Sanikiluaq (May 03/04) - Mary Inuktaluk Sr. feels a shift in how the wind blows in Sanikiluaq lately.

She can't quite put her finger on it, but to her it feels warmer on the island -- her homeland she affectionately calls "The Hawaii of Nunavut."

"It's like we're in our own little world," said Inuktaluk last week. "The island seems to be small on the map, but it's huge."

Inuktaluk thinks about global warming now, something she never imagined as a young girl, growing up in what is now Nunavut's most southern community.

"When I was younger, people used to go camping around this time in April until mid June by ski doo," said the soft-spoken woman, who also happens to be the deputy mayor of Sanikiluaq. "Now the ice will be unsafe until the last week of May."

Years back, the arena would open in November, she said. It didn't open at all this year.

"Big, big changes in the environment," she said. "It feels windy a lot, but we see the snow is melting pretty fast. That only gives us a little bit of time to go camping or fishing."

Out at the airport, Bill Fraser talked about living in "the Caribbean" of Nunavut.

"We're below the 60th parallel," said Fraser, who has lived in the community since 1995 and loves it there. "But we don't have any trees, which is pretty interesting."

Nestled in Hudson's Bay, 150km off the west coast of Quebec and about 300km from mainland Nunavut, Sanikiluaq has a variety of wildlife -- from ptarmigan to geese, and char in the waters.

The land is known for its soapstone, from which carvers create magic and beauty.

But Inuktaluk has noticed increasingly fewer people are buying soapstone carvings, or at least they are not buying them with the gusto she remembers they did 10 or 20 years ago.

In Sanikiluaq, everybody knows everybody else, and many of those people are related to each other, too.

"Everyone has a story," said John Jamieson. "And everyone has stories associated with them. Because we're so small, you can't help but know about the various types of people."

This makes the place friendly, said Jamieson, principal of Nuiyak School, who has called the community home since 1982.

"People remark on that," said Jamieson of the positive spirit in the community. "It's a very traditional community."

Lucy Tookalook has worked for Air Inuit in Sanikiluaq for the last 12 years. Born and raised there, Tookalook explained matter-of-factly that her great, great grandfather was none other than Sanikiluaq himself -- a man whose adventures as a fast runner became legend.

The story goes that Sanikiluaq was left in an iglu to fend for himself and grew to be a great hunter, even able to outrun the wolves.

While Tookalook is well aware of Sanikiluaq's ability to run swiftly, she disputes the left alone in an iglu part of the story. But then again, when it came to family stories: "I never asked a lot of questions," she said laughing.

The island's geographic isolation could be viewed as a barrier to closeness with other people in Nunavut, but Inuktaluk said people in Sanikiluaq feel very much a part of the territory.

"We can help other Nunavut communities understand how we live in Nunavut very differently than they do."

The land continues to call them out in the spring and summer.

"We can go about 50 miles out on our Hondas," said Inuktaluk. "In the summertime it goes up to 30C and you can get a suntan. I know because I've done it!"

But the closeness of the 750 or so residents may have led to the quick spread of the contagious Influenza A virus that hit the community hard last November.

Schools and day cares shut down so that people could recover from severe coughs and cold.

Health care workers were flown in, not an easy task for an island community which only receives regularly scheduled flights on Air Inuit four times a week. "We're OK now," said Inuktaluk.

Love the people and language

Jamieson, whose first steps into the North brought him to Iglulik in 1971, has stayed in Sanikiluaq mainly because of the people.

He supports culturally relevant programs, and retains an elder on staff to guide the children in their Inuktitut and other programs.

"The children here are speaking Inuktitut. It's very strong. We're fortunate," said Jamieson. "We don't have a lot of outsiders in town. The kids, once they leave school, they are speaking Inuktitut."

A teacher education program offered in the community will soon mean seven Inuit teachers will be available.

"We're going to be able to expand the amount of Inuktitut the kids get," said Jamieson, adding: "It's in the smaller communities where the real cultural strength is."

When asked what she likes about living in Sanikiluaq, the place named after her great, great grandfather, Tookalook simply answered: "It's home, I guess."