On Tuesday, we had a tour of the Museum of the North, which was pretty interesting. There were dozens of stuffed animals, like this giant bear:
There was also this awesome room called the Place You go to Listen. It was somehow hooked up to sensors that measure any earthquake activity and the northern lights, which are always around, even when it's near 24 hour sunlight. However, the constant sunlight means there is no chance of witnessing the northern lights, which just means that I'm going to have to brave the cold at some point and come back and visit.
Yesterday (Wednesday), we had a couple of speakers and we toured IARC -- the International Arctic Research Center. It sounds impressive, but the tour guide was awful. I've never met someone who seemed so incredibly bored to talk to a bunch of visitors. It was sort of upsetting, but she provided comedic relief, both during the tour and afterwards when we reflected on her blah attitude. Last night after dinner, everyone gathered around the table to work on some homework problems (it's not all fun here, I promise. Just probably 99% fun, 1% work), and then we went out for ice cream. I learned that cinnamon ice cream is incredibly tasty. Good bonding activities.
Today we had two more speakers in the afternoon. One of them was a hydrologist, which was of great interest to me since that's the field I hope to go into. It sounds like there is definitely some interesting topics related to water that could be studied in Alaska, so maybe one day I will find myself back up here. Before dinner, we played a round of bowling at the bowling alley on campus. If only Chapel Hill still had the campus bowling alley, life would be amazing. This one was a little unique because it never got your score correct. If you rolled a gutter ball, it often gave to 7 or 8 pins, which made me happy.
However, I have found a few down sides of Alaska. First, the bugs. There are too many (I think I've mentioned this). The second is the near constant sun. It really does mess with your head. This evening, several of my classmates and I were playing pool and one girl mentioned she though it was 8...except it was really almost 11. I don't think this is something that you can fully understand unless you experience it because it really is mind blowing. How can it be so sunny out at midnight? It is exciting to see at first, but it takes time to get used to sleeping while it's light out.
Yesterday, we saw that there was a forest fire off in the distance, and today the smell was quite noticeable in the air. I think we're safe here because I've heard it's across the river, but still, it is pretty upsetting to think about. So keep the creatures and the people who live in that area in your thoughts. I know sometimes fires are natural, but from what I understand they have been happening more frequently here, and that cannot be a good thing.
It looks like we have some great things scheduled for this weekend, and I'll be sure to post updates and photos.
(As a side note, sorry if I ever repeat anything. I'm struggling with remembering who I've told what because I'm keep confusing myself. I'm trying to keep this up to date. I'm calling and emailing Jeff a lot, so he hears everything twice. I occasionally call my parents. And I'm keeping a travel journal. Plus I'm experiencing everything first hand. That's a lot of the same thing, over and over. So if anything is repeated, I guess that just means that you can enjoy it twice)
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