Sitka or Bust: Commute The World

TIA. That’s what you say when things go wrong in the kitchen, when strangers bark at you from a passing vehicle, when you sigh at the extremely high prices for anything at the store. TIA. This is Alaska. The chef says it all the time, mostly in reference to buying fruit in a quart for what he might have bought a gallon in the lower 48. Everyone here seems to miss the lower 48, if only because we don’t want to go poor. When you visit the grocery store you might as well bring your entire pay check with you, either that or learn to live off the land. The stores only sell in bulk, so unless you have a really extensive family, you are dependent on eating the same thing for a while, or at least having a freezer. That in my hands is indeed a 4 pound can of tuna. Even a tuna aficionado cannot possibly consume that much tuna without wanting to crawl into the ocean and get eaten by a sea lion. Personally, I’d rather not die from mercury poisoning.

What little the stores do sell in individual/personal sizes, they charge ridiculous prices for. I bought three red bulls and spent over ten dollars. A pack of gum is about two and a package of gobstoppers would normally be 99cents, but in Alaska you only get half the gobstoppers for that price. Might as well use your money as tinder here. Unless you have a lot of money or a decent job that allows you to survive, I would not recommend coming to AK. Sure, the beauty is indescribable, but you’ll be panhandling on the street corner in no time.

The store I frequent is about a hundred feet from my lodge, but I still only go to have a change of scenery. Considering I only made about 80 bucks today, I really don’t have any available funds to squander on 30 pound bags of candy or cigarette packs that cost at least ten dollars. I don’t even want to think about the prices offered in the House of Liquor next door.