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5 May, 2008
It's the beginning of May, the season of nights of the midnight sun. The sun moves clockwise in the sky night and day. Of course, snow on mountains and sea ice warmed by sunlight a whole day is getting melty and soft.
Especially, snow is going soft in fiord because it is windless and quiet there. If snow on mountains disappears, sea ice will be covered with cloud of soil dust, and then will be brownish-red all over. That causes sea ice to be all the easier to absorb heat. So, the speed of snow and ice melting goes faster. When I have a camp, I melt snow into drinkable hot water. I use as clean snow as possible. You can see many icecaps having casted ashore in many places, but I've made it a rule to put up a tent away from icecaps because I fear attack by polar bears when I'm sleeping,
Polar bears are wandering around for seals which make a hole through icecap and sea ice to breathe near icecaps. I think they can forgive strangers in their territory. They sometimes break the tent suddenly.
Mitsuro Ohba
