Press "Enter" to skip to content

Posts tagged as “Anna Demkovich”

‘I will definitely return here’: Growing up in Barentsburg means students, visitors exchange fascinating life experiences

0 0
Read Time:9 Minute, 45 Second

(Editor’s note: This is one in a series of articles by Anna Demkovich, 14, about moving to and growing up in Barentsburg).

It’s hard to forget the landscapes of the Arctic. Especially the beautiful view that I watched every day from the window: the Sleeping Knight, the Pomor Lodge, the fjords.

About Post Author

Mark Sabbatini

I'm a professional transient living on a tiny Norwegian island next door to the North Pole, where once a week (or thereabouts) I pollute our extreme and pristine environment with paper fishwrappers decorated with seemingly random letters that would cause a thousand monkeys with a thousand typewriters to die of humiliation. Such is the wisdom one acquires after more than 25 years in the world's second-least-respected occupation, much of it roaming the seven continents in search of jazz, unrecognizable street food and escorts I f****d with by insisting they give me the platonic tours of their cities promised in their ads. But it turns out this tiny group of islands known as Svalbard is my True Love and, generous contributions from you willing, I'll keep littering until they dig my body out when my climate-change-deformed apartment collapses or they exile my penniless ass because I'm not even worthy of washing your dirty dishes.
Happy
Happy
0 %
Sad
Sad
0 %
Excited
Excited
0 %
Sleepy
Sleepy
0 %
Angry
Angry
0 %
Surprise
Surprise
0 %

‘If a day passed without events, it was in vain’: A 14-year-old’s diary about growing up in Barentsburg (part two in a series)

0 0
Read Time:9 Minute, 15 Second

(Editor’s note: This is the second of what was originally a two-part series by Anna Demkovich, 14, about moving to and growing up in Barentsburg. She has since agreed to provide two additional articles about her experiences that will be published in the next two issues. Her first article about moving from a war-torn town in the Ukraine to Svalbard was published in the previous issue of Icepeople.)

•••••

When you hear the word “north” you imagine that polar bears are everywhere. Sleds with reindeer and dogs replacing public transport. People dressed in a bunch of clothes so that they look like cabbages. Harsh snowstorms causing huge snowstorms. Icebergs protruding from the water. Harsh, like the Arctic winter, the polar explorers.

And it is. Almost.

About Post Author

Mark Sabbatini

I'm a professional transient living on a tiny Norwegian island next door to the North Pole, where once a week (or thereabouts) I pollute our extreme and pristine environment with paper fishwrappers decorated with seemingly random letters that would cause a thousand monkeys with a thousand typewriters to die of humiliation. Such is the wisdom one acquires after more than 25 years in the world's second-least-respected occupation, much of it roaming the seven continents in search of jazz, unrecognizable street food and escorts I f****d with by insisting they give me the platonic tours of their cities promised in their ads. But it turns out this tiny group of islands known as Svalbard is my True Love and, generous contributions from you willing, I'll keep littering until they dig my body out when my climate-change-deformed apartment collapses or they exile my penniless ass because I'm not even worthy of washing your dirty dishes.
Happy
Happy
0 %
Sad
Sad
0 %
Excited
Excited
0 %
Sleepy
Sleepy
0 %
Angry
Angry
0 %
Surprise
Surprise
0 %

How I became an explorer: One 14-year-old girl’s long voyage from the Ukraine to a new life with her family in Barentsburg

0 0
Read Time:10 Minute, 47 Second

(Editor’s note: This is the first of a two-part series by Anna Demkovich, 14, who agreed to share some of her writings about growing up in Barentsburg. This part details how her father found work in the Russian settlement and her journey from her Ukrainian hometown to the far north. A Ukrainian version of this article has been published by her homeland magazine Пульса (“Pulse”).)

It all started with the usual advertisement.

I am the daughter of miners. There are four of us in the family: I, Mom, Dad and my younger sister Dasha. I never stood out among my peers and my life was no different from that of other Krivorozhan children. But I always had a feeling that something special would happen, which doesn’t happen to everyone, and that my world would radically change. But, this “something” did not happen and did not happen. But then…

About Post Author

Mark Sabbatini

I'm a professional transient living on a tiny Norwegian island next door to the North Pole, where once a week (or thereabouts) I pollute our extreme and pristine environment with paper fishwrappers decorated with seemingly random letters that would cause a thousand monkeys with a thousand typewriters to die of humiliation. Such is the wisdom one acquires after more than 25 years in the world's second-least-respected occupation, much of it roaming the seven continents in search of jazz, unrecognizable street food and escorts I f****d with by insisting they give me the platonic tours of their cities promised in their ads. But it turns out this tiny group of islands known as Svalbard is my True Love and, generous contributions from you willing, I'll keep littering until they dig my body out when my climate-change-deformed apartment collapses or they exile my penniless ass because I'm not even worthy of washing your dirty dishes.
Happy
Happy
0 %
Sad
Sad
0 %
Excited
Excited
0 %
Sleepy
Sleepy
0 %
Angry
Angry
0 %
Surprise
Surprise
0 %

Exchange students: Youths from Barentsburg and Australia get inadvertent education about life during brief cruise

0 0
Read Time:4 Minute, 19 Second

The youths from Barentsburg ended up taking a boat trip to nowhere due to rough seas. An Australian family who paid to visit the Russian settlement decided they were too tired to disembark while the local kids climbed aboard. Which turned their “diminished” experiences into something much richer than originally planned.

About Post Author

Mark Sabbatini

I'm a professional transient living on a tiny Norwegian island next door to the North Pole, where once a week (or thereabouts) I pollute our extreme and pristine environment with paper fishwrappers decorated with seemingly random letters that would cause a thousand monkeys with a thousand typewriters to die of humiliation. Such is the wisdom one acquires after more than 25 years in the world's second-least-respected occupation, much of it roaming the seven continents in search of jazz, unrecognizable street food and escorts I f****d with by insisting they give me the platonic tours of their cities promised in their ads. But it turns out this tiny group of islands known as Svalbard is my True Love and, generous contributions from you willing, I'll keep littering until they dig my body out when my climate-change-deformed apartment collapses or they exile my penniless ass because I'm not even worthy of washing your dirty dishes.
Happy
Happy
0 %
Sad
Sad
0 %
Excited
Excited
0 %
Sleepy
Sleepy
0 %
Angry
Angry
0 %
Surprise
Surprise
0 %