Sens and Sensibility: Nanouk’s Travel

Dad, I want to stay here. I don’t want to live in the city. I want to come back home.

No son, I want you to have a good life. Our world is too tough to live and survive. I want you to do well in life with some modern amenities and comforts. You and your children will have a life that you cannot even dream of in these harsh conditions where the snow never melts, the sun ever rises and you have to fight for survival every single day.

Dad, please listen to me. Our life in the open and with freedom is much better than what I saw in my visit to the big city in Toronto. I am all confused and at times amused after meeting the famous people over there. With all the toughness of life and fight for survival, I will still be happier there at home.

Tell me son about your days there.

So Dad, I landed in a park near the Lake Ontario and I was looking for some direction but the sign there got me all mixed up and lost- North Pole, Niagara Falls, Vancouver and Halifax and all I could see was the blue waters on three sides and a garden of green on another and so I headed there.

At the garden at night, I saw a man riding a beautiful horse. But it seemed strange that they were both standing still and so I walked towards the man astride in regal attire and called out, “Hello! I am Nanouk. I am new here and wanted to know if you could help me around.”

What help can I possibly give? I am King George V of England whose empire spread from one end of the globe to another and they said that the Sun never sets on the British Empire. My Jewel in the Crown was India where I visited in 1911 when the capital was shifted from Calcutta to Delhi. A grand durbar was held in Delhi to mark the occasion. And you know the best part about the Indian travel then was game hunting when I shot 21 tigers, 8 rhinoceros and a bear in just ten days.

You do hunting for fun but we Inuits in the northern snowy part of Canada do it for survival. We have to hunt polar bears, walrus and fish with our spears, bows and arrows. We store the frozen meat for winter months which lasts over ten months when moving out of our igloos is near impossible.

Since you as the King of the British Empire and the Emperor of India are not from this land, you stand frozen as a King in Queen’s Park while I look for someone famous from the land of the maple leaf. Your garden is green and beautiful but my ice world of white is so much better.

I was told by this King of a beautiful land just off Toronto, where water fell from great heights, that there lived a man who the locals say was the greatest inventor of the twentieth century. I took a Grey-line bus and reached Niagara where after seeing the beautiful waterfalls, I walked into an overlooking garden where the famous man stood. As I went close I saw a written in bold…Nikolai Tesla.

Hello Nikolai, how do you do Sir? I am Nanouk from another world much further north. My father wants me to come down here and study science and its benefits. Will you be my guide?

Dear Nanouk, I too came from Croatia and after studying in Germany, Hungary and Austria came to US in 1884. Here I worked with a great man called Thomas Edison whose DC based electrical works were the standard of the country. Soon I left Edison for we were completely different personalities. Whereas Edison was more focused towards marketing and financial matters I was more academically inclined.

I designed the alternating current (AC) electrical system which soon became the pre-eminent power system of the twentieth century and has remained so worldwide since then. If you take a walk down from here, you will find the remains of a hydro-electric power plant. I patented the Tesla coil which laid the foundation of wireless technologies.

It is good that you want to study science but in this land you also need to have a high level of business acumen or else you will soon get frustrated. I too had become eccentric and in the later part of my life I devoted much of my time to the care of wild pigeons in parks.

Thanks Nikolai. You’ve been very helpful. Science is good but becoming looney is not. I would rather stay sane than go insane. You stay here enjoying the greatest of all the waterfalls. I salute you for all the inventions and patents but the world of my dreams is not this. If I could make the life of my fellow Inuits better with health care and basic amenities that could make their difficult life a little easier, that’s where my science should take me. Money is important but I am quite like you…

Dad, I returned to the city once more and landed myself in a museum where I found among other things shoes worn by us. I was taken around by a man called Thomas Bata. He showed me the golden shoes of kings, sparkling ones of rock stars and simple ones for kids. We then sat down for a glass of beer when I asked him about himself.

My family were cobblers in the present day Czech Republic. In 1895 we created a shoe out of canvas instead of leather and became very popular. After World War 1, came the economic slump. Our factory in Ziln was called Bataville and our workers began to be called Batamen. Business grew rapidly and we expanded into many new countries including India. We also started Bata Price where the shoe cost ended with a nine after a decimal rather than a whole number, a tradition we have maintained till date. I died in a plane crash in 1932. In 1964 we moved our corporate headquarters to Toronto, Canada. Presently it is my daughter who is taking care of my business which is going through difficult times.

Ok Mr. Bata so you too are not from Canada. Then who is?

Thomas laughed aloud and asked me to follow a road that would take me to another Hall where he told me to finally meet a pure bred Canadian. I thanked him for a pair of shoes, which he said was his company’s bestseller, called Hush Puppies and moved on.

I landed at the Hockey Hall of Fame and at the gate was greeted by a smiling gentleman who introduced himself as Wayne Gretzky.

Hello Wayne, I am Nanouk from Nanungat up north in the countryside. Mr. Bata said you are ‘The Great One’ so I bow to thee.

Wayne smiled and asked me to follow him as he took me around the Hockey Hall of Fame. He showed me the pictures of hockey greats, the clothes worn by champions and even showed me how to play. It is pretty easy Dad. You have a long staff curved at the end and you have to strike the small round thing called puck into the net. He showed me some movie clips where the players do not take it easy and end up fighting each other. He then took me to a room where the famous trophies are kept and told me about the Stanley Cup which is awarded to the National Hockey League Champions. He even took a picture of me standing with the cup. It felt so good Dad.

Wayne presented me with a shirt with 99 printed on the back. I read at the museum that Gretzky is regarded as the ‘greatest hockey player ever’ and was the leading scorer and provided the maximum assists than any player in the history of NHL. Gretzky was honoured by the Canadian government with many awards and the shirt number 99 was retired for NHL as a mark of respect for the great player. Now Wayne lives away from Toronto where he has a vineyard. He even let me taste sweet ice-wine. Ice-wine is made from grapes that are plucked at night in cold winters as that is the time when the fruit is the sweetest.

Finally, I found a real Canadian and I liked the sport he played. This is good life Dad but for this all you need is some good ice and we have plentiful of it back home. For that I need not spend the rest of my life here. So as sun sets on the beautiful Lake Ontario, I am flying back Dad and will stay with you, my friends…be myself and be with nature.