Umiak on Paper
Posted on August 10, 2007, by admin.
Filed Under Pacific Coast, Community, 7 Generations |
Willamette Week - Best Lifeboat
Some kids have farewell dances or pizza parties, but the eighth-grade class at Portland Waldorf School built an Inuit whaling boat to celebrate their graduation. With the help of local wilderness organization TrackersNW and the Ancestral Lifeways Community , the 30-student class spent four days on a permaculture farm outside of Portland learning to live like urban hunters and gatherers—camping, harvesting tidepools and building the umiak boat’s cedar frame and paddles. “No other class on the West Coast has ever done anything like this,” says TrackersNW founder Tony Deis*. “These kids weren’t just goofing around. They wanted to make sure the boat was built right.” After a test run, the students officially set sail across the Willamette on June 11, launching outside of their Milwaukie campus and docking near the Hawthorne Bridge. But the experience exceeds a single lasting memory. The kids—most of whom have known each other since the first grade, but half of whom are going on to different high schools in the fall—plan to reunite on their umiak several times a year for many more voyages to come. Awwwww!
* Tony tells us he has no idea where these quotes came from, but at least they’re in the right spirit.
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Yep, curiously I said none of that in any shape it was. I did talk on the phone with the Willy Week but it is oddly not what I said. Nevertheless, they made up okay stuff. So, who cares… for now.
Cheers,