A five-month-long slumber party. A college dorm. An introvert’s hell.Those are just some of the words residents of Antarctica use to describe life in the world’s coldest, most mysterious continent.In 1959, 12 countries including Chile, Japan, Australia and the United States – signed the Antarctic Treaty, pledging that the seventh continent would only be used “for peaceful purposes only.” As a result, there are no military bases there, although military planes and ships can bring people and supplies.That means that only a few thousand humans can say that they have lived in Antarctica.And yet, despite bunking with strangers, taking 90-second showers and having zero privacy, there are intrepid travelers who believe all the challenges are worth it.Keri Nelson is one of them.The Minnesota native first went to the White Continent in 2007 to work as a janitor at McMurdo Base, one of the three US outposts there. Now a veteran of 16 Antarctica seasons, she has done stints at all three stations – in addition to McMurdo, the largest and most active, there are Amundsen-Scott Station at the geographic south pole, and Palmer Station, north of the Antarctic peninsula.“If I was going to describe it in musical form,” Nelson says, “I would say McMurdo was like gritty, dirty bluegrass and South Pole was like sym …
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[mwai_chat context=”Let’s have a discussion about this article:nnA five-month-long slumber party. A college dorm. An introvert’s hell.Those are just some of the words residents of Antarctica use to describe life in the world’s coldest, most mysterious continent.In 1959, 12 countries including Chile, Japan, Australia and the United States – signed the Antarctic Treaty, pledging that the seventh continent would only be used “for peaceful purposes only.” As a result, there are no military bases there, although military planes and ships can bring people and supplies.That means that only a few thousand humans can say that they have lived in Antarctica.And yet, despite bunking with strangers, taking 90-second showers and having zero privacy, there are intrepid travelers who believe all the challenges are worth it.Keri Nelson is one of them.The Minnesota native first went to the White Continent in 2007 to work as a janitor at McMurdo Base, one of the three US outposts there. Now a veteran of 16 Antarctica seasons, she has done stints at all three stations – in addition to McMurdo, the largest and most active, there are Amundsen-Scott Station at the geographic south pole, and Palmer Station, north of the Antarctic peninsula.“If I was going to describe it in musical form,” Nelson says, “I would say McMurdo was like gritty, dirty bluegrass and South Pole was like sym …nnDiscussion:nn” ai_name=”RocketNews AI: ” start_sentence=”Can I tell you more about this article?” text_input_placeholder=”Type ‘Yes'”]
