Richard Gleeson
Northern News Services

NNSL (Feb 03/99) - Eddie Kolausok has a simple, if temporary, solution to the high cost of renting in Yellowknife -- igloos.

Kolausok, with help from friends David Gowans and Robert Firth, has built two igloos on the ice between Jolliffe Island and the mainland, next to the Snow Castle's skating rink.

Though igloos may be a solution to high rents, Kolausok did not build igloos to save money. The DIAND employee built them to raise money for the Yellowknife Association for Community Living and for the John Howard Society of the NWT.

"Tony (the Snow King) and I would be happy to get any type of donation for these organizations that help a lot of needy people," said Kolausok, a director with the John Howard Society.

During his Feb. 27 to March 6 stay at the igloo, Kolausok will be taking pledges for both organizations. He also has a number of events scheduled for his stay, including nightly poetry readings and storytelling.

And he's already got two neighbours lined up -- fellow DIAND worker Emmanuel Atiomo, who is originally from Nigeria, and businessman David Connelly. Both coughed up a donation for the pleasure of spending a night in an igloo.

"If anybody else wants to experience that during that week they're welcome to contact us," said Kolausok. All inquiries and pledges are to be made through the Yellowknife office of the John Howard Society.

During his stay, Kolausok will be relying on tradition while he's at the igloo. He will be wearing a traditional parka loaned by former premier Nellie Cournoyea, as well as caribou pants and traditional kamiks from friends in Holman. Kolausok's sole source of heat will be a qulliq, a traditional stone oil lamp.

He still needs some caribou skins to sleep on, and appealed to any hunters out there who may have some to consider loaning them for his stay.

Igloos are not new to Kolausok. In Inuvik, in 1996, he spent 10 days and nights in one as part of another fund-raiser.

"It was very comfortable. There was a blizzard for the first couple of days and it was still very warm and cozy."

Apart from the fund-raising, Kolausok said igloo living helps him get in touch with his Gwich'in and Inuvialuit heritage.

"My father used to live like that, so the significance it has for me is it reminds me of another time," he said. "The experience of doing it really makes you appreciate the resilience of people of that time, and how gifted they were at using nature."