someone was here

[piranha]

pseudo-inuksuit at nanaimo harbour. i've noticed that since the 2010 winter olympics incorporated an inunnguaq in their logo these things have proliferated. i like them in that location, because some people go to great length to construct them well, and at least at the harbour they're not actually misleading as a waymark.

language notes:

"inuksuk" means "substituting for a human" in the inuit language; "inuksuit" is the plural. peoples of the arctic use these monuments of unworked stones for communication and survival. traditionally they indicate a food cache, a reference point, or a navigation marker. they can be constructed from a single upturned stone to large cairns with many stones carefully balanced.

an "inunnguaq" is a subcategory of inuksuit, a structure in a stylized human shape, with legs and arms, which has been coming to mean friendship and welcome, and seems to be mogrifying into an international canadian symbol.

Comments

[ceri]

I love the picture and appreciate the lesson. :)

[sara]

In the summer, when the water's low, these appear on rocks in the middle of our river.

They're basically meaningless, but kind of fun, and much less offensive to me, as these things go, than spraypainting on rocks.

[piranha]

oh yeah. i expect that rock cairns are a very, very early form of human engineering.

[crantz]

Wow, I'm amazed at the balancing act going on there. That's just cool.

(Also, thanks for the word education. I only knew inuksuk)

[piranha]

i know! it's really awesome. it had my hands itching to try it myself.