Sidthisak Kaybounthome sits behind the wheel of his cab, idling in a parking lot across the street from the terminal at Wiley Post-Will Rogers Memorial Airport.

He blasts the heat. Outside, the temperature hovers around 25 degrees below zero — not unusual for winters in Barrow, the northernmost town in the country. But Kaybounthome hasn’t seen many winters this far north.

Not too long ago he was a monk at Wat Lao, Mountain View’s Buddhist temple.

He told me his story as we drove along the Arctic Ocean coast, past frozen buildings and bleached whale bones blanketed in drifting snow.

Monkhood was a calling he followed for most of his life, ever since he became a novice at age 11, he said. When he moved to Anchorage in 2000, he helped build Wat Lao into the complex it is today. His work consumed his life. When you are a monk, you give all your time to others, he said. There’s not much time for family. And that’s why he quit.

His elderly mother still lives in Laos, thousands of miles away, and he wanted to earn more to support her, he said. In 2013, he left Wat Lao and took a job at Prudhoe Bay. The oilfields weren’t for him, so he packed his bags and moved further north to Barrow to drive a cab. There’s more business there than in Anchorage, he said.

It’s not like Mountain View and it’s nothing like Laos, but he’s learning to call it home.

“I can live anywhere,” he said.

This microprofile originally appeared on Mountain View Post.

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Go west on Commercial Drive, past the car wash and the smoke shop, and you’ll see an unpaved lot that stands out from the rest.

There’s a picnic table out front, a little white house in the back and a few old campers parked around the yard. One sign advertises a 24/7 window repair business; another promises “Yup’ik gold & silver.” A giant coffee cup rests on a massive spinning saucer by the driveway. A partially rebuilt ’68 Dodge Charger sits next to a stack of tires nearby.

The lot – and everything on it – is Jack Vinson’s best hope.

Three summers ago, his 12-year-old son was struck by a car while riding his bike along Patterson Street. Vinson still keeps a laminated copy of the Anchorage Daily News report about the crash: It barely made 100 words, but it changed their lives forever.

The collision paralyzed Vinson’s son from the chest down. He spent his 13th birthday in a coma. The medical bills topped $1 million, and there wasn’t nearly enough insurance money.

Vinson, living with his own disability, began scrambling for ways to make money, he says. He rents the lot on Commercial Drive in the hopes of opening a business.

He tried a 24-hour coffee cart, a drive-in theater and a secondhand store. Nothing ever took off, so Vinson sells odds and ends and keeps looking for an idea that sticks. Maybe there’s room for a food truck on the lot, he says. Maybe he can sell one of the campers to bring in a little more cash.

“Everything here is to make money for my son,” he said. “All this is just to keep us going. Everything is for sale.”

This micro-story originally appeared on Mountain View Post.

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The little house at the end of North Bliss Street is full of memories, said Tulukqaaqsiuq Hank, who found my blog, Mountain View Post, on Facebook and sent me a note with some old pictures attached. I sent him a message and asked if he’d be willing to tell me more. We ended up talking on the phone for a few hours over the course of a several days. He lives in Point Hope now.

Growing up on N. Bliss, still in grade school, Hank played basketball in the driveway with the hoop his dad built, back before his dad went to prison. Sometimes, when the cupboards in the house were empty and his mother was nowhere to be found, he pocketed packets of ramen noodles and candy bars from Red Apple to feed his young brothers.

He rode his bike all over the neighborhood, smoked stolen cigarettes at Lions Park and learned to take care of himself. One day, when a stray dog chased his cousin, he fought it off with a metal rod. When things got tense with a boy at school, he broke into a neighbor’s house and stole a handgun for protection.

Hank spent the next 17 years moving in and out of the justice system on charges ranging from assault to burglary. He fought addiction. He felt angry. He was locked up when his brother died: Tigautchaiq Douglas was 22 when he fell from the fifth floor of the Castle Apartments. Then, a few years later, Hank learned about the death of his girlfriend while brushing his teeth and watching the evening news at Goose Creek Correctional Center: Elaine Cleveland was 34 when she was discovered, frozen, in a van in downtown Anchorage. It broke Hank’s heart.

Behind bars, he said, he became part of the Native Brotherhood: Police call it a prison gang, Hank calls it a positive movement. It helped him understand some things.

”I kind of understand why I am who I am today,” he said. “It had to take a lot of tragedy for me to change my life.”

The last time he was in Mountain View was last fall, right after he got out of prison, right before he went back to Point Hope to be with family. His childhood girlfriend, Panika Williams, had called him and asked for help finding her mom, Irma Williams, who came up missing, and Hank walked all over the neighborhood looking for her. The house on N. Bliss is still there, remodeled and recently sold. Tuluk couldn’t believe how much it changed — how much the whole neighborhood changed — since he grew up there.

He had no luck looking for Williams that day. It wasn’t until October that a man walking his dogs found her body buried in Davis Park. She was 54 years old. (Michael Memeo, her former boyfriend, was charged with first and second-degree murder and evidence tampering. He’s currently scheduled to go to trial in October.)

In Point Hope, Hank says he found a measure of calm on the Arctic Ocean ice, thinking about his future and making peace with his past.

“Mountain View taught me to survive,” he said.

Here is the picture that was attached to his email:

Kirsten Swann is a writer and blogger who lives in Mountain View. A version of this post originally appeared on Mountain View Post.

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How did he end up in a town where snow covers the ground half the year? His parents took him, he says as he rings up fresh basil and rice noodles. They heard Anchorage had better jobs than in Merced, California, where they used to live.

“It’s easier to get a living for your family,” says Lee’s wife, Chue Her. “Less competition.”

Talk to the business owners up and down thriving Mountain View Drive and the answers are the same. At the Dominican restaurant and the Polynesian salon. At the shawarma cart and the pho shop and the Korean laundromat. In Anchorage and in this neighborhood, people see opportunity.

Mountain View is a grid of modest houses and apartment buildings, churches and small shops, bordered on one side by a state highway and on the other by an Air Force and Army joint base. The population is a little over 9,000. People don’t drive as much as they do elsewhere, instead choosing to walk and ride the bus. The neighborhood parks are full of children this time of year, their bikes lying in the grass. Asian greens crowd the community garden. On a weekend morning you can hear the sound of Lao Buddhist monks chanting on one block and African-American spirituals pouring out a church door on another.

Welcome to the future of America. Welcome, according to some sociologists, to the most diverse neighborhood in the country.

Read more here.

With photos by the talented Ash Adams, and an awesome, nation-wide interactive map by the dynamo Lam Thuy Vo.

The post For Al Jazeera America: Alaska’s Mountain View, America’s most diverse neighborhood appeared first on Julia O'Malley.

It’s one of Anchorage’s lesser-known farmer’s markets; a cluster of tents and tables that pop up in Davis Park every summer weekend.

There, you can buy luscious greens and fragrant fresh vegetables from local Hmong gardeners. They grow their wares in home plots and community gardens around East Anchorage.

Gina Her, who helps organize the weekly market, said it’s a popular stop for members of her Hmong community. Other shoppers are pulled in by the sight and smell of homegrown produce.

“It’s convenient,” said Darren Williams, who lives in Mountain View and stopped by the park to pick up some greens Friday afternoon. “It’s freshly picked, it’s not flown in.”

The market is open Thursday-Sunday through the end of September, Her said. Look for the biggest selections on Saturdays and Sundays, and prepare for creative communication, since many of the gardeners speak little English.

Luckily, the smell of fresh green onions is the same in any language.

This post originally appeared on Mountain View Post.

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1) Soup bones.

I’m a big fan of bean soup in the winter. But to make a decent one, a person needs a nice, smoky soup bone. BUT: Try finding one of these at Fred’s. In the era of prepacked meat, bones are not easy to find. When I asked the Fred Meyer butcher, he told me to buy a whole bone-in ham! I think not. You can get three bones at Red Apple for about $6.

2. Candles.

These candles, meant for Buddhist and Hmong shrines, will set you back a couple of bucks. I use them for all kinds of things. Stick them in a couple bowls of black rice on the table for a fancy dinner, use them to light up a jack-o-lantern. I’ve even used them on birthday cakes. (There is also an ah-mazing knife and cleaver section next to these candles. I should have photographed it. Also on offer nearby: every kind of rice you’d ever want, tortilla presses, massive tea kettles.)

The Apple’s Asian shrine section (not to be confused with the Catholic saint candle section in another part of the store) is just cool. You can buy the incense they burn at the Lao Buddhist temple on Shodde Street and the metallic Hmong spirit paper I’ve seen cut into paper dolls and taped on doors in the neighborhood. These are the paper dollars burned during Hmong and Chinese ceremonies to send “money” to relatives in the spiritual world.

3. Fresh greens and other produce.

You want long beans in January? How about some lovely, crisp baby pak choi? Basil? Baby eggplant? You’ll find them at Red Apple, and the prices will beat most every other market in the city.

Here are some banana flowers:

And look at all these delicious greens:

 4) Delightful beverages from around the world.

Mixology enthusiasts, Red Apple is the jam for interesting cocktail flavors. You can find everything from Goya pineapple soda to Malta cola from Africa.  I will personally give a prize to somebody who makes a cocktail with this:

5. Dried beans and lentils.

On the subject of soup, one time I went to Carrs-Northway thinking it would be no big deal to pick up red lentils for this VERY DELICIOUS lentil soup recipe. There were no lentils in the store, and both cashier and manager were like, “Lenti-what-the-heck-are-you-talking-about?” when I asked. Anyway, that made me think that lentils were actually more exotic than I thought. And I started buying them at New Sagaya City Market, where they cost like $8 for a Dixie cup full. Then I went to Red Apple  and realized I was paying far too much. The Apple has an enormous dried bean selection, all well-priced.

 6. Unusual meat

Red Apple’s protein section is something to behold. They cater to the entire Asian/Polynesian diaspora. I was in the market for the above oxtails (pho!), but a person can find whole head-on chicken, beef tongue and brain, and pork blood, among other things. Once again, best prices around. (If you’d curious just how unusual, look close at the freezer case below…)

What is your favorite Red Apple buy?

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Here is his cousin, the adorable Bibesh Kafle, age 10, making us all some chatpate, a Nepali rice snack. Here he is with all the ingredients:

Here it is, all done:

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