Iqaluit, Nunavut, Canada.
Iqaluit is the proud capital of Canada's newest territory,
which is the result of a lawsuit by Canada's First Nations
(various Indians and Inuits/Eskimos).
When I went to visit Frobisher Bay in the Northwest Territories at Baffin Island in 1999, the Northwest Territories dodged . I still captured the Northwest Territories flag (Capture The Flag!) at the airport gift shop, but the rest of the town had become known as Iqaluit in the territory of Nunavut.
Iqaluit is indeed a proud territorial capital, with a museum and markers for its history. Iqaluit is also the only city ever to vote itself off the Silly Places list! (Like I said, proud.)
But unfortunately, these plagues are upon Nunavut's capital city:
- Trash. There's more trash along the roadsides than anywhere I've seen outside Alabama. Convenience store owners have signs up saying, "Please respect your community and don't throw trash here."
- Dogs. Local law requires all dogs above a certain size to be chained up outside of town. This is since a little girl was torn to pieces by people's pets a few years ago, according to a hotel proprietor.
- High prices. $10 for a small bottle of cough syrup, $18 for mittens. (Canadian dollars, admittedly. But it's still double what an American is probably used to.)
- Dirt. All over almost every road. All kicked up by...
- Taxis. Almost half the vehicles are taxis. You'd think more people could walk, in a town two miles long. But I guess it keeps the car usage down.
- Starving artists. Or at least they have heavy tooth decay. But carvings (very similar to the Collection of the Museum of Civilization in Hull, Quebec, Canada) go for $30 or less, particularly if you haggle. Right at your dinner table. The local hoteliers and restauranteurs smile upon this, apparently. Or at least they weren't objecting.
- No wood. Plywood doesn't count; there's plenty of that, in houses and among the trash. But when I walked in a shopping mall with my wooden walking stick, a native looked at me as if I had three legs. A stick of solid wood is roughly as rare there as a stick of solid gold - and much rarer than fur or ivory.
- Canada's slowest customs house. Ellis Island was probably more efficient. But, in Baffin Island's defense, they only get one international flight per week, staggering in from Greenland. So they don't get much practice.
- Cable TV. Particularly the Boston channel that used to have "Dilbert" cartoons.
- An elite coffee shop. Specialty coffee is $15 a pound.
- Sunup at 2 am. Or sundown at 2 pm, depending on time of year.
- Ice in the harbor in June. In fact, it was still frozen over in June 1999 when I visited. The supply ships make their annual runs in July and August. Meanwhile, the passenger planes carry mostly cargo.
- A Pentecostal church. With a wooden angel nailed to the side. With a loudspeaker coming out of the angel's hand.
- A Territorial Liquor Warehouse. Gotta store a year's worth at once, after all.
- Fancy Places with home-style cooking, with steak, corn, and mashed potatoes for dinner. Caribou meat is optional.
- A very small memorial to the English discoverer of Baffin Island, plus a mention in the Baffin Island Visitor Center: "Sir Martin Frobisher came, mined fool's gold, made a laughingstock of himself, and poisoned English relations with the Inuit for generations." This was much more succinct than what the Museum of Civilization in Hull, Quebec, Canada had to say about him.
(Thanks on this entry go to Tracy who proclaims herself a "Nunavut lover", and points out that most of the Inuit residents of Iqaluit can not only afford the high prices, they make more money than the average North American. This is almost entirely due to Canadian government subsidies.
(Acknowledgment on this entry goes also to the many people who rose to defend Iqaluit's honor. So many people voted against Iqaluit being a Silly Place, they got it thrown off the main list. I'm glad you care, and every vote counts... but the next time you complain about how evil the United States is, try not to do it from Microsoft Hotmail free e-mail, eh?)