Original subtitles

(wind blowing)

(ice cracking)

(wind blowing)

(wind blowing)

(wind blowing)

(wind blowing)

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

DOUG (over TV): Over in the Eastern Arctic,

contact between the Eskimo

and the white man has been limited.

The Eskimo still lives as a hunter and trapper,

though he uses some of the white man's tools and weapons.

But with new developments like the DEW Line Airlift,

these Eskimos are faced with disturbing changes.

The site for the new town is close to a good supply

of clean fresh water,

leading to an excellent landing beach.

But most important of all, the Eskimos,

a sea culture people, like it.

From here they can look to the sea.

How do we help the Eskimo consider tomorrow,

to feel good about the future?

How does he feel about his changing life?

Well, let's ask him.

Which would you rather be doing,

hunting and trapping or working at the base?

MAN (over TV): I think better to hunt.

DOUG (over TV): Hunting better?

Do you get much chance to go out hunting now?

MAN (over TV): No.

DOUG (over TV): Not very much. How 'bout you Jacobie?

Which would you rather be doing?

MAN (over TV): Oh, I'd, I'd rather hunt.

DOUG (over TV): Like the others, Davide expressed a preference

for the hunting and trapping life.

Like the others, he was unable to say why.

You and I may see the obvious reasons.

But the Eskimos do not yet think as we do.

They look with nostalgia to the life of the hunter,

the old way.

But they feel a subconscious sense of security

in the new way.

The basic change is in progress.

(wind blowing)

(radio chatter)

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): Polar bear and seal.

This part is polar bear, this part is seal.

Oh! These are my uncle's.

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): They fit just fine.

There's... (laughs)

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): When I was little,

I always see the hunters go away for hunting.

I always imagined what they were doing out there.

What it was like to see what they have seen.

♪ ♪

(speaking native language)

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): I'm just happy that I was born here.

(speaking native language)

Let's go, let's go, let's go, let's go.

If I was an American, I would maybe be working now,

and I would be stressed.

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): How can I be stressed?

Look at the nature.

I don't have to wear a watch when I'm hunting.

I'm just me, my dogs.

Just live.

(speaking native language)

(snow crunching)

(whining)

(speaking native language)

(speaking native language)

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): I have been living with the hunters

for a few years now.

I have been learning from my uncle.

(speaking native language)

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): He's one of the great hunters.

I call them the great hunters,

the hunters that knows the ice,

the weather, hunting all their lives.

It's, it's a life I want to live.

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): I'm not raised as a hunter.

When I was about eight, we moved to Nuuk.

1999, we moved to Denmark.

When I was in Denmark and Nuuk, I had always homesick.

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): My mother,

I was in school down south when she was killed.

So, I couldn't go back to school.

I tried, but I couldn't concentrate so I came back here.

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): I got a job here.

I worked for a few years.

Then one of my uncles, he was leaving,

and he had two dogs.

And, he asked me if, if I wanted them.

I just said yes.

I was not thinking so much to become a hunter,

but the female

began to have small puppies.

Before I knew it, I had seven dogs.

So, that's where I decided I have to try this

before it's too late.

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): Hey, hey, hey.

(speaking native language)

(speaking native language)

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): The sound travels longer,

and the sled will be making too much noise.

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): So, he's gonna go very far so it,

the seal doesn't wake up.

It will be a better chance for him to catch it.

♪ ♪

(speaking native language)

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): We cut it the way that it has been passed from hunter to

hunter for generations.

Every hunter get a share from the seal.

It depends on how many hunters are hunting together.

They are rules.

This is tradition that has been on for many, many years.

We are not killing animals just to kill them,

but to eat them, to use their skins.

Without animals, we cannot survive.

♪ ♪

We are not above the nature.

We are not above the animals.

♪ ♪

(wind blowing)

♪ ♪

(honking)

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

EVA (off-screen): The Pikialasorsuaq is a huge,

vast area that is so rich in all kinds of animals.

It is a place where animals and birds go for birthing.

OKALIK (off-screen): The seals, the beluga, the narwhale,

the polar bear, the fish.

It's considered one of the most bio-diverse areas

in the Arctic.

The polar bears hunt the seals, the seals eat the fish.

So, it's all a natural cycle.

EVA (off-screen): We need to protect the environment that we depend on

and protect the area that is so vulnerable

from the outside world.

(splashing)

THEO: He's looking at me, that bugger!

(laughs)

Oh, ho, ho.

The ice that had formed this winter allows this to happen.

He's not looking at us as a food source, whereas

some years, for example four years ago

I was dragged around by one of these, trying to kill me.

We're no higher than the polar bear.

The polar bear is on top of the food chain.

We're just equivalent.

With the sea ice diminishing

the whole food chain is affected right up to the top.

♪ ♪

We had been doing wildlife management

prior to European influence coming to this part of the world.

And if the world looked after the environment

as most aboriginal cultures have been doing

then the world would be so much further ahead.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

The Inuk today, the young Inuk,

doesn't fare as well as the old Inuk

in the hardy environment that you have to live in.

MAATALII (off-screen): Sometimes I say that I was born in the wrong era.

LEENA: Always look around, always.

-MAATALII: Yeah. -LEENA: Yeah.

Don't just look down.

Always look around.

MAATALII (off-screen): My parents' generation was a generation

who was completely nomadic.

But I'm that generation who didn't have that experience.

(ringing)

Wow!

(laughing)

This is what happens when you come to this hill.

You have access.

Crazy.

MAATALII (off-screen): We're a biproduct of colonization.

When I hear about the way life was before outsiders coming

into our homeland.

I've been told that,

whether it's one family or a number of

families that have come together,

every single member of the camp had roles

and responsibilities.

Ultimately, they had a purpose.

That's such a beautiful way to look at a community.

It's really important that we remember,

even into today whether we live in those camps or not,

that every single one of us matters.

Every single one of us has a purpose.

But I'm so disconnected from that reality.

And, that breaks me inside.

This is a dream of mine as a young Inuk.

I believe it's a dream of many young Inuit,

to reclaim what I lost not growing up in my homeland.

MAATALII (off-screen): My earliest memories of being on the land

were in my mom's Amauti,

in my natural environment as an Inuk.

I was born in Iqaluit.

But we moved to southern Canada when I was very young.

And I moved to Ottawa as a fluent,

strong Inuktitut speaker.

And, I can't say that I am that now, because I'm not.

And, so it's wild that I speak English better than

my language, my mother tongue.

♪ ♪

MAATALII (off-screen): When I moved back home,

that's when I could start filling in that emptiness.

(chanting)

(chanting)

(cheering)

Of the 65,000 Inuit in Canada and 165,000 Inuit

around the world, Intuit youth are the majority.

MAATALII (off-screen): Over 50% of our population is under the age of 24.

We're growing very quickly,

and I always say it's because we know how to love.

MAATALII (off-screen): We're not going anywhere.

Ultimately, we'll be the ones living here for the next 100 years,

200 years, 300 years and over 1,000 years

because we've been living here for thousands of years.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

THEO: We're quite removed from the initial close relationship.

And at one point there was no boundary.

They had been going back and forth, back and forth.

Canadians going this way, Greenlanders going the other way.

This was the relationship between Greenland and Canada.

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): When they tell stories about the generation before them,

how they lived, it's a whole different story.

ED (off-screen): If you read a lot of the literature of the explorers,

they were always kind of marveled by how, how happy the

Inuit were in a world in which we would all just think,

"We're gonna die."

MAATALII (off-screen): People always say,

"What a terrible place for them to live,

so desolate and so out of reach."

But I think they loved it.

MAATALII (off-screen): They thrived in that environment.

Very self-determined, very knowledgeable, very skilled.

THEO: The hunting is similar.

Walrus, bearded seal, ringed seal, narwhal, beluga and caribou,

and fish.

Everything is very similar, meaning that at one point

they all came from one peoples.

So the relationship was quite close, if you really look at that.

Today the ice is not forming anymore,

separating our bloodlines,

separating the rich culture that we might be sharing.

♪ ♪

MAN (over TV): White men are coming to the Arctic now in ever

increasing numbers.

Building air strips,

taking mineral wealth from the frozen ground,

manning radars and air defense bases,

which stretch across the North.

Anna Kuluk's brother works as a carpenter.

And his children go to a modern school.

Here they learn about the outside world,

which the Eskimo knew so little of

until only a few years ago.

There are few Eskimos in the whole Arctic now

who do not have some contact with the white man.

They are adopting his dress, speech and ways rapidly.

♪ ♪

MAATALII (off-screen): There certainty has been a breakdown

of our way of life.

And the onus is now on us, as youth,

to revitalize that relationship that we have with our culture,

language, traditions,

and our environment.

(speaking native language)

MAATALII: My dream is for us to reach the same level of

self-determination the day before an outsider came

into our homeland.

(laughs)

We'll radio you.

Don't forget the...

(speaking native language)

Have a good day.

MAATALII (off-screen): Today I work at the Piruvik Center to create more access

and opportunity for Inuit youth to be able to learn

our language and our traditional practices.

Inuit youth want to learn more because it helps us understand

who we are and where we came from and what strengths

our ancestors had so we too can be strong.

(speaking native language)

MAATALII (off-screen): We put our elders at such a high level

because they are our knowledge keepers, they are our guidance.

MAN (over radio): Calmly.

Mainly sunny.

Temperature high of 17 degrees...

MAATALII (off-screen): And, I have teachers all around me who continue to

teach me about my culture.

So, I call her my...

(speaking native language)

and she calls me her...

(speaking native language)

LEENA: She carries that namesake pretty strongly.

MAATALII: She's one of my teachers

and I learn so much from her.

Heating some snow.

LEENA: Yeah, it's not gonna melt there,

it's gonna have to be there.

I'll do it in a minute.

-MAATALII: Okay. -LEENA: You have to open that.

MAATALII (off-screen): I can just imagine but never understand what it was like

for my grandfather's generation.

When people talk about colonization, they're like,

"Oh that happened hundreds of years go," you know?

But for us, in Inuit homeland,

colonization happened to my grandparents.

LEENA: My, no, also to me.

MAATALII (off-screen): Yes.

LEENA: I'm the, my generation is the first generation, um,

to be totally taken away from home.

ED (off-screen): I don't think we can underestimate how profound an impact

past policies have been on the Arctic peoples.

In the 1950s, for example,

the government was very concerned about sovereignty in the Arctic.

♪ ♪

THEO: Igloolik, 1938.

Hall beach, 1959.

Qaanaaq, 1950.

The governments said, "you now live here."

They had to live there.

So it's not by choice that they started living in these communities.

JOHN (off-screen): My family were relocated from Northern Quebec

to the high Arctic in 1953,

a distance of about 2,000 kilometers.

The change from Northern Quebec to the high Arctic was different

and much more harsh.

JOHN (off-screen): We were told that it was for our own good,

but we found that very hard to believe.

I remember being treated not as human beings,

but as something less than human beings.

I remember the lies they told.

I get very emotional when I

recount the, the experience.

♪ ♪

ED (off-screen): They had their hair cut,

they were told not to speak their own language.

They tried to turn them into white people.

It just wasn't right.

THEO: I was literally taken from the grasp of my mother by a priest

and dragged off to residential school for seven years.

Abuses were being done to the students.

Physical,

mental,

and at sometimes sexual.

ED (off-screen): In many ways, it was a

social experiment that went horribly wrong.

And we're living with that now.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

HEATHER (off-screen): With great change comes great opportunity.

As that sea ice diminishes,

we're seeing great interest in shipping.

MAN (off-screen): Korea has a keen interest in the Arctic sea routes.

MAN: The prospects for Arctic business developments are getting better.

MAN: If a shorter route opens up,

we want to know about it.

HEATHER (off-screen): Shorter shipping times means

goods get to market faster.

All of this is a benefit to nations

that are investing in it.

You'll see more Chinese icebreakers,

even maybe Chinese submarines in the Arctic.

The Russians and the Chinese have one of the most ambitious

economic visions for the Arctic.

If they want to Arctic to be developed,

they will focus their resources,

and they will develop it.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

(wind blowing)

WOMAN (over TV): Good afternoon, (inaudible).

ALEQATSIAQ: This is almost like a Kool-Aid.

(water running)

(dog barking)

(speaking native language)

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): I can maybe look a little bit clumsy sometimes.

(speaking native language)

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): It's going to be a problem if I'm going to be a hunter.

Because when you are a hunter you have to be able to stand still,

stand quiet on the sea ice.

You have to be very good with your hands.

(wind blowing)

It began with my finger.

At first it was only my finger, then my leg.

The muscle is retracting off and on all the time.

I have tried to go to the doctor

to try to find out what it was.

They don't know, so I may have to meet a neurological doctor

to fully understand what it is.

It's going to be a problem if it gets worse.

♪ ♪

(speaking native language)

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): Maybe it will get better.

I have to have a purpose in my life.

I have to do something in my life.

(speaking native language)

♪ ♪

(cracking)

I want you to listen to the cracking sound.

I can see the ice is like a wave, moving like a wave.

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): If they become too big it will begin to break the ice.

And the ice will just snap.

In these last years, to be a hunter has become very hard.

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): The old hunting grounds,

like where they used to hunt.

MAN (off-screen): Yeah.

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): We cannot reach them anymore.

They are just history now.

MAN (off-screen): Let's go!

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): I think there will still be ice while I'm alive.

But everything is changing.

♪ ♪

(water running)

♪ ♪

EVA (off-screen): The Inuit from Greenland and Canada,

are so much dependent upon the animals that come

from the Pikialasorsuaq area.

The cost of living and cost of food in the north is so high,

so the people in the communities perpetually have

to supplement their meals each day from what they hunt.

WOMAN (over TV): $12 for a carton of orange juice,

this is everyday life in Nunavut.

A Conference Board of Canada report says more than a

quarter of the people living in the territory don't have

affordable access to food, let alone nutritious food.

But food security experts say the situation is actually much worse,

affecting almost half of Nunavut's population.

MAATALII (off-screen): This is the Nunavut country food store here in Iqaluit.

It's really important to me because this is where I can

buy locally harvested country food that we Inuit prefer to

eat over store bought food that is shipped up

by plane from the south.

MAATALII (off-screen): I wish there were more options like this in our local stores

because we have such amazing food that we can harvest.

And I know that many people want to be full time hunters

and fishermen.

Today, I'm looking for some Iqaluk, arctic char.

It's my favorite thing to eat.

I've been told that, because of a warming arctic,

that our char, which is usually this red,

is now becoming this color because of what they're eating instead,

more of those small white fish.

Yes!

This is how it's supposed to be. Look it!

MAN (off-screen): They look a lot healthier, right.

MAATALII: Yeah!

♪ ♪

ED (off-screen): If we do nothing as we've done in the past,

and just sort of let thing happen,

we're gonna lose some species.

There's no question about it.

ED (off-screen): We're going to see migration patterns

alter very dramatically.

It's gonna be a very, very different place.

It's going to be unrecognizable.

(speaking native language)

(speaking native language)

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): All the hunters,

some of them tells me, uh, the animals are polluted.

In their fat, they can see some rot that isn't supposed to be there.

It's kind of disturbing.

Sometimes I don't want to eat the meat.

But I have to eat it.

And our dogs have to eat it also.

That's how we live, uh, we eat what we hunt.

(speaking native language)

(snow crunching)

♪ ♪

♪ Here come Johnny singing oldies, goldies. ♪

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): Before I became a hunter,

I worked as a manager in the bar.

63.

A few months ago, the owner asked me if I could help out.

So I did.

(laughing)

(speaking native language)

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): I cannot say what

I'm going to be doing ten years from now.

Our culture has changed so fast.

It might be one of the reasons

that we get lost in our life here, now.

We get, uh, confused.

I have, uh, several friends that, uh,

that, that has committed suicide here.

For me it's three or four.

For me, yeah, that was very close to me.

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): I don't know if it's going to become better.

But...

everything change in this life, so.

MAN (over TV): Once called the creator's unfinished world,

the Arctic is just now emerging into the 20th century.

The oil men and the miners have found little here

but a promise and a challenge.

There have been few big strikes.

But like the men who came before them, like Frobisher,

Hudson, Franklin, and Peary,

they have helped to open up this land.

The prize they seek is great,

the price we pay may be greater still.

ED (off-screen): In the past we could do pretty much whatever

we wanted in the Arctic.

Some companies were getting a dollar-ten back for every

dollar they invested.

And, they just went wild.

ED (off-screen): You know, they laid waste to good parts of the Arctic.

♪ ♪

And now the rest of the world has suddenly realized that

this is the last frontier we can exploit for a variety of purposes.

A quarter of all of the unexploited oil and gas

reserves in the world are located in the Arctic.

The rest of the world really, really needs those resources.

And, they're untapped.

HEATHER (off-screen): There'll be new, non-arctic actors from Saudi Arabia

and even, potentially, India looking for those energy resources.

We're seeing increased in military operations in the Arctic,

more port infrastructure, more mining.

And so states are quickly working to try to figure out

the best approach.

ED (off-screen): Future economies are staking themselves on what

happens in the Arctic.

So the million-dollar question is,

is this going to be the wild west and we're just gonna

let everybody do whatever they want?

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

THEO: What happens on the land affects what happens in the sea.

What happens in the sea affects what happens on the land.

It's all very intricately interconnected.

In a sense we're just trying to gain back what we have lost...

the continuation of life in the Arctic as it has always been known,

and how it should be.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

(splashes)

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

(chewing)

♪ ♪

(thunder cracking)

(horn honking)

(horn honking)

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): I have been here for five days now.

I went to the doctor to see what,

what's wrong with me.

If they can fix it, I can keep hunting.

WOMAN: Does it get worse when you are under stress?

ALEQATSIAQ: It does.

When I feel confident enough I don't really notice it as much,

so I don't think about it.

WOMAN (off-screen): Okay.

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): I'm still waiting for, for the answer.

I hope they can do something about it.

If it's getting worse, then I have to think about,

to do other things than hunting.

I can become a 'tom tom drunk.'

No, I'm just kidding! (laughs)

♪ ♪

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): This is something you cannot control.

If you cannot change it, then that's how it is.

But if you can change it,

then you have to do something about it.

♪ ♪

MAATALII (off-screen): Our leaders started to mobilize back in the '60s

and '70s fighting for our rights as indigenous peoples.

MAN: We are being misrepresented in the territorial council.

And our organization, if it's regional

will have more understanding of what goes on in our communities.

MAN (over TV): Our guest is the director of the Inuit Tapirisat of Canada.

Welcome, please, John Amagoalik.

(applause)

MAN (over TV): Now, what do they want?

I realize that's a very broad story,

but what do they really want?

Is it money?

JOHN (over TV): Well, what they want is, uh, is, is, uh,

whatever is left of what we had before.

You know, before, before Columbus,

before Martin Frobisher, before those people came.

We want to protect as, uh, as much as possible of what

we have left.

Over the past few years, uh,

people seem to think that we're after money,

we're after, uh, um, services.

But the original intent was, very simply,

survival of our people.

You have failed.

We haven't failed.

You have failed to agree that aboriginal peoples have the

democratic and human right to self-government.

You have self-government.

You have your, you elect your member parliament.

You elect your provincial governments.

You benefit from resource development on your lands.

In the Arctic, we don't have the right to benefit

from resource development from our lands,

from our resources.

MAN (over TV): Good evening.

There's agreement tonight on the first amendment

to our new constitution.

It comes at the end of a two-day conference

on native rights.

The amendment doesn't promise immediate action;

it promises more talk.

Native leaders now have a guarantee they'll be sitting

down with government leaders again to talk

about their rights.

MAN (over TV): A 'yes' vote that will change forever

the map of Canada.

Inuit have agreed to the land claim,

so Ottawa has agreed to divide the Northwest Territories.

(cheering)

The final vote was 69% in favor.

Inuit leaders celebrated.

MAN (over TV): Tonight, a new territory, a new Canada.

The territory of Nunavut was born at midnight.

And since then, there's been celebrating and ceremony

to welcome the new arrival.

And, it's a big one, 2.2 million square kilometers,

twice the size of Ontario.

MAN (over TV): The ancient Inuit lamp called the Kudlik is the

symbol of survival for the Inuit.

And the Inuit say the land claim agreement and the

creation of Nunavut will ensure the survival

of their culture.

MAN (over TV): It took to 25 years to negotiate a land claim

agreement with the federal government,

a deal which created the territory.

JOHN (over TV): It seem like a long time,

but when you have your people behind you,

it makes it easier.

MAN (over TV): But, before any political speeches were made

or bills introduced,

a moment of silence to remember those who didn't live

long enough to see a dream come true.

JOHN: 20 years ago, it was, um, mixed emotions.

Uh, we were happy that we were successful in creating

a territory and settling our land claim.

The, the other half of the emotions

that we felt was uncertainty.

JOHN (off-screen): We're very concerned that the international community

seems to have forgotten about us again.

The rush to control the Arctic is happening right now.

In a sense, now we have to face international forces,

which seems to want to repeat

the colonial attitudes of the past.

MAATALII (off-screen): The rest of the world is looking

in our direction.

But, have they talked to us about it?

Have they talked to hunters in our communities who understand

what that means for migration routes?

Because we have that knowledge.

We want to protect what we have left.

The stakes are so high for us.

♪ ♪

MAATALII (off-screen): Everything that we are experiencing today

are symptoms of our history.

Many Inuit live in overcrowded homes.

Many Inuit are food insecure.

We have one of the highest suicide rates in the world.

Our language and our culture and way of life is

so connected to our land, our water, and our ice.

All of these things help weave into the fabric of my being.

So, I am no better than my land.

What on earth are we to feed our children if we can't

harvest the animals that we've depended on for thousands of years?

Will my future husband fall through the ice?

Our human rights as a people and the protection of our

wildlife and environment go hand-in-hand.

♪ ♪

(dripping)

(engine running)

(speaking native language)

EVA (off-screen): The three commissioners traveled up to Grise Fiord,

Resolute Bay, Pond Inlet,

Clyde River, Siorapaluk,

Qaanaq, Kullorsuaq

and other places in the northern part of

Greenland and met with the hunters.

KUUPIK: The important thing is that the hunters and the

fisherman are included in, in the research.

MAN: We'll probably get more problems with more cruise ships.

MAN: I do believe the narwhal return to that polynya.

MAN: Polar bears, they come to the communities more often now...

WOMAN: ...contracted trichinosis from fat that was infected...

WOMAN: ...learn from each other what it's like on the other side.

EVA (off-screen): Their concerns are consistent.

Both sides.

The shipping, the commercial fishing,

tourism, oil and gas exploration.

And, the Europeans looking for the easy way to get to the

other side of the world.

OKALIK (off-screen): The recommendations were largely Inuit led

management and monitoring and Inuit led governing system.

And freer travel between Canada and Greenland.

EVA (off-screen): There is a very close relationship, family ties.

People in northern Greenland, Qaanaaq,

Siorapaluk area used to hunt in Elsmere Island,

as if it was part of their country years ago.

When I was meeting people and interviewing people

in, in Siorapaluk and Qaanaq,

I, I found out that I have family ties,

and it was such an amazing experience.

EVA (off-screen): How their face lit up and, and start talking about so and so

in Pond Inlet, so and so in Grise Fiord,

so and so in Arctic Bay.

And, you feel the, the, the yearning

to see them once again,

and, sorry.

I didn't think it was gonna come.

Sorry.

EVA (off-screen): I really felt their desire to reconnect.

Their yearning to be with their friends again and

relatives like they used to.

And have that ease of access.

OKALIK (off-screen): The outside world needs to listen and understand

where we are coming from and where we are trying to go.

We have the most to gain when we are successful.

And we have the most to lose if there is a catastrophe.

♪ ♪

(whining)

(speaking native language)

(whining)

(speaking native language)

MAN: Help, help, help, help.

WOMAN (off-screen): Somebody help.

(whining)

(whining)

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): The people we learn from cannot teach us as

the way they had been taught, because of the ice.

It's too unpredictable now.

Life here is, is harsh, uh, it's hard.

You never know how it is here,

so you cannot plan too long in your life.

♪ ♪

They found out I have, uh, Parkinson's disease.

(speaking native language)

I cannot control what happened to me.

There's nothing I can do than take medicine they gave me.

♪ ♪

If I cannot continue as a hunter, of course, I won't.

I will have to stop.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

MAATALII (off-screen): I've always had to lean on my culture.

It really has carried me through the hardest times

of my life.

I was in a very controlling and abusive relationship

for a big part of my life.

And, what I realize now is during that process of control,

manipulation and abuse of all levels, um,

you lose yourself.

You begin to give up part of who you are

to suit somebody else's standard and expectation.

And that's how you continue on this spiral.

MAATALII (off-screen): And eventually, you either wake up

or you don't wake up from it.

After I escaped from that relationship,

I slept for a very long time.

About a month actually.

And, I haven't shared this with anybody before,

but I started dreaming about my ancestors.

I started dreaming about my homeland.

♪ ♪

MAATALII (off-screen): I imagine it was before colonization.

That's what it looked like.

And, that's what made me feel like I could smile again.

And that was what reminded me that I'm still here because

my culture allowed me to be here.

And I still have a purpose.

And I have to wake up.

And so I did.

MAATALII (off-screen): My ancestors visited me in my dream

to show me that we've been here before and we'll get there again.

(singing in native language)

-MAATALII: Good morning, (inaudible). -MAN: Good morning, ladies.

WOMAN: O, K what?

-MAATALII: O, K, A, L, I, K. -WOMAN: O, K, A, L.

(singing in native language)

MAN (over loudspeaker): One, two, three, four, five, six.

(speaking native language)

KUUPIK: The Pikialasorsuaq Commission's mandate

is for Inuit in Nunavut and Greenland to aim for, together,

to take control of an area divided into two by state borders.

It's a matter of survival. Physical, cultural, and mental.

We lived here before the states existed.

And the so-called conflict on whether it belongs to Canada or Denmark,

I would say, leave it to us Inuit.

It belongs to us together anyway.

We don't need a state commission.

(applause)

WOMAN (over loudspeaker): All in favor.

MAATALII (off-screen): I'm so proud of how far we've come

over the last just three generations.

And, what possibilities exist for the future.

♪ ♪

JOHN (off-screen): We don't want to continue to be victims.

We're not going to put up our hands or wave a, a white flag.

We're not gonna do that anymore.

(applause)

(waves crashing)

(wind blowing)

♪ ♪

DAVID: Huh?

(chipping)

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): David is my nephew.

He loves to hear the stories about hunting.

DAVID: Harpoon.

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): Tries to imitate his grandfather.

Even though he's seven.

DAVID: I'll get hot.

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): He's already going out with

four dogs with his own small sled.

Even though David doesn't know that my uncle will be watching him

from distance so that he doesn't get hurt.

Sometimes he will get wet or he will lose the dogs.

But that's how it is.

(speaking native language)

ALEQATSIAQ (off-screen): I don't know if David is going to become a hunter.

It depends totally on him.

The culture is changing.

But I think it's gonna get better somehow.

THEO: We welcome the return of the sun.

We actually celebrate the returning of the sun.

The sun had been under the horizon since the end of November.

And it resurfaces in mid-January.

It now gives us day light to get out and about.

The same as it has always been doing.

The continuation of life as we know it.

MAATALII (off-screen): I was told that my grandmother was

pregnant with one of my aunts.

And, the sea ice was breaking up.

And so, she gave birth,

picked up her baby, and kept going.

Because, there was no other option at that time.

So, when I feel like the world is falling around me,

I think of it as sea ice.

And, I think about how my ancestors were able to

navigate through that breaking sea ice.

MAATALII (off-screen): I can really get through anything

because of what I've been taught by their survival.

♪ ♪

(ice cracking)

(music playing through credits)

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

Captioned by Cotter Captioning Services.