Day Two: Anchorage

9:11 am Alaska Time

I took this picture this morning at 9:11am. It seems to be pretty much like twilight until about 11am, and then it's light, but it is more like it's afternoon back home.

This morning I met my principal for a few moments before she went to her conference with the other principals. Then we came back to our hotel next door to theirs for breakfast. Most of us thought that we would be having a continental breakfast but to our surprise there was a chef making omelets, pancakes, eggs and french toast. I had reindeer sausage. My picky eater buddy and I made an agreement if I ate a bite he would.

Reindeer Sausage!

It was really good. I would definitely eat it again. If I hadn't known, I would have thought it was polish sausage. (Like someone once let me believe that the "chicken" I was eating was chicken, and not duck! You know who you are!)

After breakfast a few of us went and walked around the hotel. One of the guys said he saw moose tracks and poop out behind the motel and so we decided if we could find it. We could find the poop, and tracks in the grass directly behind the motel, but the tracks were hard to take a picture of.

The Moon!

Moose Poop!

The mountains behind the hotel

Hey, look I learned how to make the pictures bigger! 

So we met back in the lobby at 10am with everyone and then we went off to Walmart. 

The view from Walmart. 

I've been looking for lemon Oreo's since I saw a friend post about them on Facebook. I found them at Walmart. I got two packages and sent them to Teller with some other stuff I forgot to get.

Walmart's all look the same. 

I have to go to Alaska to get Lemon Oreos

Walmart's Alaska Bush Program

One thing interesting about Walmart is that they allow you to shop for non-perishable items, place them in a cart and fill out a form with your name, address and phone number. Then you mark COD. Then Walmart boxes up your items and rings them up and ships them out.

In Anchorage a gallon of milk was $3.39 a gallon. A 6 pack of Fiber One Lemon Bars were $2.98, which is about the same as Portland. Milk may be a bit cheaper tho. a 12 pack of Coke regular price at Walmart was $4.88. The BSSD staff has told us that many of us that our stores won't have a lot of items to purchase because they order stuff before food stamps and WIC come in, and as soon as the villagers get their checks, there's not much left til they order again to get there in time for payday.

Most of my food I shipped from Portland, 30 lbs of food was about $30, takes about 2 weeks to get to Teller. The BSSD staff says it takes about 10 days to get the food from Anchorage Walmart to our villages. I'll let you know how long it takes for my small order to get there. (LEMON OREOS! and a few other "junk food" items I was craving.)

 From there we headed over to Sportsman Warehouse where one of the interns needed to buy some boots, and the Asst. Superintendent bought us some Ice Trekkers.

They go on the bottom of the boots to give you more traction when you are walking in ice and snow.

They forgot to do our gear check, so we headed back to the hotel. We had to get our coats, gloves, hats, boots and snow pants out for inspection. I passed with flying colors. There were a couple that needed to get better gloves tho. So we went to lunch at a place close to REI and an used book store called Tidal Wave. I went to the bookstore and browsed. 

AMAZING! Carrot Cake from The Midway Cafe in Anchorage. I also had a grilled cheese sandwich.

After lunch we came back to the hotel. Kristina took a nap and I started writing this post. I decided I would go downstairs to the lobby and sit at the table and write, but everyone else was playing cards so I sat and watched them play. They decided to talk a walk, and Bill went upstairs. He came back with some of his family pictures and I showed him pictures of my family and friends. Bill is the other intern that will be with me in Teller. He went to EOU as well, but was in Ontario, Oregon.

Interns playing cards in the lobby. 

Dinner: TV Dinner Special: Buffalo Shephard's Pie, roll, salad with ranch, greens, and a carrot cake cupcake!

At 6 we went to dinner with our respective principals. Bill and I also went with the principal of Golovin and Kirsten the intern going there. We had a great dinner and I learned a lot about what Teller is like and what to expect. I'm so excited to finally get there on Wednesday. We also found out that we will possibly get to see the Iditiarod during our spring break, possibly couch surfing in Golovin!!!!

We'll also might get to ride a snowmobile the 6 miles across the bay to Brevig Mission to see Sean and Andrew who are interning there. 

We are the first interns that they have ever done this with. So it's a new experience for them, as well as for us. They are being very open and honest about what to expect while in the villages, as well as telling us the good things as well. I am really glad to have chosen to do this, because I am going to learn so much.