Go Bingo

We set out in the early morning for a day trip to Chevak. As usual, we ended up sitting at the Bethel airport for almost 2 hours, waiting for ERA airlines to figure out what plane we were going to take on the Hooper Bay, Scammon Bay, Chevak flight. It was patchy fog, but seemed like a nice day to me. We had a nice day in Chevak, crisp and cold with a bit more patchy fog. I think the patchy part in Bethel was just over the airport runway because ERA cancelled all afternoon flights. I thought for sure the evening flight would come, but come 4:30 in the afternoon, the news was all over town on the VHF radio....ERA cancelled all flights, Grant Air cancelled all flights and Hageland Air cancelled all flights too. So I guess we're spending the night at the Chevak clinic!

With the prospect of an exciting night in Chevak, I looked at my co-worker and there was not even the slightest doubt in her mind about how we would spend our evening......."Let's Go Bingo!" I've been wanting to experience this cultural phenomenon for awhile, so I agreed and we "had a date with bingo". Bingo was supposed to start at 7:30 and people told us to get there early if we wanted a seat!

First, though, we were invited over to her cousin's house for some moose stew. Fresh Yukon moose that her cousin had just killed 4 days ago up on the Yukon river. Walking into the cozy, warm house, I wasn't sure what I was getting into, but knew it would be an adventure (no camera involved, though). There was a huge stainless steel bowl in the middle of the table filled with large moose vertebrae. I think they had been boiled or pressure cooked. Then there was another pot of "soup" on the stove which was dished out into large bowls. I always get worried when someone else does the dishing and is giving large portions. Luckily, I got to the table in time to choose the smallest one! It was a oily/brothy soup with rice and macaroni noodles in it. Everyone else added a bit more seal oil to the broth, but since I'm a gussock at heart I passed on that one. Then, you choose your backbone from the common dish and pull little pieces of meat off the bone. A moose really has a big vertebrae, by the way. The meat was actually very tender in the more meaty sections. Luckily, I shared a bone with my co-worker and she helped me with the more difficult parts like eating the marrow. But I did succeed in mostly cleaning the bone (I tried to hide a few parts that I just couldn't eat). There's a Yupik word for this which I can't remember, but it is very important to thoroughly clean the bone or the hunter won't have good luck next time. Or else they were just pulling my leg because they could tell I was uncomfortable. But everyone else did an amazing job of eating the whole thing. The best part is that the whole dish was served with Tabasco. That stuff saves everything!

It was a relatively quick dinner so we could run to Go Bingo. Bingo was in the town hall, a relatively big room lined with 3 rows of conference room tables put together to form long lines. We arrived about 7:00 and seats were filling up. There were lots of ladies there, from old to young and everything in between (plus a few token men). On each table there was an empty Coke can between every 2 seats. Hmmm....I thought maybe there is going to be some kind of fun game of pass the Coke can or something. A package of Bingo sheets cost about $25 and then you buy additional sheets for bonus games. In total, there were 17 games for the night, and I would estimate that most people spend between 40-60 bucks per night. This is quite the habit when you consider a packed house every night of the week. I counted the head count for the night and it was about 75 people spread out on all the tables, the floor and a few more random spots (there's about 700 people who live in the town). There's also "Rippies" for sale in the corner. These are like little lottery tickets that you peel off....quite popular here in the bush. As the night progresses, the floor becomes littered with used Bingo sheets and used Rippies. So one sheet has 6 bingo squares on it and a lot of people play more than one sheet at once so that they are actually playing like 24 games at a time (see picture). The lady started calling the numbers and I was watching Juliana's sheet fill up (I actually just chose to observe when I saw how complicated the Bingo patterns are---no just getting 5 in a row here). The lady would call out B1 and Juliana would be marking N32....and then a few seconds later the lady would call out N32. What is she telepathic for Bingo? I looked around at all the other ladies. They seemed to be telepathic too. Then I realized there are television screens all around the room which show the number on the ball the second that it comes up! The calling is just for the second time and to make it official. As the night progressed, I actually became a little depressed. Bingo sure is bad odds...I can't believe people can be so addicted. The Coke cans turned out to be spit receptacles rather than a fun pass the Coke game. Everyone chews something called Iqmik here which is chewing tobacco mixed with punk ash (the ash from burning a special mushroom which makes the nicotine hit your system very fast). I just started thinking about how many productive things could be done in a small village if a bunch of people were willing to get together every night for something productive. Plus, once Bingo starts, the conversation pretty much dies because you really have to concentrate to play so many games at once. Nobody around me won any money the whole night. Juliana claims she hasn't won in months. She just calls it a donation. Not to be too much of a poopy pants, but I really just can't imagine the mindset.

Needless to say, I was ready to hit the sack when 10:30 rolled around. Bingo is very tiring and it had been a long day. We slept in the Clinic waiting room on some old foam mattresses. Luckily, there were no emergencies the whole night. We did get bumped off our flight the next morning for a medic evacuation, but luckily were able to catch another airline home and made it back to Bethel about 2:00 the next day. Yahoo! Here's to my first Bingo and Moose Vertebrae!