Unveiling the Beauty of Unalakleet

“Wherever you go becomes a part of you somehow.”

-Anita Desai, author

The Bering Sea from Unalakleet. :)

I begin this post in the air, flying from Anchorage to Juneau! This week has been a time of beautiful sights and people, and some of my favorite moments have been spent looking out the airplane window at the gorgeous, snow-capped mountains and valleys below me as I explore this incredible state. I can now say that I have spent time in three different places in Alaska, and each are so unique and amazing!

Flying into Anchorage!

My time in Anchorage was the perfect way to start break. Sophia and I stayed with an awesome friend we made while playing in the Orfeo opera, so we got to spend time with her and two of her hilarious, young boys. When we weren’t attending the job fair, we were catching up on sleep, watching Downton Abbey and Lord of the Rings with our host family, and driving around to all the big sights of Anchorage (mostly so we could try to find a moose walking along the road- and we totally saw one!!). Although I only spent a couple days in Anchorage, I can definitely tell it has a different feel. It reminded me a lot of Seattle or even Chicago. It has an urban feel that honestly felt foreign to me! I think I have been in charming, spread-out Juneau for so long that I have grown accustomed to recognizing people wherever I go and never having traffic. It’s interesting that after living in one of the biggest cities in America for the past four years, I felt homesick for Juneau when I was in another big city. I will say, though, that I met some wonderful people at the job fair and heard about some intriguing opportunities- including a potential position in Anchorage. So I applied for a few positions, just to experience the process and keep my options open, but we will see!

And then on Sunday afternoon, Sophia and I boarded a flight to Unalakleet (Heidi was with us this whole time, but she had friends she got to visit in Anchorage, which was really neat for her, and then we happened to be on different flights to Unalakleet for some reason!!). I knew this week was going to be different when the attendant at the check-in counter asked to weigh each item I had and asked my current weight. I understood his reason for asking that when I saw how small of a plane it was! Passengers were placed strategically around the plane to balance out the weight, and we were off. The flight attendant passed out earplugs shortly after we boarded, and I realized as soon as the engines were turned on why those would have been nice to have!! That was the loudest hour and a half of my life. :P But I was seated next to a kind man who was from Unalakleet and has two children in the school where the three of us taught all week. So I got to hear all about his village during the flight.

NOT THE RAISINS!!

There are so many stories and comments I’d love to share about my time this week...it was really neat to live in a village in the Alaskan bush for a little bit. There were some things that didn't surprise me, and others that did. First of all, we had all been warned that the food would be very expensive in Unalakleet because it is so isolated, and that was definitely true! Thankfully, we all went to Fred Meyer (WOO HOO Fred Meyer!!) in Anchorage before we left and stocked up on all meals for the week. We did walk around the one grocery store in town a couple times, and I discovered that some of my favorite items were 2-3 times more expensive than what I normally pay. I will say that Juneau’s prices are also higher than anywhere else I have lived, so some of the items were about the same. The one that shocked me the most was, a regular-sized bag of raisins was $11.87! And a pack of Oreos was $8…! Another thing I was prepared for was the size of the village. It is only 3 miles long, so you can easily walk from one end of town to the other, which the three of us did often throughout the week. But the village looked so small when we flew in! It was pretty amusing because the nice man next to me pointed out the window as we flew over Unalakleet and said proudly, “That’s home!”, and I looked out and only saw mountains and water...I was so confused! I then focused my eyes a little more over the landmass and realized there was a tiny oval filled with colorful houses, nestled in the mountains. I had already replied enthusiastically before I saw it, but I was glad it ended up being genuine. :) And the village definitely had the small town feel I expected. Everyone knows everyone, and many people share the same last name. I was actually observing a third grade math class all week and noticed that five kids in the class had the same last name. I turned to the cute, bubbly girl next to me and asked if she was related to the boy across from her, and she sat back in her chair for a second, looked up in deep thought and simply said, “Hmm...I don’t know!”.

Our dorm that houses many teachers in Unalakleet!

Besides that, there were many surprising things about Unalakleet that really blew me away. First of all, people drive snowmobiles as vehicles! I got off the plane and picked up my bag outside of the tiny airport terminal, and there people went, getting on their snowmobiles and zooming off to their houses. Many people also had cars, which was surprising to me. People have to fly their vehicles up there or put them on a barge, which is very costly. And yet, so many people do it! Other surprising things: there were dogs EVERYWHERE! It was HEAVEN! Most residents had dog houses outside their homes, and their dogs would be hanging out outside all day. Some dogs were even running around the village and would come up to us to say hi. We met an adorable husky puppy yesterday and had a blast chasing her around (or was she chasing us…?!). I also saw a dog that legitimately looked like a POLAR BEAR. SO CUTE! Another surprise: I totally thought we were going to be sleeping in sleeping bags on the floor of an unheated school, but I could not have been more wrong! First of all, Unalakleet has a really nice school. It is one of the nicest buildings in the village. You can tell as you walk around the school that the village makes education a high priority. There is a strong wifi connection (something else I didn’t expect!), a nice gym, SmartBoards in every classroom, a beautiful music room, and anything else a school anywhere else would have. I was incredibly impressed with the facilities, as I was equally impressed with the teacher dorm we stayed in, which was a 5-minute walk from the school! Sophia, Heidi, and I got to bunk together in a toasty, wifi-filled room, and we shared a bathroom, two showers, and a living room between the three of us. So I didn’t super need the pillow, blanket, and sleeping bag I brought! The one thing I wished I had brought, though, was a towel...oh well! Make it work!! Haha! But I did learn that Unalakleet has only had cellphone coverage and paved roads for 5 years and wifi connection for 3 years. Those were not surprising to me, but still shocking because it’s honestly hard for me to imagine a life without those privileges!

Husky!!

So these last few aspects I talked about may make you wonder, “How is this village so developed?”. Or at least, that’s what I was wondering as I walked around! It was totally not what I pictured the Alaskan bush to be like. I thought for sure that I would have no Internet access and possibly no plumbing. And there are definitely villages in Alaska that are like that. But because of its size, location, and its Western influences, Unalakleet is more developed. It was heavily influenced by Swedish/Swedish-American covenant missionaries who opened up a church in 1887 in the village, and a boarding school in 1954. So it is more similar to my life in Juneau than I realized in those ways, but it definitely had its distinct characteristics.

The playground of Unalakleet school!

In addition to the snowmobiles and dogs, I loved the atmosphere of the people in the village. Unalakleet’s people are very, very warm and friendly. People picked us up and dropped us off at the airport, everyone waves to everyone with a smile, and the principal and the music teacher at the school were super gracious and easy to talk to. And the students!!! They were sooo sweet! Just adorable. The three of us had the privilege of shadowing the Unalakleet school music teacher, Tim, for the week, which included watching him team-teach that third grade math class I spoke of earlier and teach general music and ensemble classes, all the way from kindergarten to twelfth grade! Unalakleet only has one school, so it was interesting for me to see how a school accommodates students of all ages while keeping a tight knit community. First thing: the classes are much smaller because we were working with a community of about 700 people! So each class ranged from 3 to 20 students. It was cool to see how the dynamic of the classes changed with the size. We also learned how having such a small class size can be debilitating, especially when students travel for their various sports and music competitions (such as the Native Youth Olympics, which I just learned about this week!). Also, I learned that the people of Unalakleet, who are mainly Inupiat, Yupik, Athabascan, or of another native group, are rather reserved. This means that trying to get a group of seven middle school students to sing in front of one another is pretty difficult! We also saw this shyness play out each time students walked into Tim’s room throughout the day and saw three random strangers sitting around his desk- I am not joking, every time this happened, a student walked in, looked at us with huge eyes, and bolted! They are very shy! But they eventually came back, and we promised them we weren’t scary, which seemed to keep them in the same room as us. :) They warmed up to us by the end of the week, I think! And so did we! After we observed him on Monday, Tim let us take over his general music, choir, and band classes (because he has no orchestra students currently), so we each got to teach a different general music class and lead rehearsals. I even gave a private lesson to a trombone player, which was super neat! He and two other high school students are the most advanced in the school, and it was a really good collaboration for us to work with these two wind players and one percussionist, and I know they valued our instruction as well.

The music room was full of instruments, just as Lorrie’s magical, musical room in Juneau is. So I was lucky enough to borrow one of the three cellos there. Because Tim has significant experience teaching band and choir and doesn’t have students interested in playing stringed instruments, those instruments have sat in the closet for a while. And because of the village’s more isolated location, most of the students in the school had never seen or heard a stringed instrument. That’s why we were very excited to take the instruments out and play them for the students. A couple of the students said they had seen our instruments from movies, especially from Titanic, which was pretty funny. One of the elementary schoolers excitedly said, “Yeah, they played that instrument as the ship was sinking!!”, when I asked if they had seen a cello before. So we had the treat of introducing our instruments and playing some simple pieces for each class! It was an inexplicable feeling to see the amazement and wonder on students’ faces as they heard the first notes we played together.

Playing for one of the general music classes in Unalakleet School!

We were all super impressed with the school. We observed various teachers and talked with Tim and the principal a lot, and everyone was very genuine and very invested in the village children’s education. Tim grew up in western New York and moved to Unalakleet 6 years ago and has remained there ever since, which is rare for outside teachers. He told us that the two questions students asked him when he first arrived were, “How old are you?”, and, “How long are you staying?”. It was a little heart-breaking to hear that second one. But he has totally stuck with it and has built a great program. He is teaching his students all the essentials of being a hard-working, successful musician- from practicing tips to rehearsal techniques, he’s giving them a great musical education, and that was so good to see. He also adapts to the needs and desires of the community. He tailors his lessons to these smaller, shy classes, and focuses on performance to help students come out of their shells. He’s doing a great job. And the principal is also not from Unalakleet- he moved to Alaska over a decade ago from California and has invested in the village as well. He is so sweet- he took the three of us to the end of the roads in the village to look for seals along the ocean! We totally saw giant bearded seals that were as long and as heavy as SUV’s!!!! LIKE, WHAT?! They were way off in the distance, but he had binoculars so we could see the giant, round, caterpillar blobs lift their lazy heads up off the icy water.

The Eskimo Ninja at Peace on Earth!

Besides the seals, dogs, kind people, and epic vehicles, Unalakleet is famous for a couple other reasons. First of all, it is the first stop in the Iditarod, the popular dog sled race. It also has a couple awesome restaurants- one of which was called Peace on Earth and the other, The Igloo. Peace on Earth has fantastic pizza that is a whopping $36 for a large pizza….the three of us went out one night with a friend we made from the dorm, and splitting the price between four wasn’t too bad! The other awesome things about that restaurant were, it had beautiful hand-made kuspuks, which are Alaska native hooded overshirts with pockets, and jewelry, a bunch of instruments sitting out we were allowed to mess with as we waited for our food (picture Sophia on the mandolin and singing, me on electric bass and then piano, Heidi on guitar and tambourine, and our new friend taking pictures… :P), AND you know who works there because his parents own the place?! The ESKIMO NINJA! You might wonder who or what that is…you know, I did too before I met him! Basically, he was a contestant on a competitive tv show called American Ninja Warrior where participants go through seemingly impossible obstacle courses, and he was known as the Eskimo Ninja. So he made our pizza, and I totally asked if we could get a picture with him. He also told us that he built an obstacle course in the village to practice before he went on the show and it’s open to the public! So post-pizza coma, that’s exactly where we went!!! I think it’s safe to say that alas, I am not the next Eskimo Ninja. But Heidi might be!!! She was pretty excellent at jumping post to post with one foot!

Although the three of us chose to spend our Spring Break traveling and teaching in a rural village in Alaska, we all agree that we had a slower-paced week. We spent time walking along the beach, watching the sunsets (which were at 9pm!!), and watching movies. We loved getting to learn about a new place that is so rich with natural beauty and amazing qualities in its culture and land. I’m finishing this blog post, sitting on my couch in my toasty house-sitting home in Juneau, glancing up at my wonderful parents who also flew in last night and will be here this next week. :) Yeah, life in Alaska is good. :)

Music and Friends :)

“May your adventures bring you closer together, even as they take you far away from home.” -Trenton Lee Stewart

Me and Jana, after hiking Mt. Roberts!

Hello from Ruth and Jana in the beautiful city of Juneau, Alaska! Okay, I never left, but Jana is here now, and I feel like I am seeing this wonderful place through new eyes.

After the Symphony Showcase!

The past week came and went in a calm, joyful fashion- it was full of classes, rehearsals for the Showcase, and preparations for my visiting friend. :) I spent Saturday morning cleaning and finally doing laundry and also talking to my wonderful grandparents (shout out to Granmommy- happy birthday!!!). I then headed over to Glacier Valley for cello ensemble rehearsal, which has been a weekly time of making beautiful music together. We even got outside and took some awesome group shots to advertise for our giant cello ensemble concert on April 30th (the day before I technically graduate, even though I still have classes to finish up until August!)! And then, before I knew it, the Symphony Showcase marathon began!

The quartet and I got all dressed up and performed our two quartet pieces (including the premiere of Tyree’s piece!!), and I performed my solo piece, Silent Woods, last night and again this afternoon! In the midst of that, Jana arrived. She actually got to the church last night right as the performance was ending, so it was super exciting to walk off the stage and find her!! The performance went great- it was a packed house, and I gave it my all. Man, do I love performing! And people noticed that, which is always nice to hear. :)

Jana and I rushed home soon after the concert so we could get some shut-eye before our epic day today! We got up right at 7:30 (which is pretty impressive, considering it was Daylight Savings time!) and set out to hike Mt. Roberts to the tram. And we did it!!! Both of us were nervous we wouldn’t be in good enough shape to get up it quickly, but we were hiking rock stars and made it up there with plenty of time to have a mini photoshoot- thank goodness no one else was around! We then slipped and slid on our butts (yes, that happened) down the icy/snowy hills on the way down. But it was just serene up there. There is nothing like being on a mountain, surrounded by snow with the sun shining down and the channel’s waters whispering in the distance. And Jana sure picked a good weekend to visit because we have seen the best weather here the past couple of days!! After that, we had enough time to visit the Flume Trail (because that is totally one of my staple trails, as we know) and drive around downtown before heading home to get ready for the concert. The concert today also went great- I felt even better about it the second time around! I gave it my all, and I had such wonderful friends there to support me. I had a few church friends show up, and Eric and Teri, my Alaskan parents, were there with a giant bouquet of gorgeous pink roses for me. :) It was so nice to play in the church we were in today, Aldersgate Methodist, because there were windows all around that let in beautiful natural light, and one audience member told me that the sun was shining right on me and Lorrie as we played Silent Woods. :) It was pretty special!

After I received many kind and warm comments from people, Jana and I headed out to the famous Mendenhall Glacier to watch the sunset. It was magical! I kept saying to Jana throughout the day that I had never done some of these things- like watch a sunset here, or spend a day in the sun (because honestly, the sun isn’t usually visible!). This has been a very relaxing, refreshing weekend, and it has been so wonderful having such a good friend here. :)

Jana and I took over 200 pictures today- definitely too many to post on here! So feel free to check out our Facebook album!

I am also posting a link to my Silent Woods performance, so enjoy it!!

The sunset by Mendenhall Glacier. :)

Sparkling in the Sun

This just made me laugh:

"It is a blessing to have pretty people around me. I like people who are sparky, positive. Evil, dark people are repelled by me: 'Oooh no! Too much sunlight.'" -Geri Halliwell, former Spice Girl

It has been an absolutely gorgeous week in Juneau. The sun has been out almost every day, and it feels too warm for March (although I don’t mind too much!). I think all this sunlight has definitely lifted my spirits. Knowing that I made it through the toughness of the dark, rainy fall and winter makes me feel such relief and excitement for the next couple seasons here! I’m definitely looking forward to summer. :)

It was another great, busy week that just flew by. I am still loving living on my own and having a car. Being so close to school has been really nice as well! Speaking of school, teaching went really well last week! I am preparing my high school orchestra for their concert a week from Tuesday, where we will be playing four of our own pieces, in addition to three pieces as a combined orchestra (which Tyree will conduct). Sophia, Tyree, and I will all get a chance to be on stage, since Sophia will conduct her four pieces with her orchestra as well. Sophia and I are also in charge of choosing the repertoire for our orchestras for the Spring concert, and she and I are really into the theme of “journey” and are finding music that fits into that theme. :) We are really excited to read through the new music with our orchestras after the concert next week!

The Mendenhall Glacier, which is our quartet's namesake and the inspiration of the piece Tyree Pini
wrote for us and we will be performing at the Showcase next week. :)

JAMM classes have been really good as well. Our songwriting students are producing really neat compositions. Last week, Sophia and I introduced their final project, which is to either take the lyrics they have already written and create a soundscape accompaniment for it using an ostinato and two different sounds, or to write a melody for their instrument. The students were given the option of either writing on staff paper or drawing their own symbols between bar lines to express their ideas. It has been super neat! Sophia and I started video recording our students talking about and playing their songs last week, and we will be putting them on their online portfolios very soon! You should check out our songwriting page and definitely look at our students’ portfolios they made. It’s so cool to see them take pride in their portfolios as they make them their own.

The view from the East Glacier trail!

Sophia and I are also team-teaching kindergarten violin classes twice a week, which both terrifies and excites me. I, of course, love working with kindergartners. I mean, nothing really beats a little kinder hug around my waist or a cute violin performance. However, I still don’t feel confident in my violin instruction skills, and there is a whole awesome system Lorrie has got down for these violin classes that I am trying to perfect. We have rituals and sayings (like “violin on shoulder” or “slide down the fingerboard”) that are always sung by the teacher and then repeated by the students- I have finally gotten those down! The classroom management isn’t as daunting, knowing that I have Sophia as well as the kindergarten teacher in the room (and often Lorrie!). I have definitely noticed how much a classroom teacher’s level of involvement in these violin classes affects the overall success of the group. When the teacher is in the room, there is a consistency of instruction style, and that teacher knows their students the best. It is such an incredible and necessary partnership to have the classroom teacher and the music teacher working together to provide excellent instruction to the class. This aspect is one of the many things that I think makes JAMM a leading El Sistema program. As Sophia and I, and Lindsay and I, co-teach these JAMM and kinder classes, I value more and more these collaborations.

I continue to teach Spanish and feel successful at it most of the time! It is still a little intimidating to get up and teach a content area I am not the complete master of (although I have noticed a dramatic improvement in my speaking skills and vocabulary knowledge- yay for learning with the students!!), and to teach it to groups of students who are not always super into it. But most of the time, I am up for the challenge of keeping them engaged. I am really excited to see how well my implementation of the teams has stuck- my unit ended 3 weeks ago, and my students still sit with the same teams I assigned them to! Even though they are sitting away from their friends, the students did not even question where they sat when this new unit of reading through a short novel began. That’s pretty cool. :)

Me and Heidi in front of the Mendenhall Glacier!

The week ended quickly, and before I knew it, it was Sunday. I spent Friday night and Saturday socializing with new and old friends. The quartet and I went to a super fun game night with new friends on Friday night. It was great to just be silly young people and mess around with Snapchat (now I see why it is so addicting for my students…) and laugh uncontrollably while playing charades. And oreos and cheezits are the best dinner (am I right, twinny?!)!!!! I spent Saturday outside, playing music, and dancing- it was perfect! Heidi and I went for an unplanned run on a trail along the Mendenhall Glacier, and that was just breathtaking- well, literally, but also figuratively! I then went to cello ensemble rehearsal for our epic cello ensemble concert on April 30th and had a blast playing super fun Piazzolla pieces, among others. I then did something I thought I would never do...I went contradancing downtown!! Juneau has a monthly event where an awesome band gets together and plays music for hours as everyone is guided through different contradances by an instructor. I had an absolute blast spending time with new friends and Sophia (because she was playing in the band this time!!). I got home late but pushed myself to get up early and do work this morning before going to church with a Glacier Valley co-worker and then spending time with the quartet tonight (we are going to have a lesson planning, research data collection, rehearsal, dinner, and movie party!). I really don’t know what I would do without these three other girls I love so dearly. And the more people I meet, the more excited I am about the idea of staying in Juneau and investing in this community. It is a truly incredible place. And I’m totally going contradancing again!!

Our Symphony Showcase performance is next week, and I am super excited for that! I’m particularly excited to premiere the new quartet Tyree wrote for us. It really captures the essence of Alaska native music and the glacier. :) My DePaul friend, Jana, is also coming next Saturday, and I am so excited to see her again and show her around Juneau until I leave for Spring Break (two more weeks of classes, then I am off to Anchorage for a job fair and Unalakleet for my rural practicum!!!)!

Anyways, I am going to take a second to casually stare out the window at the majesty of a mountain standing behind my neighborhood. No big deal!

The mountain outside my window. :)