On a recent weekday 44-year-old Merle Apassingok captained his father's sailboat, hunting bowhead whales in falling snow off St. Lawrence island. His nephew Agra labored to bail water the way Apassingok had as a boy.
"I was telling my crew, I said, 'Hey Agra, you're probably the only 9-year-old boy in the whole world sailing for whales in a walrus skin boat,' and then we started laughing," Apassingok said.
The joke was on them. Nearby, Apassingok's younger brother hunted in yet another handmade skin boat, with yet another 9-year-old crew member learning the same skills. It's springtime in the coastal villages of the Alaska Arctic. As it has for generations, that means whaling season.
Read the full story at adn.com.
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