The Whole Wide World

It’s a happening. Change is here. It started with the blue hour in the afternoon which increases by a few minutes everyday bringing more and more light to our little station. The mountains across the sea ice were completely visible this afternoon and all the colors were in the sky looking out past Hut Point. So pretty. The store is also noticeably busier with people making souvenir purchases before they leave. The first flight of WinFly is a mere fifteen days away. That will take roughly fifty of us back to New Zealand and bring another fifty down to the ice.

I came into work this morning to an email from our winter site manager announcing that our new dorm rooms are ready to move into. I have to be out of my current room and into my new room by next Thursday. I’ll probably move a bag of my things each day before work and then make the final move next Thursday which is my day off. I have to rearrange all the furniture back to its normal configuration, which includes putting a bed I’d collapsed back together again. The same goes for my new room which will be considerably smaller, but have a connecting bathroom that is shared with my suitemate, Eleni. The room I am in now has four beds, one of which is a bunkbed, so space for five residents. The room I am moving into has two twin beds, so I will be rearranging the furniture to make a big bed since I still two months of sleeps down here. It’s nice to sprawl.

The hot topic on station today….the booze news. The National Science Foundation (NSF) had their weekly conference call with station leadership this morning. During the Q&A at the end, someone asked about booze sales for the upcoming summer season. Apparently word got out that the NSF are considering revoking booze sales at the bar this summer and someone brought that rumor up in the meeting. Word spreads like wildfire down here and the community board was full of memes by lunchtime.

Someone approached my in the hall as I was entering the store before lunch. Have you heard the news, Annemarie? Nothing is confirmed or approved yet, but the NSF are considering halting booze sales at the bars as early as October. The station is buzzing with this, as you can imagine. Binge drinking and alcohol related incidents are definitely a thing down here, so it doesn’t really surprise me that this is being considered. I do think it will affect some peoples decision to return to the ice for future deployments. It will certainly be interesting to see how this unfolds…