-- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com p to alaskto alaska, so politicpolitical black guy whe nnot an issup not an issue aboup about, what's going alaska? aand i don't know how to go in thir this, p this, thiss thir this, p this, thi fip fine afine and some sa aand p and i feand i feei suppossupposed to know wha si

suppossupposed to know wha san alaska and bought new clothes. p my name is w. kamau bell. r asas ap as a comedias findifindin findifinding humor america i don't understand. this is "united shades of america." alaska. natives have survived this brutal environment for thousands of years. today its unique wildlife and natural beauty and severe winters all contribute to its representation as america's last frontier, and as a californians, an avid indoorsman, the last frontier is the last place i want to be, but here i am, in

anchora anchorage, alaska, to find out more about the culture and get an experience better than watching an alaska reality show. >> what is your name? >> casey. >> nice to meet you. this is my first trip to alaska. am i getting a typical alaskan experience right here? >> no. this is tourists area. >> i am in the tourist district? >> yes. >> this is my first time in alaska. i did not expect to see -- what is the word i am looking for, black people. what is it like to be black in alaska? >> interesting. >> on a typical day, how many black people do you see? >> three. >> and that's more if you pass mirrors? >> yeah. >> what does it mean to be a black alaska native? >> you can handle the cold. >> if somebody asks us where i am from, i lead with alaska,

because people lose their minds. and the inevitable sarah palin comes up. >> do you know sarah palin? >> i met her on several occasions and asked several questions. >> i asked a dumb question, and you do. >> there's only so many people in the state. >> you are a native of alaska. >> yes. >> alaskan native means something differently than somebody born in the state of alaska. natives are broken into language-defined tribes, some think you can call them eskimos, but they are not. >> we turn on the tv, and it's like the alaska show, it's not this. >> no. >> in the lower 48 we talk about alaska, we think about frozen

tundra and polar bears, and what do i need to go to get that? >> far north. >> like where? >> barrow. >> go there if you want polar bears. >> so if i go to borrow i will see that? >> oh, yes. >> i guess i am leaving anchorage, and going to borrow. if you are wondering why i am so skeptical. here are facts. one, there are no roads in and out of town. two, it goes completely dark for two whole months of the year. three, it's 320 miles into the arctic circle, which means it's 320 miles past where i am supposed to be. landing in barrow, it certainly looks more like i am on the path to the real alaska, and also the

path to frost bite. i often joke about being in the middle of nowhere, but this is actually the middle of nowhere. it's so cold i am actually afraid my afro is going to break. i am headed to the appropriately-named top of the world hotel, and thankfully this airport taxi line is not like the one at l.a.x. >> can you take me to the top of the world? >> okay, top of the world hotel. okay, welcome to barrow. >> what is your name, sir? >> cj. >> my name is kamau. >> nice to meet you. >> now we can't say a black man can't get a cab in alaska. where are you from? >> thailand. >> what brought you here? >> work. >> this is different from thailand. would it be bad to walk downtown

from the airport? >> too cold. >> what would happen to me? >> walk five or ten minutes, you -- >> does that mean dead? is that thai for dead? what is this? downtown? this is downtown? >> yes, this is downtown. okay. >> this is the top of the world hotel? >> yes, sir. >> thank you for the drive and tour. >> have fun in barrow. >> okay. standing outside my hotel looking at the frozen tundra, thousands of miles away from home. there's darkness as far as the eye can see. my thoughts on barrow are crystallizing, and all i keep thinking is -- holy shit.

not the vast frozen plains. or a wall of mountains. nothing would get between him and what he was after. some called him obsessed. we call him mister coors. and the pure rocky mountain water he hunted down is still used to brew the beer that bears his name. coors. the banquet beer. dad, yoh no, i'll take you up to me off rthe front of the school. that's where your friends are. seriously, it's, it's really fine. you don't want to be seen with your dad? no, it's..no.. this about a boy? dad! stop, please. oh, there's tracy. what! [ horn honking ] [ forward collision warning ] [ car braking ] bye dad! it brakes when you don't. forward collision warning and autonomous emergency braking.

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and six is greater than one. flonase changes everything. ♪ >> now the forecast for the northern art kau, mostly cloudy skies, and highs on thursday and friday around 10 below, and lows through the rest of the week around 15 below. >> i am from the bay area, so

when i hear 15 below, i assume we are talking about 15 below 60 degrees. >> all right. just ahead, a little bit, that would be a great place to lay down and die. this will be great for ratings, dying. oh, god. my first stop is the local weather station. if this is the real alaska, i want to find out how cold it actually gets here, even though i am sure the answer is, you don't even want to know. >> dave anderson, welcome to the weather center in barrow. >> it's cold outside, sir. >> yeah, but are you even enjoying the weather? >> no. >> and what is your function? >> one of our more important and fun things we do is launch a weather balloon. >> can i launch a weather

balloon? >> we can launch a weather balloon. we are all set up. >> let's do it. >> what we are going to do is inflate the balloon and get it set up. we're using helium gas to do this. the balloon will get about 2100 miles high and it will be 40 feet across. >> what is it made out of? >> it's a latex rubber. >> i am not mature enough not to laugh at you calling this a latex rubber. >> what sit doing? >> sending back information on temperature, humidity, pressure. this is the beginning of all your weather forecast, right here with this balloon. >> i live in northern california and it's not really the kind of weather you are dealing with right here. >> no, quite a bit different. the coldest it has been here is 55 below with about a 90 to 100

below windchill. >> people still go outside. >> yes. >> let's launch this outside. >> this is not nasa launching apollo 11, and a countdown feels appropriate. t minus 3, 2, 1! >> there she goes! >> that's that, huh? >> that's it. >> and that's a good time in this town, huh? >> yes, this is our exciting time of day. >> oh, it's still cold. oh, god, don't die. don't die. >> finding out locals remain

active when it's 15 degrees below zero, brought many things to my mind but i can't say most because it involves too many curse words. let me talk to some locals and find out what they have to say about all this. this is ridiculous. it's so cold. how long you have lived in barrow? >> this is my home. i was raised here and i choose to live here. >> i like that you say i choose to live here, ignorant people like this guy come into this town and say, how do people do it? >> my mother and father did it, and my grandparents did it and so i am doing it. >> does the cold bother you? >> no, this is the balmy weather, i am wearing shorts. >> what? >> this is life in the arctic, and you have to be tough and crazy, okay. >> how long have you lived in

barrow? >> 22 years. >> how old you have lived in barrow? >> october of 2009. >> you are a newbie. >> i have been so cold i feel like i have seen jesus a couple times. >> that was actually genuine. thank you. >> i want to ask you, how long you have lived in barrow? >> two years. >> what brought you here? >> work opportunities here. >> than where? >> california. >> i can get you a job in california. >> no, it's different. it's culture job. their median income is $25,000 higher than the national average. the high salaries are meant to entice workers to the numerous workers in barrow's leading

industries, passenger air transportation, civil services and selling overpriced winter coats to travel show host. the wage opportunities have people from around the globe willing to brave the cold. >> we're very much a melting pot at transportation, and i have filipinos, white, mexican, and we're a little bit of everything. >> i didn't here black? >> we do. >> you have a black? >> yes, my duane, he is good. >> 75% of the time, duane is a black guy. >> there's 62% native and 38% everybody else, and it's really multicultural. >> so multicultural in the last five decades the population has more than tripled and ethnic diversity expanded beyond the natives to beyond 20 races that call barrow home today. >> it's only 62% native. how do you feel about that? >> the mighty dollar brings everybody in, and they come and

go, and for us, we are here to stay. this is our home. >> thank you for talking to me. >> you are welcome. >> now, go put some pants on. >> and after learning people move to borrow for the economy, and i set up a meeting with my new friend, mike schultz. he told me to meet him at the local pool hall behind a shop. maybe this post sign will point me in the right direction. >> which way is out of here? i finally found it, conveniently located between snow and more snow. just like it happens every time. >> you have to start someplace. >> is this the closest thing to what barrow has as a sports bar? >> yeah, and there's no alcohol, and it's sports bar light. >> you can own and possess

alcohol within the city limits but you can't buy it or sell it. >> when you moved here how many nonnatives were in borrow? >> six, and everybody else was native. when i first came here, if i was dropped off, i would have been dead. they have been living on the tundra for years. >> the oil industry, the infrastructure jobs make barrow what it is. >> what does the future hold for this place? >> when i got up here, kids would go out and hunt and they lost the ability to fend for themselves. you have shot a caribou? i don't need to, i can go to the store and get a hamburger. you have learned how to survive if you fall through the ice, well i heard about it, i have not been out for three years because i want to play video

games. and they are missing a big part of growing up. it makes it really difficult to watch a culture kind of disappear. it's not right. i hope it works out because it's an unbelievable culture. >> listening to mike, i can't help but wonder if a land so deadly and remote can the natives of barrow afford to lose their culture that kept them going for thousands of years, and it made me realize, oh, no, my camera crew is going to be pissed if they can't buy alcohol up here. better be some awards behind what you are paying for, right? the final answer. chevy. the most awarded car company two years in a row. wow, it's like a luxury car. i was shocked. i mean it's like, this is chevy? get cash back for 20% of the msrp on all 2016 spark, sonic and impala vehicles. that's over $8000 on this chevy impala. here with bud light party super delegate michael pena

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barrow, alaska, is way out there. it is far. it's like you literally, to get to barrow, you can't get there unless you go on a plane. it's so remote it feels like anything can happen there, and walking around the streets of barrow, you could run into amelia ehrhardt and jim morrison. i feel like alaska is the no snitching state. nobody's talking. it's another beautiful but brutally cold morning in barrow, and instead of walking around and risking hypothermia, i

decided to reunite with an old friend. jc, glad to see you. >> it's 7 below. >> with the windchill factor, feels like a million below. you know what i am doing today? dogsledding. you have ever been? >> no. >> the way you are laughing, i feel like it's a bad idea. in my conversation with mike schultz, he talked about how the native people are losing their traditions, and i saw no better example than dogsledding, and i met with the lash musher in town. >> yeah, sad but true, slowly whittled down over the years.

>> how long you have lived in barrow? >> since 1986. >> when you got here, were there other sledders? >> yeah, other teams. they kind of all switched over to snow machines. >> hope you don't take this the wrong way, and you are the last dogsledder, and you seem to be -- how do i say this, not a native. >> yeah, kind of ironic, being that the natives invented dogsledding. >> the four-legged companions were used for track prey and keeping their owners alert of dangerous animals. >> any tips for me? >> just hold on tight and i will kind of teach you the commands, and yell g and they turn right, and yell kita, and that means go. g is right, and paw is left,

and -- whoa is please, please, stop. >> yeah, and if they don't stop, it's stop [ blee. >> are you sure they hear the dogs revolution. a dog just peed on my cameraman. wait a minute. i am the only one that can do that. let's go this way. how about this way? there you go. oh, whoa. >> there you go.

>> next week we will be coming to the beaches of aruba, talking about which tequila tastes better. >> take off. >> now, this part i like. >> now, yell kita real loud, okay. >> kita! wow, ha! ♪ >> i think i just lost my virginity on that last bump. oh, yeah, this is the life. as much as i love my k-9 chauffeurs, it's clear they are not as practical as snow

machines in terms of speed. speaking of frozen, i am still from yesterday so i am sticking with the con fines of my man's taxi. >> this is a much nicer city when you are warm. when you are walking everywhere, you start to get angry at the city. now it's kind of pretty. like carol, there are other loca locals speaking out to keep the customs alive. i am meeting with fanny at the heritage center. >> look at this, different hunting tools mainly for butchering the nail. >> in my neighborhood we call

that a i wish somebody would kind of knife. >> black people, we just eat the intestines, and we don't turn them into rain coats. you are using everything from the animal? >> yeah, everything given to us from the land and the ocean and the air is treasured, and everybody thinks it's so flat and cold and frozen, but to us it's a living world that we live in. >> that is that a perspective i did not have before i came here. what part of your culture are you working hardest to keep? >> our language. yeah. my age group and some older than me, we were sent away to go to boarding school. i came home not myself anymore, and i almost lost the proper usage of our language. >> fanny is speaking of

christian boarding schools that were open in the early 1900s by missionaries, and missionaries working with natives, not that cool. and an official report by the government said it was like genocide. >> we were punished if i accidentally said something in our language, we got slapped in the hand. >> oh, wow. >> my fourth grade teacher, i accidentally looked out and he put me in a tall trash can and make me stand there. that's when i cried. >> yeah. >> he was telling you you were trash. >> uh-huh. >> what are you doing today to keep the language alive? what are you working on? >> i work with our school

district, and it's important to teach our children who they are so that they will always feel safe and be strong knowing that they are with the real people of the north. >> uh-huh. can you teach me some words? >> alapa. >> you are telling me, oh, i am cold. >> alapa. (vo) whatever your perfect temperature...

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after talking with fannie, i learned they are connected by nature and man. so i enlisted a local photographer who suggested taking me to point barrow, the northern most point in town. he says it's a popular hangout for polar bears, so let's hope there is no white on black crime today. >> are you john? >> should i be scared? >> i am not, but you should be. >> all right, john, thank you, and i will be scared, and good thing i brought a head start on fear. all right, thanks, john. >> welcome aboard.

this is an environmentalist nightmare, chasing after polar bears in a humvee. >> we are going to hit rough terrain, so hang on. >> whoa. okay. >> we are going to go over the rift. >> what are the odds we survive? >> not survive, it's don't tip over. >> okay, we have different goals. good thing i got my life insurance renewed for active stupid. >> we're good. >> you are good, and i on the other hand will have to get my long underwear dry-cleaned. >> what we will keep our eye open for is paw prints going across the road. >> we have not seen a bear yet, but this is where it could be? >> it could be sleeping behind

there. i tell my children, don't shoot the bear that kills me, he's just doing what is natural. >> that's how i feel about the police. >> see that paw print. >> wow. >> tell me where we are. >> we are almost to the end of the peninsula that is point barrow, a little known fact, the point 500 years ago used to go two miles further out than we are going. >> is that climate change? >> it has to be, what else would cause the ice to melt and raise the oceans? >> homosexually? that's what i heard on "the 700 club." >> this is what i think is interesting. >> okay. >> this is the first place north in america, and all land is south of here. >> i can see the beauty. >> actually, if you look, there's the water right there. >> wow. >> all of these berms along here are waves that have been pushed

up. >> this is the most northern part of the united states? >> yes, there was 20 bears walking along the coast and today you can see two or three, and i am not an eurpb sraoeurpb list. >> starting in the early 1900s, commercial whaling, which is the hunting of whales for profit, which was banned in 1986. long before commercial whaling exhibited the native tribe hunted whales which was the harvesting of whales for the survival of the community, and this whale hunt something popular today, and crews are allowed to haarest 25 whales per year because not one ounce is sold.

and tonight, i am going to the home of herman, a local whale boat captain to learn why whale something still increasingly important, and to sample the delicacy, whale blubber, the other, other, other white meat. >> we eat it raw and frozen, and it keeps us warm in the cold winter months, so if you want to try the skin and the blubber, there's your chance. >> all right. >> see how it tastes. >> tell me what i am about to eat? >> the black part is the skin and the pink part is the blubber. >> okay, when i was a little kid, and i said one day i want to be a comedian and never imagined i would end up eating whale blubber. >> it's filled with omega 3s. >> it tastes healthy.

>> this is the meat part and we cut it into slabs this big. >> let me try salt, at an african-american, we put salt on everything. oops, that's a lot of salt. that's how my grandmother would have done it. i never tasted anything like this before. you can really taste the meat. >> yep. >> is this a whale you caught? >> the whale we were blessed at last fall. we don't go out and catch the whale, we are blessed with it by god and the whale will offer itself to a captain or crew that knows it will take care of it by sharing it with everybody in the community, especially those that are in it to hunt for themselves, and it's a really spiritual thing. >> in the lower 48 a lot of people have no idea about any of this, and when they hear the world whaling they have negative

c connotations around it. what do you think? >> i have no ill feelings about that. experience itself. most of the meat, you can buy from the store and it's quite expensi expensive. i am just a person trying to survive. >> i wouldn't have thought about it from the side that your people were doing it for 10,000 years, and it sounds when the commercial fishermen came in that's when it got messed up. shouldn't stop you from learning your traditions. >> i learned it from my father and he learned it from his father and from generation to generation it was handed down, and i will do the same thing with my twin boys from when i was 10. >> i don't have a tradition that i have been doing it with my father since i was 10. >> until my last dying breath, i will instill whaling in them.

>> yeah, a lot going on, but i think i would have to fry it up. [burke] at farmers,we've seen almost everything, so we know how to cover almost anything. even a ufh2o. [man] that's not good. [pilot] that's not good. [man] that's really not good. [burke] it happened august fourteenth,2008, and we covered it.talk to farmers.

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i ate whale. >> no. >> yeah, and they are like, whoa, yes. yes, they offered me whale and i am not an adventurous eater, and i like my sushi fried, and i amp guy at the restaurant, and what they do, they harvest the whales and bring them in, and they pass it out to the community, and everybody gets some, and we don't even share with pizza, sometimes. i bought it, that slice is mine. i bought it. yes. after a long night of testing my berkeley hippie friends to apologize for eating whale, i caught up with jc. >> i ate some whale last night.

>> did you like it? >> uh -- [ laughter ] >> to stay on the trail, i have been invited by a young whaler to observe the sewing of seal skin that will cover the boat, and my presence here is no small feat. our cameras are the first to gain access to the sacred tradition. tell me about where we are at? >> this is the frame. >> what is it i am smelling? >> you are smelling the seal. >> yes. now, to me it smells pretty thick. >> it's pretty strong. >> not because i am from the outside, it smells strong to you, too. >> yeah, it's strong. >> and i feel like my clothes going back to california will smell like this.

and we have to skin the boat. >> the skin is waterproof and tough and pliable and stretches. >> how long does it take for the process? >> a couple days to thaw it and scrape it and a day or two to sew it. >> it takes everybody. >> wouldn't it be easier to just buy a boat? >> the way they are doing it, it's the way their people have done it for thousands of years and they want to adhere to the traditions. >> they are the eskimos and we are the indians. i am half white. >> even though you are from a different culture, from the interior, they accepted you up here and take you whaling? >> yes. the way we live is not much

different than they live here, togetherness, and we live as a community, and we adhere to the old ways. >> i am learning, certainly you see people with cars and on snow machines and snow machines, and there's an effort to keep a foot in the past with traditions. >> it's a proven method and it works. >> how could 10,000 years be wrong? >> how could 10,000 years be wrong. >> while this boat won't be ready for a few days, he took me outside to show me what the finish product looks like. >> this is your cruise boat? >> yes, sir. >> it has the new skin look. >> got that new skin smell. >> oh, yeah. nothing symbolizes the town of borrow without whaling, and wanting to teach the youth and the next generation about what the ancestors did, and whaling sums it all up? >> barrow is a whaling

community. >> and it will always be a whaling community? >> hopefully. >> his enthusiasm for whaling shows he is embracing the culture, and he is also half nonnative and i want to know more about the defining choice these people face, embrace the past or fall in line with the future. talk a little bit why these traditions are so important for you? >> i am an american, but i am native american and i am proud of that. >> what does it mean to go whaling? >> it's a family thing that we do as a community, you know, and it brings us altogether. it's not like we are stockpiling it or saving it and trying to make money off of it, and everything is distributed evenly. >> in the lower 48 if somebody hunts and kills a deer, they take it home. we are selfish. why does it go back to the

community? >> i will not eat and watch my neighbor starve. doesn't feel right, man. >> you are right. >> even if i don't know the person, you know? >> that's the big thing in a lot of the lower 48, if i know you, you are my friend -- >> then you might get something. >> and i am not busy, then i will help you. you have the good fortune, despite everything you still hold on to your traditions. >> that's what is so important, and barrow is a melting pot, and there are some of would like to watch tv shows. >> what is so wrong with tv shows? >> if you lived in a city you could do that. but to do that here and succeed is going to be difficult. you know? >> yeah. >> but when there are a lot of people that think like i do that want to see the culture succeed and want to see the kids out there whaling and doing what the elders want us to do we will all be teachers, because we have an

opportunity right now and we have an opportunity to see it in the next generation, and once it's gone it's gone, and if i allow my kids to let it go, it's going to be gone. >> not to have it would be -- >> it's would be tragic, it would suck. >> i think that would just about say it, it would suck. seems to me you are doing an incredible job. seems like i am in the past and the future but in the right place, you know what i mean? >> amen, there you go. take you o the front of the school. that's where your friends are. seriously, it's, it's really fine. you don't want to be seen with your dad? no, it's..no.. this about a boy? dad! stop, please. oh, there's tracy. what! [ horn honking ] [ forward collision warning ] [ car braking ] bye dad! it brakes when you don't. forward collision warning and autonomous emergency braking. available on the redesigned passat. from volkswagen.

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trip learning about traditions past, i was offered the opportunity to try the new school of travel. >> dang, you do all your own stunts? >> i know. i met you two days ago, and i thought i hope i end up with my life in his hands. i just lost feeling in my nose. >> it has to be 20 below. >> i am actually frozen in this position now! we are headed out for one last authentic alaskan experience, seeing the northern lights, and that is if my eyes don't rip out? >> i think i froze the part of my brain that remembers my birthday. thanks for taking me out on the

snow machine, i appreciate it. >> it was a blast. >> the first time i was in alaska, it was in anchorage. on tv when you turn on alaska, you don't see a small town. i kept asking people, is this the real alaska? some people said come up to barrow. i came and i did a bunch of stuff, and i dogsledded and tried whale and i went snow machining, and there's a thing about people like me making it seem almost magical, and there's a lot of things, special things happening here, but what does living in this part of the world mean to you? >> it's not easy. you run out of stuff. you might have to wait a couple days. you accept that. >> you have to think more about how you are living? >> it's important to know you have a responsibility to look out for others, and you may not

know somebody but you have a responsibility as a community member to look out for one another, and that's why we continue to whale, it's to preserve that, you know, that sense of community and oneness. >> i hope you are able to continue whaling and continue that sense of can community. >> me, too. >> i appreciate you talking to me, but where are the northern lights? do i not have the right eyes to see them? >> they are hiding from you. >> this is television, and through the magic of tv, i can go like this, and aw, look at those northern lights. man, that's beautiful. aren't those beautiful? >> yeah. >> wow, we got so lucky on the last night, we were in town and we saw the most beautiful northern lights show ever. >> snap your finger again to see a polar bear. >> i'm good. okay, so these northern lights might not be real, but in barrow i feel like i saw the real alaska.

sure, it's sure partially defined by the weather and remoteness, but it's not the last frontier at all, it's an increasingly modern and diverse, and while there's still an internal struggle to hold to tradition, barrow has a community unparalleled by any other. now, it's time to go back to regular old california, where, sure, i will be lucky to get help on the side of the road, but the wi-fi is fantastic. i am not going to go miss you, cold. ♪ ♪ ♪

-- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com portland, oregon. a city i hate to love! [ laughter ] portland is an amazing city. you could have a nascar race at a tuna noodle convention at a khaki pants festival. and portland used to have a thriving black community. why has that changed? and who has replaced those people? and the answer is hipsters. when you walk the streets, you