I stop somewhere in Anchorage Coastal Trail, along the ocean almost as brown as the Mississippi River, in order to write my first Alaskan steps. I traveled through time and space. I left Iceland Sunday at 5 pm and I landed in Alaska the same Sunday at 4 pm.
As usual, I was “welcome” by a border patrol, more willing to close the door than to open it to future explorers… After a tiny tiny heat-shock from early Icelandic winter to Alaskan summer, I face another kind of shock. I have to go through the second enquiry* of this countless day. You never get used to this kind of experience, even when, like me, you are a upstanding citizen… Therefore, I answer every why and how of my arrival here today, like any other passenger, like for any other of my previous transatlantic journey. However, when the nice border controller put my passport in a yellow file, I understand something is wrong, and when he leads me to the small closed room where another nice border controller is awaiting for me, I know something is really badly wrong! Same questions and answers all over again for at least twenty minutes (I am even asked why I visited the US two years ago and, therefore, if it is still a thing with my ex American boyfriend! For God sake, do you want me to tell you everything about my love life!?)… My problem? I don’t have a return ticket and apparently, this is one of the conditions for any ESTA** applicant: you have to possess a return ticket and/or enough money to buy one (I don’t even think to use it as an argument, but in this kind of situation, you only say “yes, sir”). I knew my blurry return might be an issue, but I didn’t expect such a fuss! Thankfully, those two border controllers are genuinely nice, they explain everything, their humanity balance my (very) bad experience in Boston two years ago. I offer to immediately book a return ticket if that’s what they want to let me enter the country. But my historic of travel speaks for me and I don’t need to, they let me go and I finally go through Alaska’s doors!
I catch the bus and the driver’s generosity make amends for my first stressful hour, it will be my first good memory of this American land so special it becomes genuinely welcoming… The bus ticket costs 2 $, I need to give the exact change but only have 20$ banknotes; the cheerful driver let me travel for free… I will return the favor another day she says!
My body understands better jet-lag and doesn’t make a big deal of it anymore. I start feeling tired later than I though, after a white Alaskan beer and a gargantuan meal. I fall asleep at 9 pm, 24 hours after my last wake-up.
When I awake, the landscape gets blurry with the same haze as my American summer, are they forest fires or wind’s dirt? The air is so warm, I skim 25°C and let both my legs and arms out. It is still summer over her, more than Iceland, when I am closer to the Pole. But Iceland is an isle… But North America gets through more opposite weathers…
My first Alaskan day is so smooth, I don’t know my time because my body works countdown and the sun’s height doesn’t look like anything I know anymore. I wander nearby hydroplanes whose landing and taking off cuddled my sleep; Alaskan wind is full of their noise that, for a weird reason, reminds me of a water bomber’s and will become the daily music of my traveling sky.
Then, I visit Anchorage Museum. I discover a piece of multiple tribes’s traditions, but would like to learn more about Russian colonization and American arrival. I understand the link between the nature that « Lower 48 » painters romantically represented and the reality it actually means for those who had, and still have, to make it a home. All this get my heart impatient to explore…
As I walk in dirty and poor downtown streets where I am rudely hit on, I realize I have only known America with him, except for a short moment in San Francisco. I discovered a protected America and now, I newly approach a new America. I don’t utterly know what America means for me, is it only my past that I love through it? Anyway, America brings this special sparking in my heart, this untamed attraction for my unfinished soul…
My feet finally find their way to the Coastal Trail that I couldn’t find in the morning, I would like to let my eyes run to Kincaid Park but my day was too slow and already ends. After a 3 miles walk and a writing break, I need to find my new ephemeral home for the night.
* Before even getting in any plane towards the US, even only for a lay over, you have to answer a bunch of question to explain the reasons of your stay. This time, I have been asked what was the last show I performed !
** Automated system that determines the eligibility of visitors to travel to the United States under the Visa Waiver Program. More informations here.
Justine T.Annezo – Aug. 12th 2019, Anchorage – GTM-8
Fleeting Wor(l)ds 