New Year, New Decade

Source: GSMArena.com

Happy New Year Everyone!  Hope your celebrations were fantastic!  I can’t believe the year is 2020!  A new year, a new decade.  Hard to believe the new millennium began 20 years ago.  Time really does fly.  So much has changed, for better and for worse.  I’m still disappointed we never got actual hoverboards in 2015.  We were also supposed to be living on Mars by now.  Hopefully these things will happen within the decade and/or my lifetime.  I can’t wait to see what exciting things this year will bring.

I uploaded Swings, Sticks, & A Magazine, the second media film project I did with my Grade 10 English students, to the school’s Facebook page over the Christmas holidays.  It didn’t take long for the film to rack up views and positive comments.  Pretty soon I’ll have to start thinking about this year’s film project.

            

Unfortunately, I didn’t do any extreme ironing in 2019.  Other things kept getting in the way.  I’m making it my duty to do some ironing this year, maybe twice to make up for last year.

            

The Inuit music community suffered a devastating loss before the end of 2019.  Kelly Fraser, an acclaimed singer songwriter from Sanikiluaq, Nunavut, died by suicide in Winnipeg, Manitoba, on December 24.  She had just begun production on her third studio album Decolonize.  A statement released by her family stated that Kelly suffered from PTSD “as a result of childhood traumas, racism, and persistent cyber bullying.”

           

Kelly rose to prominence with her Inuktitut rendition of Rihanna’s “Diamonds” in 2013.  She released her first album Isuma in 2014.  Her second album, Sedna, was released in 2017 and nominated for a Juno Award for best Indigenous music album that year.  She was also co-creator of Nunavut Hitmakerz, “an initiative specifically designed to engage, inspire, and empower Nunavummiut youth by promoting life and career development opportunities through the arts.”  Hitmakerz is now a full-service record label with studios in Iqaluit & Ottawa.  The label caters to Inuit & Indigenous artists.

            

Kelly & Thor. Hitmakerz Workshop in Arctic Bay. September 18, 2017.

Kelly Fraser.
1993 - 2019.

I briefly met Kelly when she visited Arctic Bay in September 2017.  She was touring several northern communities, performing, and holding workshops on song writing, recording, singing, personal storytelling, and understanding the music industry.  You can revisit my in-depth coverage of that workshop here.  She was accompanied by Thor, a Danish-Canadian artist & music producer, who also co-created Hitmakerz.  We only had a few minutes to talk, but I congratulated her for making a positive impact in the music scene and thanked her for the music production equipment she & Thor were donating to the school.  I bought & listened to her album Sedna in the days after she left the community. 

She will be greatly missed.  This tragedy further highlights the need for more mental health resources & services in the North.  If you or someone you know is in mental distress and need help, you can call the Nunavut Kamatsiaqtut Helpline at 1-867-979-3333.  For kids, there’s the Kids Help Phone at 1-800-668-6868.

Kelly Fraser – YouTube Channel
Kelly Fraser - "Diamonds" cover

Kelly Fraser – “Fight For The Rights”

CBC News – December 2, 2019 – Kelly Fraser on why singing in Inuktitut is important…

CBC News – December 27, 2019 – Inuit singer-activist Kelly Fraser…

Iqaluit deep sea port. (Under construction)
January 3, 2020.

I returned to Arctic Bay on January 3.  I was glad I didn’t have to overnight in Iqaluit.  I needed the weekend to get ready for the upcoming semester.  It took me a few hours to settle in.  Not a lot of snow had fallen in the community but I still had to shovel my front porch.  I did spend the weekend in my classroom preparing course outlines and lesson plans.

My schedule had me teaching three classes: Grade 10 English, Grade 11 Social Studies, and Grade 10 Guitar.  All I did on the first day was go over the course outline, hand out binders & folders, and play icebreaker games.  I don’t want to be the teacher who gives work on the first day.  Although, what I don’t tell my students, is that I do have lessons prepared for the first day, just in case if they really want to get started right away.  I start instructing on the second day.  For English, we began with a review of grammar.  In Social Studies, we began the semester by looking at the effects of globalization on quality of life.  And in guitar, I taught my students the basics: holding the guitar, maintenance, set up, posture, beginner strumming & picking, and a few notes.

In cadet news, we held the biathlon tryouts at the beginning of the month and finally received the results.  Out of the 12 cadets who competed on behalf of 3045, two females were selected to advance to Alberta later this month.  They were part of the original team and overjoyed upon hearing their names called.  I privately met with the original team after the announcement in the cadet office.  The corps recently bought custom hoodies & t-shirts, decorated with the 3045 number and Royal Regiment of Canada emblem.  I let these cadets take a hoodie & t-shirt as compensation for not being able to travel to Whitehorse and Alberta.        

My military superiors in Winnipeg asked me if I could be the escorting officer for my cadets as well as two female cadets from Iqaluit?  Normally this wouldn’t be done because I’m a male officer but they were unable to find a female officer for this assignment.  I submitted a leave request to my employer and was accepted.  I passed on this information to Winnipeg and immediately began planning supply lessons.  I would be gone for 6 school days.    

The competition was going to take place in Canmore, Alberta.  I vaguely remember driving through Canmore with my family in the summer of 1997.  The town must look very different now.  I will find out in the near future.   

More on this trip coming up.