Richard Gleeson
Northern News Services

NNSL (July 12/99) - It was a time to put all arguments on hold, slow down, step back and consider the tremendous achievement and promise called Nunavut.

Of course, Nunavut Day is also time for some music, fun, good food and hundreds of balloons.

The July 9 anniversary of the 1993 signing of the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement was a day to celebrate in every Nunavut community, though the weather forced a postponement in parts of the Kitikmeot.

In Iqaluit, most of Nunavut's birthright organizations chipped in to make the day. Employees turned off their computers and headed over to the Nakasuk school grounds to serve up stew, helium balloons, pop and cake for the hundreds who gathered there.

In the territorial capital, the warmth and sunshine did not prevent some from donning sealskin parkas as a show of pride.

"I'm getting warm already," said Simiga Korgak with a smile minutes after putting on a sealskin parka, pants and kamiks in preparation for the traditional clothing contest.

He had borrowed the clothes from friend Pitseolak Alainga, who said his mother had made them.

"I wear that in spring to keep the rain off the clothing I wear inside it," said Alainga. "They're better than rain gear."

The comparison cuts to the heart of Nunavut Day. The federal government, and after it the territorial government, transposed southern solutions, the only solutions they, as southerners knew of, on the people of Nunavut.

As well-intentioned as it was, it was rain-gear government in the land of seal skin, thrust upon the people of Nunavut by a foreign culture.

Despite the warmth, seal skin was back in vogue Friday and, said Alainga, it's becoming more and more fashionable every day.

"It's the start of a new beginning for us," said Alainga, chairman of the Amarok Hunters and Trappers Association and a board member of the Qikiqtaaluk Wildlife Board and Baffin Fisheries Council.

"I'll say this: for me, when they first started talking about it, for a while I really didn't want Nunavut to happen. I'm slowly changing my mind.

"As a young man I'm putting all of my thoughts together and hoping things get better day by day."