplane, but if I try to board one with nail clippers or a bottle of water..."

My other thoughts turned to what often happens to my stuff when it travels on a (granted different) northern airline.  So I give you my latest script... Going Down in Flames

INT  CARGO OFFICE, NORTHERN CANADA -   EVENING

A man sits leaning back in a chair his feet up on a desk.  Dressed in dark coveralls and a fluorescent green vest, hearing protectors sit on his head. He holds a paddle with a small rubber ball attached by a rubber band, and he is bouncing the ball repeatedly with the paddle.

The phone rings. Looking annoyed he reluctantly sets down the ball and paddle and answers the phone.

CARGO MAN

Nameless Northern Airline, Cargo Office, may I help you.

Screen splits to reveal a man dressed in a suit, standing in front of the unlit spot for the Olympic flame at a crowded Vancouver Olympic Stadium. He's talking on a cell phone to the Cargo Man.

OLYMPIC MAN

Hi, yes its me Mark from Vancouver 2010. I spoke to you before. Have you found the torch yet?

CARGO MAN

All of our cargo gets forwarded on the minute it arrives here at Nameless Northern Airline.

OLYMPIC MAN

Look, we've already been through this. We still haven't got the torch, it's been three weeks and we really really need it now.

CARGO MAN

Can you describe it?

OLYMPIC MAN
(Yelling)

Its the Olympic Torch!

CARGO MAN

Can (beat) you (beat) describe (beat) it?

OLYMPIC MAN
(Sighing)

Its about three feet long, a wavy silver torch, there's an Inuksuk and the Olympic Rings printed on the sides. It has orangy yellow flames...

CARGO MAN

Whoa! Flames? That would be dangerous goods. Did you know that nine whole coconuts are considered dangerous goods for shipping on an airplane. (chuckles) Coconuts.

OLYMPIC MAN

We've been through this. We've gotten all the permissions. Where is it?

CARGO MAN

Okay, okay, don't get your pants in a knot. Now when did you ship the coconuts?

Murder he writes

It should be pretty straight forward. Although the laws surrounding murder, and what constitutes 1st degree murder, 2nd degree murder and manslaughter are fairly complex, the section that deals with the culpable homicide of a police officer is pretty clear.

Section 229(4) of the Criminal Code lays it out.

(4) Irrespective of whether a murder is planned and deliberate on the part of any person, murder is first degree murder when the victim is

(a) a police officer, police constable, constable, sheriff, deputy sheriff, sheriff’s officer or other person employed for the preservation and maintenance of the public peace, acting in the course of his duties;

Which is why, if the statements of the accused's lawyer in this article are accurate, I wonder just why in the hell there is a trial still going on for the murder of Chris Worden.

Even if you took the accused's, Emrah Bulatci, claims at face value (and I have to say that a claim that you shot someone twice to "hurt" them, and that you didn't intend to fire the next two shots that killed him stretches all manner of credibility) he is guilty of 1st degree murder.

According to the article Bulatci admits he fired the four shots that killed Chris Worden, he acknowledges that it is his fault that Chris Worden is dead. Chris Worden was acting in the course of his duties. He was in uniform, responding to a call of a suicidal person. Bulatci further admits that he was in Hay River to deal drugs, and armed with an illegal firearm.

Whether he intended to kill Cst Worden or wound him is immaterial. He killed a police officer by shooting him four times, knowing full well that his death could result from those actions.

His guilty plea in court today was an admission of first degree murder, and there needn't be a trial to determine that.

The address is in a remote area and deliveries are not made daily

I get that this isn't the easiest place in the world to deliver packages to. We're way up past the Arctic Circle and flights don't come here daily. But it also isn't that difficult. I regularly get Express Post mail, and it is rare that it takes longer than a week, ten days at the outset.

I also understand that not everyone is familiar with the geography up here. Its a big spot on the map, with a lot of unoccupied space. But when you're in the business of delivering packages worldwide, you should have some competency in doing just that. I mean heck, anyone with a computer can figure out in ten minutes where exactly we are, and how things get here.

Not UPS though. I dread when I make an online order and see UPS is the carrier. Because it is a rare, rare occasion that they don't screw up. Packages that take weeks to get here are not uncommon, they often try (and I'll emphasize try) to collect brokerage fees from items ordered from Canadian sites. And they just don't have two clues when it comes to getting things here timely, without them criss crossing the country, sometimes several times.

Having filled up the hard drive on my senescent computer I ordered a new external drive so I can keep processing photos that I take. UPS is the carrier. So last night, with a moderate amount of trepidation, I clicked on the tracking number to see where my hard drive was, and where it had been.

The first thing I saw was that it was in Edmonton with the words that form the title of this post written boldly beside it. I've noticed that this phrase appears on all of their shipments here, so that didn't concern me too much. It was the next thing I read that troubled me. "Ship to Aklavik NT".

Arctic Bay is on the north end of Baffin Island in Nunavut's eastern Arctic. Aklavik is on the MacKenzie delta, in the Western Arctic of the Northwest Territories. If you hopped on a plane and flew directly from Aklavik NT to Arctic Bay NU, it would be about an 1800 km trip. Of course that's not the route my harddrive would take from there to here, and it would be more like a 7900 km trip, down to Edmonton, across the country to Ottawa and then north to here.

So soon I was on the phone to Apple. I love Apple, and I never have trouble with their service, but this was a little overwhelming for the person on the other end of the phone. After talking to UPS they came back (and as an aside they had a really good play list while I was on hold) to tell me that: UPS had tried to deliver the package to me in Aklavik, but were unable to. Now that hardly seems surprising that they couldn't find me there, seeing I'm on the other side of the country, but I was more interested in what UPS was doing to deliver my package to me here. The reply was that they would ship the package back to Aklavik but the address is in a remote area and deliveries are not made daily. I went on to explain that no matter how long or how quickly the package took to reach Aklavik it wouldn't do me much good seeing I didn't live there.

I know she was just trying to be helpful when she suggested that seeing as the package was at UPS's facility in Edmonton perhaps it was best if I just picked it up there, but I laughed out loud and said if I wanted to spend $5000 in airfares I'd go to an Apple store myself and pick the damned thing up. I then launched into a lesson in Canadian geography and began begging that they put some sort of note on my account never to use UPS to ship to me. Never. Ever. But alas that's all done at the factory/warehouse that the part originates in and it would apparently be impossible. 

Luckily my latest order is coming via FedEx.

Gavage

Gavage is the practice of force feeding ducks and geese, usually associated with the production of pate de foie gras. The force feeding produces a disease called hepatic lipidosis, which results in an abnormally large liver, up to three pounds in weight. Animals involved in the production of diseased liver, er, pate de foie gras, are frequently penned up in cages little more than the size of their body. A description from wikipedia describes the process, and the amounts that each animal is force fed.

In modern production, the bird is typically fed a controlled amount of feed, depending on the stage of the fattening process, its weight, and the amount of feed it last ingested. At the start of production, a bird might be fed a dry weight of 250 grams (9 oz) of food per day, and up to 1,000 grams (35 oz) (in dry weight) by the end of the process. The actual amount of food force-fed is much greater, since the birds are fed a mash whose composition is about 53% dry and 47% liquid (by weight).

The feed is administered using a funnel fitted with a long tube (20–30 cm long), which forces the feed into the animal's esophagus; if an auger is used, the feeding takes about 45 to 60 seconds. Modern systems usually use a tube fed by a pneumatic pump; with such a system the operation time per duck takes about 2 to 3 seconds. During feeding, efforts are made to avoid damaging the bird's esophagus, which could cause injury or death

This agricultural practice for the production of food is common in at least one EU country, France and produced in others. To be fair a number of EU countries have banned Foie Gras production.

Gavage is not to be confused however with Garbage, an example of which is the false controversy of a visitor to the Canadian Arctic (in this case the Governor General) partaking in a traditional meal that consisted in part of sustainably hunted seal, a huge part of the 100 mile or local food diet, in this part of the country. A controversy generated by the Europe based International Fund for Animal Welfare, but in a climate created by the EU decision to ban seal products (and inexplicably reported on as "news" by Canadian News Organizations, whose job doesn't include parroting what every "official" tells them to "create balance"). These seal are taken in a humane, sustainable manner: no cages, no growth hormones, no pesticides (apart from those that are accumulating in the north thanks to southern agricultural practices and industrial pollution).

I suppose if the EU wishes to take away their citizen's ability to purchase seal products that is their prerogative. Even if it is misguided and led by problematic charisma. But really it is no business of theirs what a Canadian, even one of the Governor General's stature and profile, eats while in Canada, with Canadian products.  Perhaps if they need something to occupy the time they spend on this nonsense they might turn their attention to several member countries of the EU, whose constant over fishing is helping to empty the worlds oceans.

Close your eyes and imagine...

"Imagine that you're standing at the edge of cliff, looking down at the water far below."

I know that I am a lucky man, in many, many ways. One of the strokes of fortune that I enjoy is a family with no major health concerns. I look around at others and wonder if I could handle the challenges they face. I like to think I can, but I don't know for sure. I have no idea what it is like to have a child with autism (as friends of mine do), or to have ALS (as a friend of mine does), or a child with seizures (as other friends of mine do).

I have a little better understanding what that is like today, because of the powerful voice of one of those friends. If you do nothing else today, go here, and listen to Meandering Michael.

Excellence

Our more than 1,000 First Air employees remain dedicated to excellence in customer service and our belief in continuous improvement.

Scott Bateman: President and C.E.O. First Air

Eleven days ago we had a food mail order from Northern Fancy Meats in Yellowknife delivered to First Air Cargo there.  As we've yet to receive the order, and we have a rather interesting history with First Air and food mail I tried to track it down today.

My first call was to Northern Fancy Meats, to get a shipping reference number and confirm that the order had been shipped. The second was to our local First Air cargo office, which was unfortunately closed for the day, as I reached them after business hours.  My next call was to First Air Cargo in Iqaluit.

Excellence

This is essentially how my call there went:

Me: I'm calling from Arctic Bay and I'm trying to find a food mail order that was shipped from Yellowknife on the 11th that we haven't received.
Cargo: Its not here.
Me: I haven't given you the reference number yet.
Cargo: It doesn't matter.  Its not here, as soon as we get food mail its sent out on the next flight. Its not here.
Me: Do you want the number.
Cargo: Its not here! We ship it out on the next plane when we get it.
Me: Then why did it take one of my orders three months to arrive.
Cargo: Its not here.
Me: Never mind, I'll call down to Ottawa.

Continuous Improvement

A short time later Northern Fancy Meats called back to let me know that a check with First Air in Yellowknife confirmed that it had been sent, that it wasn't in the freezer there, and the system showed it was sent to Iqaluit. I related the above to her. 

Having reached the voice mail of the First Air office in Ottawa I was trying to reach, I left an angry message and then set about putting the details in an email to them. The phone rang again and Shiloh from Northern Fancy Meats again greeted me, this time with the good news that she had found our order in Iqaluit.

She had apparently spoken to the same person I had, who told her the order was there in Iqaluit, and that he had missed seeing it when I had called (which apparently was why he was able to answer me so quickly on my call, I had reached him on the phone in the freezer). He had overlooked our four boxes of frozen meat initially but would ensure they would be put on tomorrows plane to Arctic Bay.

He was also under the impression she was calling from First Air in Ottawa.

Yep, excellence and continuous improvement.

If you are looking for excellence in customer service however I will highly recommend Northern Fancy Meats in Yellowknife. I have used them for food mail for a number of years now and have yet to be disappointed.  Their products are first rate, they package exactly how I ask, and Shiloh, who handles the food mail orders for me is incredibly cheery, and always extremely helpful.  Make your next meat order through them, and tell Shiloh that Clare sent you.

Gallow's Pole

I meant to post this earlier, a congratulations to New Mexico for becoming the fifteenth State to abolish the death penalty. It didn't come from a realization that the Death Penalty is fundamentally wrong, but from the, almost as important, realization that justice systems, despite their best efforts otherwise, are unable to guarantee that no one will be wrongfully convicted, and that innocent people will be (and have been) executed.

The abolition on March 18th, 2009 is something that New Mexico should be very proud of. It is unfortunate that Montana squandered the same opportunity just a few days later, and even more unfortunate that there remains 35 States where execution has not been abolished.

In honour of New Mexico's decision here is one of Robert Plant's and Jimmy Page's most powerful songs. Thank you New Mexico.

Perhaps its time to move to the private sector.

This just saddens me.

If Lattes were Air Fares: A short film

INT   STARBUCKS DOWNTOWN VANCOUVER    EVENING

Two people stand in line at a well lit, clean Starbucks. Micheline, a third year University student and aspiring actor is behind the counter. JACK, the first customer, dressed in a ski jacket taps his foot impatiently as Micheline approaches him from across the counter.

JACK

I've got a bus to catch. Can I get a Vente Latte quickly please?

MICHELINE

Certainly sir, where are you from?

JACK

West Vancouver. But I was born in Halifax, just flew back from there actually.

MICHELINE

That will be $3.50 please

Jack pays and already sipping his latte turns and heads out of the store. CLARE, the next customer in line, approaches. He's dressed in a t-shirt and shorts. He is very very pale.

CLARE

Wow, it's a scorcher today.

MICHELINE (puzzled)

It's only 8 degrees out.

CLARE

Yeah, I know. I don't know how you stand it. Listen, can I get a latte? That big one. (points)

MICHELINE

Certainly sir. Where are you from?

CLARE

Arctic Bay. Its at the North end of Baffin Island. In Nunavut.

Micheline consults a list taped next to the cash register.

MICHELINE.

Arctic Bay... Arctic Bay.  Ah yes, here it is. That will be fifty-two dollars and fifty cents please.

CLARE

Okay. Here you go.

FADE TO BLACK:

For what it is worth

I decided this morning that I would try to extend my coverage of my commentary on air travel (and who knows maybe pick up a reader or two) and fired off this email to my MP, my MLA, the Prime Minister, several cabinet ministers, Senator Adams, and the leaders of the Liberal and NDP parties.

Hello,

I am a resident of Arctic Bay, on North Baffin Island in Canada's High Arctic. Given the amount of attention that the Arctic is receiving these days I thought you might be interested in some of the costs of living here. 

If the Federal Government really wishes to improve the lives of the people who live in the North they must address the issue that impacts absolutely every aspect of our lives up here, the cost of travel.  The high cost of air flights (It costs me fifteen times as much per kilometre of travel to fly from Arctic Bay/Nanisivik to Iqaluit as someone flying from Vancouver to Halifax. Eighteen times as much per kilometre as someone traveling from Toronto to Sydney Australia) keeps all levels of government up here from fully implementing their programs, because of the amount of money spent on travel that could be used otherwise.  Look at the total travel budgets of the GON and the Federal Government for Nunavut, and ask yourselves if this could not be money better spent. 

As a Canadian, my standard of living should not be significantly lower then Canadians living elsewhere in the country, and yet it is.  Most of this can be laid at the feet of Air Transportation costs.  There is much talk about sovereignty in the Arctic these days, but sovereignty is not built by Naval ships patrolling our waters for three or four months of the year, it is built on the lives of the people who live here. They should not have to pay significantly more than the rest of the country in order to keep living here, to keep this country's real presence in the north, and yet it does.

I have written a couple of posts recently on the blog I write about life in the Arctic that you may wish to read. There are two that relate to Air Travel in the North, one a general one on air travel and the North and one with some cost breakdowns  and comparisons.  I think that you might be interested in what they say.

In closing I really believe that it is time for the Federal Government to intervene in this issue. This is a social justice issue, and your dollars (and subsequently mine) could be better spent up here than lining the pockets of the airline industry. I encourage you all to fly up to Arctic Bay/Nanisivik, not by Government plane but by commercial airline (don't announce it or your frozen sandwich might be thawed first). Book the ticket yourselves rather than having an assistant do so, see what it is really like to travel in my world. When you are here, take a walk around our stores and look at what air freight adds to our grocery bills.

Regards,
Clare Kines
Arctic Bay