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Nunani

April 25, 2003 - The likeness of a big person (Part three)
April 18, 2003 - The likeness of a big person (Part two)
April 4, 2003- The likeness of a big person (Part one)

April 25, 2003

The likeness of a big person (Part three)

RACHEL QITSUALIK

To the hunter's surprise, the giants did not kill him. Instead, the great inukpasugjuit gathered around him, wondering aloud what to do.

The hunter could hear giant children giggling to their enormous parents about how "cute" he was, how fun it would be to keep him. This seemed to be an important issue with the families of inukpasugjuit, so the hunter sat helplessly for long hours while the giants debated it.

In the end, they decided that it was best not to let him go. The hunter was never asked for his own opinion on the matter. He was simply grateful that they had decided not to do something ghastly, like stew him up or pull his limbs off for fun. Besides, he thought to himself, eventually their guard was bound to drop, and he would have an opportunity to escape.

The time approached sooner than expected, for the giants quickly went on with their day-to-day business, and soon even their children lost interest in the man. He was frequently left without supervision, and realized that it would be no more than a matter of days before he slipped by these foolish inukpasugjuit.

In the meantime, they were not unkind to him, and their greatest offense was his captivity. But he realized, while watching them, how utterly unlike human beings they were, how they were like a parody of human nature. Their food seemed distasteful to him, and he avoided it.

They hunted, but when they butchered a caribou, they would throw away many good parts, like the fat, which they claimed was merely a gland. And they did not hunt with dogs, but with huge wolves that seemed to understand their speech.

Then a day arrived when the man told the giants that he was bored, that he wanted to do some of his own hunting. The season was still fairly warm, and he said he needed his kayak (which had been captured with him). The inukpasugjuit easily agreed, and soon the man found himself out "hunting," but in truth paddling back home as fast as he could.

A grin spread across his face as soon as he began to recognize things that he knew: a familiar boulder here, an old camp area there. And he was sure that he was just starting to see the thin trails of smoke from his community's cook-fires. In a moment, he would be within sight...

Suddenly, something seized his paddle, and he barely managed to jerk it free of the water, which had started to churn around him. The kayak shuddered violently, and he was blinded by salty spray that flew up at his face. He wiped at his eyes with his sleeve, in time to see that a great wall of water had arisen before him. He had never seen anything like it, this barrier of blue and white that boiled and roared and foamed before him, like a thing alive.

He looked left and right, and found that it completely blocked his path, towering above. It was impossible to pass. He realized that this was why the giants had been so complacent. Their powers had ensured that he could never leave them. There was no doubt in his mind that similar barriers, perhaps even more dangerous ones, were also in place on the land, so he back-paddled and turned his kayak about, returning to the inukpasugjuit, for he knew of nowhere else to go. Behind him, he heard the water-wall crash down.

Looking back, he could see a clear way to his community, to his family, but he knew that this was an illusion. The water-wall would rise up again if he tried to approach. He wiped at his face again, now removing tears.

Life became a melancholy blur after that. The man was driven to contemplate the most horrible, desperate measures, but ultimately decided to survive, to brave the situation in the hope of seeing his family again. And during his captivity, he learned much of the giants' ways, eating their food and eventually even feeling confident enough to master their teams of wolves.

It was while out hunting with the wolves one day that he had an extraordinary idea. If he could not get to his family, why not bring them to him?

(Concluded in part four.)

April 18, 2003

The likeness of a big person (Part two)

RACHEL QITSUALIK

The hunter was sure that he had never been here before, and he was hoping that his exploration would pay off.

Having had no luck in his usual hunting areas, he was wondering if there were animals to find here. With little other than a backward glance at his kayak, he began to wander inland.

Soon he found himself cresting oddly scalloped hills spattered with the dazzling hues of numerous lichens and berry patches. Winding around boulders of enormous size, he at last came to a stream, where there stood a single bull caribou. It was a massive beast, much larger than he was used to, and it seemed healthy enough for eating.

With a couple of well-placed arrows, the caribou was downed, and the hunter eagerly ran over to it, brandishing his knife.

But he paused when he neared the carcass. There was an odd thing: water was forming around the caribou. As he watched, hair rising on his neck, the water spread outward. In less than a minute, it formed a clear pool with the beast at its centre. It stopped spreading.

The hunter eventually overcame his fear and stooped to examine the water. He dipped a finger in it, tasted it, and found it remarkably pleasant. He sat staring at it and wondering for a moment, then muttered,

"Why not?"

He drank his fill.

After his drink, he found that the water had heightened his alertness. He felt crisp, refreshed. This was why he so quickly noticed the odd sounds. Pausing to listen, he became aware that he was hearing something like pounding noises, as of heavy objects being dropped.

They had begun as the faintest of noises, but they were getting louder with every passing second. The hunter waited, wondering if they would relent, but they only increased in intensity, until the stone under the hunter's knees began to subtly vibrate. It was then that the hunter realized that the sounds had not been getting louder - they had been getting nearer.

The hunter began to rise, backing away from the water, but it was too late. Looking up, he could see the heads of two inukpasugjuuk (giants) cresting a nearby hill. More of their massive forms became visible as they approached, two great pairs of eyes set in two great skulls glaring balefully at the hunter. As they strode, they covered as much distance as a fast man might cover at a full-out run.

The hunter screamed at the sight of them, and fled toward his kayak. He had never moved faster in his entire life, but still he could hear those great feet pounding the earth as they pursued him. Luck was with him, and he actually reached his kayak before the giants were upon him. He paddled away from the shore, and was just beginning to feel some sense of relief, when he turned to look back.

The water had not slowed the giants. Instead, they had merely waded out, and now loomed over the little man in his kayak. Monstrous hands reached down and seized the kayak's stern, pulling it back, turning it around.

In a moment, a giant held each end of the kayak, and lifted it — hunter and all — out of the water. Like two men carrying a kill between them, they strode back inland. Petrified with fear, the hunter shook silently as the inukpasugjuuk took him away.

The hunter was in a daze, and noticed very little as the giants carried him over a long distance, into strange lands. They spoke not at all, and the hunter was unsure of just how much time had elapsed when they finally placed him upon a great boulder, so that he sat at the level of a single giant's chest.

For the first time, he noticed his surroundings. About him were similarly large boulders, and low-lying, grey hills. He could see little, for the distance was foggy and indistinct.

The giants turned then, and one of them whistled. After moments of silence, there at last came the sounds of many inukpasugjuit feet. Soon, the owners of those feet appeared. Several inukpasugjuit stood up and walked out from behind some of the tallest boulders, while many others lumbered out of the mist.

The hunter was surrounded by entire families of giants.

(Continued in part three.)

April 4, 2003

The likeness of a big person (Part one)

RACHEL QITSUALIK

There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of reknown. — Genesis vi:4

While cultures around the world may be drastically different in their customs, it is nevertheless startling to note how similar their folklore can be.

One of the things that most traditions seem to agree on are giants. For the majority of us, if we were to hear about an ahuizotl — a Central American monkey/fish monster — we might be a bit confused, having no frame of reference to compare it to.

But if an Irishman were to tell an Inuk a story about giants, or vice versa, either would understand exactly what the other was talking about.

As with most giant stories the world over, Inuit giant tales vary wildly, and are flavoured according to the part of the Arctic from which they come. In the west, for example, giants tend toward a malicious nature, while in the east, they are more like normal people in temperament — capable of kindness, and becoming angered only when offended. As in most cultural traditions, Inuktitut giants live an existence recognizable to human beings: hunting, using tools, wearing clothes, having spouses and children, but doing things in their own, slightly skewed way.

Giants are commonly associated with or derived from primal forces, which gives us a hint that they might often be a folkloric manifestation of ancient peoples that are no more.

The English word "giant" is a distortion of the Greek term for the giants of Greek myth, the Ge Genis, which means "Children of Earth" or "Earth Generation." The Greek giants sprang from the blood of the Titans, who were an older generation of gods usurped by Zeus and his newer pantheon.

The word "ge" in Ge Genis is related to the name of the mother of the Titans, the Earth itself, Gaia, from which we also get the "geo" in "geological." Therefore, the Titans and their progeny, the giants, represent a primal generation put down and suppressed by a more competitive, semi-urban, modern culture.

Giants in Inuit culture are no less primal, always associated with rock and water. It is tempting to think that perhaps the Inuit giants represent some form of memory of the Tunit people (also known as the Dorset culture), except that Inuit seem to remember the Tunit just fine as they are.

What mythologization there is of the Tunit makes them out to be quite strong, sometimes semi-magical, but they are invariably short. So the Inuit tales of giants must reflect something other than memory of the Tunit. It is possible that they reflect memories of an even earlier culture, before the Tunit, memories that might have been communicated to Inuit by the Tunit themselves. But we will never know for certain.

The Inuktitut term for a giant is "inukpasugjuk," which simply means "one who is in the likeness a big person." This is a cautious name, denoting that the inukpasugjuk is not simply a big person, but an inhuman creature that resembles one.

Generally, I don’t like interchanging terms for folkloric creatures, since such interchange tends to degrade the exact nature of a given being. In the past, for example, I have argued that anirniq should not be translated as "ghost," since, if we start approximating an anirniq by labelling it a ghost, we expect it to act like one, which it does not. I can make an exception in this case, however, since giants and inukpasugjuit (plural) are so alike that they are almost indisputably the same thing.

The tales of inukpasugjuit are numerous, but there are a few that serve to characterize what Inuit, in general, expect of their giants. And there is one, in particular, that is an especially old favourite.

Taitsumaniguuq:

Once there was a man who went out hunting in his kayak. He decided to move out further than his typical hunting area, so he soon found himself in a place where he had never hunted before. He saw before him what seemed to be some unexplored land, covered in great hills. So he pulled his kayak ashore and went looking about.

(Continued in part two.)

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