Diane Young

Lantiinaq in Port Lock

As told by Anesia Metcalf

to Ephim Anahonak Jr

In 1960 my mom had seen a Big Foot at Portlock when there were winter watchmen for Port Chatham Packing, Inc., down there. She was sleeping, and during the night she woke up to drink some tea. She had gotten up to loot out the window, and she saw something flash. She looked at the little island by the beach. There she saw two red eyes and something tall with hair all over it.

She said to herself, “That’s what people call a Lantiinaq.” Then she started to go down to the floor slowly, started to crawl to the room where the rest of the family was sleeping.

She woke my dad up and said, “Put some Holy Incense on the stove because I saw a Lantiinaq out on the island.”

My dad went out to see if there was a Big Foot outside, but didn’t see anything. Then I asked her if she was sure she wasn’t having a nightmare. She said that she was not dreaming. That when she told me that only people who see Lantiinaq are going to die.

In 1961 my mom moved to Seldovia from Portlock. Mom said to me that when she died wherever I would be, she would come and tell me.

I moved to Kodiak after the tidal wave in 1964. I lived in Kodiak for two years. While I was in bed I saw a shadow at the end of my bed. The shadow grabbed my foot. I was frozen, I couldn’t move or scream.

After it let go of my foot, I got out of bed to walk around. I started to feel that something was wrong with my mom. The next day I was in a good mood. My brother-in-law came over a little later on and told me that my mom had passed away on Russian New Year’s Eve. I went to English Bay for her funeral. That’s when I believed in spirits.

I used to be scared of ghosts and even to go outside after it was dark. Mostly I was scared when my grandma told me ghost stories. My Uncle Paul Moonin told me, “When I die I am going to haunt you.” I stayed away from English Bay for fifteen years.

A year after Uncle Paul died, I went to English Bay, to visit. I stayed at my grandma’s old house. First night I stayed there I couldn’t sleep. The bania door kept opening and closing. The radio turned on by itself. Then I started to believe that his spirit was haunting me.

I woke up in the morning while Fred was getting wood. I walked down to the look-out point. As I was going past Uncle Paul’s house which had a padlock on it, I could hear someone making the windows rattle. I stood there but I wouldn’t look. I could feel someone watching me from Uncle Paul’s house. My hair felt like it was standing up.

Then I turned around and walked up to my Aunt Vera’s house. I told here what happened. Then she told me to go down and talk to my Uncle Paul’s grave. I wend down there, even I was scared. Then after I talked to the grave, nothing happened to me.

Volume 2