Open Archive 3/17/2023 Translating "Interview with Simeon Kvasnikoff 2"

Creators and Contributors Dawn Randazzo (Contributor)
Brandon Moonin (Contributor)
Richard Moonin (Contributor)
Lillian Elvsaas (Contributor)
Polly Thiele (Contributor)
Thomas Andersen (Contributor)
Emilie Swenning (Contributor)
William Smith (Contributor)
Kera Venhuizen (Contributor)
Zoya Green (Contributor)
Tatianna Turner (Contributor)

Cultural Narrative He talks about his ancestors. Somebody, perhaps his grandfather, came from Nuuciq. He wonders if the Tanapes came from Nuuciq too. Something along the lines of Runaway People coming to meet him. He describes three hole baidarkas/qayaqs (paitalek) from Yaaliq Bay. The moved from Ialik down to Kodiak. (He repeats himself for a while and talks about people traveling from place to place). He describes riding in between some big waves while traveling. He’s describes traveling somewhere (unclear where) and trying to get some wood. They would go someplace and eat a big dinner and dance where the women would wear long dresses where the women would have to hold up their dresses to keep them off the ground. They would eat together and fight over the food. He says they’re killing people and wouldn’t take anything from them. He describes not taking any of the corpse’s items to avoid inheriting bad luck. He describes people coming up from the south and ensuing fights over the land. He describes the Sugt’stun dialects clashing. He describes how now there are more Sugt’stun people on Kodiak.

“My dad used to travel. Sometimes they used the big qayaqs. A few couple of people rowing so they could go a little faster. They’d go around back here. I never heard him saying he would go to Kodiak, but they would travel between communities by rowing.” – Richard Moonin

“My mother was born in Katella in 1920. And my grandfather was in Cordova. They came to town and they were heading back and they had a small sailing boat, they had a rowboat, to try to be there when my mother was born. They left here the 1^st of April and they kept on going and they kept on going. They had to travel into the wind and would stop and anchor. By the time they made it to Katella it took them a month. Time was different back then.” – Tom Anderson

“I imagine people did relocate to Kodiak. Back then they didn’t have boundaries. People traveled where they wanted to. They went where the food was sometimes.”

“We were born nomadic people until the Russian forced us to settle down.” – Brandon Moonin

“A lot of the fishermen I know would go fishing near Kodiak, and some of them never came back… they ended up living there.” -Tom Anderson

“I grew up a little boy on the boat, I have a picture being in full rain gear, had one of those fancy hats dressed all in yellow. All of us were on that little boat, I don’t know how we all fit.” – Richard Moonin