"Bearly" Escaped!

As I mentioned in my last blog, I am going to share a polar bear story with this blog. The story took place in Repulse Bay (where I am now stranded) during this past fall. Once every 5 years, the local Inuit community is allowed to kill one bowhead whale. The bowhead whale is the second largest whale in the world and the whole event is a very special one for an Inuit community. I have pictures of that event which I will also share in a later blog. They are amazing!

The killing of the whale brought many polar bears to the community, looking for fresh spoils. Eight or nine polar bears came ashore, coming directly into town and putting a great scare into the locals. One of my colleagues was here during this time and he said that he was scared walking between the school and the hotel, because the locals had warned everyone to stay indoors!

The local RCMP and Wildlife officers were able to scare off most of the bears, but had to kill 4 that would not leave the town. However, one bear was silently making his way back to town, out of sight of those that were trying to keep the community safe!

A group of locals were drying skins just on the outskirts of town, on the crest of a hill. All of a sudden, the group started making a great commotion and running down the hill toward the town. One of the local RCMP heard the commotion and drove out to see what was going on. What he found was a polar bear chasing the locals!

The RCMP officer fired a shot to scare the bear but he only stopped briefly then charged after one of the group. The officer fired again, this time killing the bear. His shot hit the bear in the head which killed the bear instantly. However the head shot made the use of the bear skin and skull useless for the locals. I've included pictures of the bear that are wild, to say the least. Look at those teeth, wow!

As much as I do not like the thought of killing animals, I am getting better at understanding the "circle of life" and how important animals have been to the very survival of the Inuit people. And today, while many do not depend on the caribou, polar bear, etc., for their survival, the locals continue to respect their culture and ensure that every part of the animal is used productively and humanely. I respect that.

Once the polar bear was deemed to be unuseable because of the headshot, a "qablunaaq" (white person, pronouced kub-lo-nak) thought the bear skull would be a great gift for her family down south! She was given an export license and was able to take it with her at Christmas time... in her carry-on baggage! It was not entirely clean by then and she said even that freaked her out a bit. Can you imagine the people at security, screening her carry-on baggage! That would have been very interesting!!

In my next blog, I'll share pictures of the bowhead whale capture and the special events that followed, courtesy of some local educators. Stay tuned!