"In North Greenland distances are measure in sinik, in 'sleeps', the number of nights that a journey requires. It's not a fixed distance. Depending on the weather and the time of year, the number of sinik can vary. It's not a measurement of time, either. Under the threat of a storm, I've travelled with my mother non-stop from Force Bay to Iita, a distance that should have required two nights.
Sinik is not a distance, not a number of days or hours. It is both a spatial and a temporal phenomenon, a concept of space-time, it describes the union of space and motion and time that is taken for granted by the Inuit but cannot be captured by any European everyday language."
Peter Hoeg, Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow, 1992
Motukiekie, October 2009, JB"Somewhere a clock strikes four double strikes, four bells, the measure of time at sea, a time that doesn't distinguish between night and day but only the monotone changeover of four-hour watches. These bells reinforce the feeling that we're at a standstill, that we've never left port but have remained stationary in time and space, merely twisting ourselves further down into meaninglessness."
Peter Hoeg, Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow, 1992
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