Saturday, November 04, 2006

Ephemeron

OCTOBER 26 - Man wasn’t meant for the cold. Aside from Robin Williams, man is one of the few mammals who don’t have body fur or any natural protection from the elements, like blubber (ok, well, some humans do…). Yet man, also the most stubborn creature on the planet, has always forced himself into the most inhospitable conditions, whether in exploration or settlement. Yesterday, we exhibited that stubbornness and forged into one of the most inhospitable places on earth, well, a taste of it, anyway. For our Chase Splurge in Alaska, we had considered taking a plane to fly over Mt. McKinley, one of the Seven Summits, or the highest peaks in each continent. Logistics and costs put it out of consideration, though, but we also considered hang gliding over the snow-capped mountains. We later concurred that we could pretty much hang glide anywhere else, so we scrapped that idea, too. One activity that was doable and seemed perfectly Alaskan was to hike through Matanuska glacier. Going up to the glacier, which is the largest one accessible by car, only costs $15 for the maintenance of the roads leading up to it. However, doing so would limit us to a certain picnic area which would’ve made for uninteresting television. To actually trudge into the ice, though, which can pose a few hazards if you’re not experienced with glacier travel, required hiring guides and renting equipment that was a little bit over our daily stipend of $50. With that in mind, we decided to hit Matanuska glacier.

The Matanuska glacier is a living glacier that moves up to two to three feet per day during the summer and several inches during the winter. It is a valley glacier twenty-four miles long and four miles wide, its terminus being the source of the Matanuska river. The weather on the glacier itself is almost always good, thanks to a meteorological phenomenon called a weather hole, which keeps a location mostly under calm weather, and yesterday was a perfect day for a hike. Our guides, Heather, Luke, and Louie taught us that the biggest danger of hiking on the glacier was the cold itself. With the TJs like Jaime and Lena shivering under their layers of clothing, we were easily convinced. The freezing temperature also worked up our mucus membranes, so we had to be vigilant for snotsicles forming under our noses. To help ward off the cold, our guides lent some of us extra layers of clothing, such as windproof pantaloons and jackets. Basically, there are three things that we can do to keep ourselves warm: add more layers of clothing, eat, and do physical activities. As long as the blood circulates normally in the body, we’ll feel warm. The reason why our extremities are the first to feel the effects of cold weather is because the blood rushes to the brain, which our bodies consider to be the most important part and the blood rush is its natural mechanism for preserving the brain, depriving other parts of the body of blood and consequently, warmth. One way to keep warm is to fool the body into thinking that everything’s okay by keeping our heads, more specifically, our napes, warm and toasty. So scarves and beanies are a good start. Our guides also made us wear these space age-looking boots to go over our sneakers for better traction on the snow. To walk the actual glacier, which is extremely slippery, they taught us how to use crampons, a framework of spikes that attach to boots to provide traction for snow and ice. With a bit of an education on glacier travel, we were off.

The first thing that entered my geek brain while we were trudging the ice and snow was how much it reminded me of all the snow-covered places I’ve seen in movies or read about in books. This topography resembled that of the planet Hoth, from the Hoth system in Star Wars. There was a little bit of Middle Earth’s Caradhas. Somewhere in the crevasses, I could imagine the entrance to Superman’s Fortress of Solitude. In the snow-covered terrain, I could envision forces of the Horde and the Alliance fighting in Alterac Valley from the World of Warcraft. It was fueling my imagination like mad and it was great. Glacier hiking entails a few perils in addition to the cold, like crevasses deceptively covered with bridges of snow or thin ice, uneven hard surfaces beneath the soft snow which can easily cause ankle sprains or worse. Carefully supervised by our guides, we traversed the icescape in awe and wonder. It is a testament to nature’s grandeur and power, which I have learned to respect. Back in the Philippines, I had grown to love and respect the majesty of the Ocean. Nature is more powerful than we can ever hope to be, and in order to fully appreciate it, we need to play by its rules. And sometimes, she doesn’t play nice. There were times when we’d be walking on solid ice or surrounded by mountains made of compacted ice. It was surreal. It was like being on another planet. Coming from a tropical country where the biggest block of ice that I’d ever seen were those industrial-sized ice blocks, seeing a gargantuan wave of frozen water was a completely new experience.

It was only after walking through the glacier for some time that the idea of impermanence struck me. The vast topography formed a gorgeous white landscape that reminded me of the Grand Canyon because of the creases and wrinkles in the ice. But unlike the Grand Canyon, a natural marvel that was the result of thousands of years of water sculpting rock, a glacier, at least Matanuska, changes very quickly. Ice cracks, fills, forms and reforms, making the glacier a living, moving piece of real estate. The Matanuska that I saw and experienced did not have the same features that hikers from a week ago or hikers next week will see. The icescape changes. As the glacier flows into the valley, the ice cracks, melts, and tears down and builds new mountains and canyons of grey and blue and stark white. It is an inspiring sight. The serenity and silence of the place also gave me cause to reflect. Our guides told us that global warming has forced the recession of glaciers to the point that in about eighty years, the Matanuska glacier may no longer exist. With a little research, though, I found that the reason for glacier recession is debatable (you can learn more about Global Warming here, here, and here). What isn’t debatable, though, is that these glaciers are disappearing. The Grand Canyon’s beauty is a testament to nature’s work over thousands of years while the Matanuska glacier is a work in progress that keeps on changing and will eventually disappear. It was an ephemeral landscape, ephemeral being a relative term simply because all those mountains of ice were older than we were. But it reminded me of the conversation from the Little Prince, where he comes upon a geographer and encounters the word ‘ephemeral’ for the first time. “We write of eternal things,” the geographer told the Little Prince. Eternal, perhaps, like the Grand Canyon. But not of the Matanuska glacier, which is more like the Little Prince’s rose. “My flower is ephemeral,” the Little Prince mused to himself, and had his first moment of regret.

So it was with that thought that I felt the melancholy of the white terrain seep into me. I had wished, at that moment, that all the people that I love were there with me to see what I was seeing. That’s why at every crook and crevasse, I would whip out my digital camera, overworked in the cold, and try to capture every moment we experienced. I regretted that my camera wasn’t sensitive enough to capture the nuances of the colors and textures in the ice. Even my words, as I write now, about everything that I saw and felt, are woefully inadequate to capture the essence of the experience. This was life in a nutshell. Moments strung together. For the planet earth, the Matanuska glacier is but a speck in its million-year history. We, on the flip side, are but specks in the glacier’s ever-changing landscape.

I don’t think I’ve ever felt more alive than when I was in Alaska. Every experience has been so invigorating and exhilarating that I hardly needed to do the things that our guides taught us to do. There were times during our hike that I’d remove my gloves and beanie because I actually felt warm. It was excitement, an adrenaline rush… a strange inspiration that I hadn’t felt in a long time. It’s something of an irony, really, that such desolation, in a place with so little life, that one can be spurred to creation. I had attempted to write poetry again when I saw my first snowfall. It’s a work in progress, and I might actually be shameless enough to post it one of these days. I’m also mulling over some graphic art inspired by all the frost, it’s shocking. Being in America has made me reach deep into myself, and I’ve been wonderfully surprised. America’s greatness does not just come from it’s wealth, which was greatly apparent in Las Vegas, but that it is blessed with such beautiful and varied topography, which I have glimpsed in Alaska. I am grateful to be here, to be alive, and to be part of this rare experience.

POSTSCRIPT: I dedicate this BLOG, my VLOG, my photos, and all my experiences in Alaska to my brother Bruno, who was again denied a US visa by the consulate in the Philippines. As sad as the glaciers made me, it made me sadder still to find out that my brother was denied a chance to see the beauty of America. Like I said in my first official BLOG, I have a great many things to say to the US consulate. My last BLOG on this trip will likely be a love letter to them. But right now, I would like to tell my brother that one day, buddy, we’ll walk the glaciers together. When you are ready to scale Denali (my brother is an avid mountaineer), I’ll be cheering you on. All things in good time, you know He has reasons for everything. Maybe He just wants you to put on more blubber for the cold. I love you, bro!