The Ghosts
Tea Kettle
A
Yupik Man and a White Man were traveling one cold January from one city
to another by dogsled when they came across an empty fishcamp along the
river. Wishing to avoid the cold that night they went into one of the
houses to stay the night. Wishing for hot tea they started a fire but
found that they had forgotten their teakettle. The White Man recalled
that there had been some teakettles by the graveyard near the fishcamp
and said that he would go get one their. The Yupik Man told the white
man that this was a bad idea and that it would be dangerous to take
something out of the graveyard but the white man wouldn't listen and so
he went to the graveyard and took a kettle back to the house in the
fish camp where he boiled snow for his tea but the Yupik man refused to
drink any.
They got ready to go to bed when they heard a
snapping noise and then the house, especially the door began to shake
violently as a fog seemed to drift in through every crack in the house.
“What's going on!?” the white man cried.
“A ghost is trying to get in,” the Yupik man told him.
Then the door burst open and a ghost which was as white as the snow
came in from under the door like fog.
The
white man started running away in fear as he tried to escape but the
ghost had sealed the door so he couldn't get out. The Yupik man knew
what to do however, he went over to the ghost without showing any fear
and put his hand on the ghosts head. The ghost was so cold it made his
hand ache but he kept his hand there and pushed the ghost slowly into
the ground. The Yupik man was anxious about the ghost so he pushed a
little faster and the ghost started to come back up so he slowed his
pushing again and the ghost began to sink slowly into the ground until
it disappeared all together.
They
then packed up everything and started to go and the white man returned
the tea kettle to the graveyard but the ghost continued to follow them
as a glowing red ball. The Yupik man made some marks in the snow which
stopped the ghost from following them but the two of them got very sick.
So
when they got to the next village they rolled in the garbage and
urinated around their house to keep the ghost away and soon they got
better.
