Save What You Love with Mark Titus

00;00;00;05 - 00;00;21;19
Mark Titus
Welcome to Save What You Love. I'm Mark Titus. In today's special bonus edition, we're taking a deep dive into the source of Bristol Bay wild salmon with my friend Amanda Wlaysewski. Amanda owns two businesses, Niki and Home Park, based in Naknek, Alaska, and Jack Fish Company based in Montana. Amanda is also one of the core characters in my documentary The Wild.

00;00;21;23 - 00;00;43;12
Mark Titus
And as you will be able to tell with this really great conversation. There is more to the sauce than just a commodity in the fish. There is something incredibly special about Bristol Bay. There's a reason that she chose this as her vocation, and there's a reason I've devoted my life to saving wild salmon, and especially from Bristol Bay.

00;00;43;14 - 00;00;59;26
Mark Titus
Hope you enjoy the show today. And if you are following us in your liking, what you hear, please consider giving us a rating on Apple Podcasts. It really helps out a bunch. And you can follow us on Instagram at Save What You Love Podcast. Thanks again. Enjoy the show.

00;00;59;29 - 00;01;35;29
Uknown
How do you save what you love? When the world is burning down? How do you save what you love? When pushes come to shove. How do you say what you love when things are upside down? How do you say what you love? When times are getting tough.

00;01;36;01 - 00;01;38;28
Mark Titus
Amanda Wlaysewski, welcome.

00;01;39;00 - 00;01;41;12
Amanda Wlaysewski
Hi, Mark. Thank you for having me.

00;01;41;14 - 00;02;09;03
Mark Titus
Of course. This is such a treat. I didn't know we were going to be able to do this this week. But given that we have this opportunity to screen the wild at Slow Fish and the fact that you and I got to hang out this week, which has been sporadic with COVID and busy lives, I'm just so grateful that you were able to come on the show and we get a chance to really dig in and talk for a while.

00;02;09;05 - 00;02;35;19
Mark Titus
So I you know, I'm going to talk for just a second because I know what kind of a humble person you are. And I'm just going to read a little something by way of introduction to you, to our audience from a recommendation I wrote for you for the James Beard Foundation, just to give folks a sense of who Amanda is and what kind of conversation we're going to talk about today.

00;02;35;20 - 00;02;38;25
Mark Titus
So are you are you okay with that?

00;02;38;28 - 00;02;39;17
Amanda Wlaysewski
Fire away.

00;02;39;24 - 00;03;07;27
Mark Titus
All right, here we go. So I'm writing today to offer my unequivocal support for Amanda Wlaysewski as a candidate for the 2019 James Beard Foundation Women's Entrepreneurial Leadership Program. I've known Amanda since 2016. We met by way of Amanda's sister, Sharon, who introduced us thinking we had similar spirits and pursuits. Sharon was right. In 2017, I interviewed Amanda as a primary character for my documentary, The Wild.

00;03;07;29 - 00;03;36;17
Mark Titus
Amanda has built a woman owned craft processing salmon business from the ground up and feeds the world the best, most sustainable animal protein available anywhere. She's excelled in a typically male dominated industry for a few key reasons. She's honest, forthright, indefatigable, courageous, and works harder than just about anyone I've ever known. and she's brilliant. While navigating the travails of small business ownership in a remote location with negligible communication and often terrible weather.

00;03;36;20 - 00;03;58;29
Mark Titus
Amanda has been doggedly homing in on a Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Montana. Beyond all of this, more than anything, I admire Amanda for her heart. She's a kindred soul who sees the forest for the trees. She and I are. She and I and all who have been touched by the wild of Bristol Bay are connected by something far greater than ourselves.

00;03;59;01 - 00;04;28;10
Mark Titus
A land and a sacred creature that defines that land. Wild salmon. These animals return with all the ocean's wealth inside them to feed 137 other creatures, including us, including the trees. Amanda has devoted her life's work to using every last breath and drop of sweat she can muster to keep Bristol Bay intact for future generations. So, dear listener, that's who we're dealing with here today.

00;04;28;13 - 00;04;29;23
Amanda Wlaysewski
Really nice work.

00;04;29;26 - 00;04;55;18
Mark Titus
Well, hey, it's it's motivated from a friendship that has been rooted in something that is, again, far bigger than us. So I'm super, super glad to give a little intro here. And with that, I'm going to dig right into this, into the meat of the matter, as it were. And and start with this. We both cut our teeth on what in Alaska is known as the slime line.

00;04;55;21 - 00;05;02;28
Mark Titus
Can you tell us your story and how you you found yourself called to Alaska and what the hell is slime line is anyways.

00;05;03;00 - 00;05;28;09
Amanda Wlaysewski
Well slime line is just what it sounds like. You're in a line of other people and you are sliming fish one after another. So the first time I came up to Alaska was with a group of friends from Montana who they had been coming up for generations. It was kind of a rite of passage. After high school, parents shipped you up to Alaska to work for all through college.

00;05;28;09 - 00;05;54;04
Amanda Wlaysewski
And gosh, the first time I flew into Naknek, I don't even really remember it. I'm so familiar with it now that I try to remember what it was like to see it the first time. But you truly, when you work at those canneries, you have tunnel vision. You show up, they show you to your bunk, they give you some gear, and then the next thing you know you're on a concrete floor.

00;05;54;06 - 00;06;30;14
Amanda Wlaysewski
It's loud, it's wet, and it smells like fish, salt, bloody water, you know? So it's new. It's like it's overwhelming that you really don't have a chance to even think about why they. What am I doing here? You just get frustrated and the first summer, I think I. I learned with a lot of different kids that you you can work so much longer than you ever expected that you could if you have to.

00;06;30;16 - 00;06;57;16
Amanda Wlaysewski
Or if it means you're going home if you don't. So I think that is what most people walk away from. The same line with is this was hard, this was disgusting, tedious, cold, wet. But I just did that for 16 hours. So it's I think that rewarding and fun and just kind of totally different environment is what hooks a lot of people.

00;06;57;19 - 00;07;02;07
Amanda Wlaysewski
You'd have to be you'd have to love it to be able to do it.

00;07;02;09 - 00;07;13;19
Mark Titus
And the impetus for you is the the rite of passage and the chance to earn some money. And was there any of that sort of wanderlust, Alaskan adventure in that for you as well?

00;07;13;21 - 00;07;38;28
Amanda Wlaysewski
definitely there is. There's a lot of similar ties between where I grew up in Montana and Alaska. It's just really connected to the outdoors. It's a little more Wild West than your average big city, but more it was just the friendships. I mean, we met, we could have been processing donuts or chickens. It was we didn't know what we were doing was so unfamiliar.

00;07;39;01 - 00;08;09;13
Amanda Wlaysewski
It was the relationships and it was just kind of the 100% present. You were there, you were on the line and you were just doing your job. And then, to be honest, your first summer up there, you don't see much outside of the cannery. I didn't even know Naknek existed outside of that campus. But then when they cut us loose, we would rent a 15 passenger van out of Anchorage, go to the liquor store, unfortunately, and just take off and go camping.

00;08;09;13 - 00;08;32;23
Amanda Wlaysewski
And we really, you know, after six weeks of working like that nonstop, you never knew, like you felt like you deserved just to cut loose and kick back with your friends and just really enjoy where we were and of course, where we were. It was just tremendously beautiful and something we hadn't seen before. So was it both worlds?

00;08;32;25 - 00;09;02;22
Mark Titus
Yeah. There's nothing like that feeling of surrender and kicking back after work in those just insane hours. I have two small regrets from my time working on the Slimline Inn and the freezer packing line, mostly in Dillingham on the other side of Bristol Bay from where you were. And that is, I didn't do what you did. I didn't take several weeks and go camping in the backcountry after and really celebrate what that was about.

00;09;02;22 - 00;09;31;23
Mark Titus
I was usually busting out of there, too, to head back to school right away. And I did get up into the braids of the Wood River system at one point to fish, but the other the other regret was not getting out on a fishing boat until I would til I turned 44 and filmed the Wild. But it's funny, you went right into the 16 hour shift thing because that was my very next little braid that was going to go down with you.

00;09;31;23 - 00;10;00;13
Mark Titus
So this kind of fits into the bigger picture here. But let's just visualize it's our 14 of a 16 hour shift and all you want is sweet sleep. This, of course, fits into the bigger picture of what you've built with your life here, too, as well. But how do you keep going? Like, how do you know? How do you barrel through that those last 2 hours to to keep your head up and to keep going?

00;10;00;16 - 00;10;28;29
Amanda Wlaysewski
You don't you don't have a choice. It I don't I don't think I ever make the choice. Well, I could go to bed or I could clock off because it's a perishable thing. You know, if we were so in t shirts or building something that you can literally sit down and walk away from, that would be different. But that the impetus is from this is a perishable product.

00;10;28;29 - 00;10;54;28
Amanda Wlaysewski
It has to stay cold. It has to we just have to keep going. And so you're just part of this process that's that's moving. You're just trying to keep up with it, you know, And so much of the idea or the technicality or whatever of a processing line is that you're being fed by the person doing the job next to you and you're feeding the person on your other side.

00;10;55;00 - 00;11;14;00
Amanda Wlaysewski
And so it's kind of like when they're done, I'm done and they're done. I'm done. If they're waiting for a fish, you know, they're not happy. And if you're waiting for a fish from that guy, you're giving them a hard time. Only because that's what keeps it going. And it's a tremendous amount of work to do in one day.

00;11;14;00 - 00;11;30;15
Amanda Wlaysewski
So you just you just have a pressure and pressure on you. But you also know we aren't done until that total fish is empty. So it's not really a decision that you make. That fish is let's push in.

00;11;30;18 - 00;11;56;17
Mark Titus
I've seen you do it recently. I'm going to extrapolate a little bit on that concept of perseverance and resilience and go into this pretty much everyone who has worked on the fight to protect Bristol Bay can identify with this kind of dogged persistence and boy, the need for resilience to. Can you speak to that from what you've observed?

00;11;56;19 - 00;12;10;21
Mark Titus
Why do people do it? Why do people fight and continue to fight and stay in the game for Bristol Bay, even when the odds have been stacked against us?

00;12;10;24 - 00;12;39;13
Amanda Wlaysewski
Well, for one, I think we we as people, we mirror each other, right? We can't see ourselves all day. We but we can see each other around us. And what are they doing? And for me as an employer, and I had the same mentality as an employee too, of kind of my own. Always my my motto or my mantra was help if somebody's having a hard time, if they're done before or if you're done before them, you help.

00;12;39;19 - 00;13;03;08
Amanda Wlaysewski
And so it's kind of that thing where you push each other or you you're not going to be done until they're done. You're done together for one. And you see how hard other people are working. I'm not watching myself all day. I don't I don't feel like I get tired because I'm motivated by fear. I want to be there.

00;13;03;11 - 00;13;24;22
Amanda Wlaysewski
I'm motivated by all kinds of things. Not a new kid there who's just working a summer job. But when I see those people working so hard and they're on our 14 and I know that I could not be doing this without them, I tell them all the time I couldn't do that. You realize I couldn't do this without you, right?

00;13;24;25 - 00;13;44;26
Amanda Wlaysewski
The person putting fish in the bag, the person cleaning gets up off the floor, the person building boxes. So, yeah, it's just a mirrored thing where you see what what you can do together and you just tap into that. So it's a momentum. It's something you're all you're all doing together.

00;13;44;29 - 00;13;50;21
Mark Titus
For the box life. It was choice, heavy duty, dry, warm for. There's a good, good break.

00;13;50;28 - 00;13;55;08
Amanda Wlaysewski
Away with a nap if you built yourself a fort or if day.

00;13;55;11 - 00;14;07;09
Mark Titus
Exactly yes at I can neither confirm or deny that there was some reefer madness going on up in the box. Lost it. Yeah.

00;14;07;12 - 00;14;26;26
Amanda Wlaysewski
We had our secret secret nap spots. And if you busted someone, that was it. That was kind of a test of true friendship. If you read it about where they're secret, either where you had your cigarets or where you were napping, that was that was a bond that you. That was in the vault.

00;14;26;29 - 00;15;05;25
Mark Titus
Absolutely. These trials, these trials by fire or by cold, cold water. So kind of taken one step further. I know you said the person next to you motivate you. I certainly being one small chapter in the big book of the long fight to protect Bristol Bay have been motivated by you. I've been motivated by people like Elena Hurley, people like Rick Alford, people like Melanie Brown, people like Nancy Maurice Lyon.

00;15;05;28 - 00;15;23;27
Mark Titus
How have you kept pursuing this this goal of protection for this place and what is sustains you? What is fed you during this time, knowing that that thing's possible? But it's it's been it's been a fight and it's been a grind.

00;15;23;29 - 00;15;49;21
Amanda Wlaysewski
If there was anywhere else in the world that this was replicated, I mean it if I could go and work in another fishery that was Bristol Bay, if I could start up a business anywhere else and see that sort of abundance, see that sort of hard work and natural phenomenon, I guess maybe it would just be a dime a dozen.

00;15;49;21 - 00;16;17;29
Amanda Wlaysewski
But there's nowhere else that this is going on. I tell the people that work with me this is a super unique thing. How many people do you know that are on the on the first step at the first step of natural resource, raw material extraction? We have people say it all the time. We have the equivalent of a gold mine, but it's it's the fish in the not going to see that anywhere else.

00;16;18;01 - 00;16;57;05
Amanda Wlaysewski
And I'm sure a lot of people work in industries that are just as special to them and just as rewarding and just as amazing from an abundance standpoint, from an industrial standpoint. But I know I can't I can't see this anywhere else. And so what a treasure. You know, I've been up there 18 summers in a row, and that's the one thing I never, ever get tired of or become desensitized to, is the first time you see that fish come off of a boat or trip a baler, and you just like, Damn, that's a lot of fish.

00;16;57;05 - 00;17;05;00
Amanda Wlaysewski
And they just keep coming and coming. It's it's pretty incredible and it doesn't get old. So.

00;17;05;03 - 00;17;33;28
Mark Titus
Well, you as a business leader and person that works your butt off. I've seen that happening. And there's certainly a reality that this is a commodity. This is a product that you're bringing to the world to feed the world. But you and I have also talked many times about the spiritual power that this place and the fecundity of this place and how unique and all the world that is.

00;17;34;01 - 00;17;46;12
Mark Titus
Is there a sense of that that you carry with you through the grind of the season, which is a short season? It's only a few weeks long, but are you able to dip into that? Well when when you're grinding it out?

00;17;46;15 - 00;18;11;29
Amanda Wlaysewski
I've probably worked 40 jobs since I was 15 years old. And after 2 hours, 3 hours, I'm bored out of my mind. I can't. It's it I don't want to look at the clock. It takes me a lot to get through it. Working with fish is completely different. You just. It gives you some sort of energy that's definitely not coming from within.

00;18;12;02 - 00;18;33;16
Amanda Wlaysewski
There's no other time of the year that. I mean, it has to do with a lot of things. It's light, you know, broad daylight till 1130 at night. You just have a whole different sense of drive. There's just no reason that makes sense to wait. Where am I getting the perseverance or the energy to it? Why am I still standing?

00;18;33;16 - 00;18;58;22
Amanda Wlaysewski
And I just really think that you draw that that fish exudes so much energy. It's was alive. It still has life to it. So that's there. That's all the way through the processing plant. And even in Montana, when I'm on packaging fish and thawing them out, cutting them again for smoking, I feel that again, it's just for one.

00;18;58;22 - 00;19;18;21
Amanda Wlaysewski
It's working with something that's so beautiful again, that's so perishable. And I just think it's a draw. You're getting the energy from that just as much as it's not more the pressure, the caffeine, all of that. But this is something different. It's it's just a different vibe.

00;19;18;23 - 00;19;46;02
Mark Titus
You also are really meticulous in your work. And I've watched it and eaten the fish that you have carefully processed. And look, it's it's hard work, it's hard physical labor, and you have to be meticulous as well. You have to pay attention to detail. You could do anything you want and you've chosen this as a vocation and as a business leader.

00;19;46;04 - 00;20;08;25
Mark Titus
You've you've really spoken to it. But why, while asking why Bristol Bay And first part and second part, what does it actually look like in the summer time if you you know, for those of us who haven't visited your plant, what is it like on the ground there and why do you do what you do up there?

00;20;08;27 - 00;20;38;23
Amanda Wlaysewski
gosh, I should have written those down. But why Alaskan why Bristol Bay, I think is just it's opportunity for one. I came from Butte, Montana, blue collar pretty hard working town miners and then that and there was the diversity of be known as kind of the melting pot. There's people from everywhere Italy, Ireland, Poland, Chinatown. There's a lot of diversity.

00;20;38;23 - 00;21;01;24
Amanda Wlaysewski
And you wouldn't believe that you're going to find that in a remote village in Alaska. But there's people from all over the world that descend upon that little village and come, and they all have somewhat of a shared experience. So that that part of it, the social part, was was really neat. And then what was your next question.

00;21;01;26 - 00;21;04;00
Mark Titus
Just to kind of look.

00;21;04;00 - 00;21;04;25
Amanda Wlaysewski
Like?

00;21;04;27 - 00;21;16;12
Mark Titus
Yeah, what does it look like? If you could just kind of give us a mental image of what is it like on the ground there in your plant? What is what is the day look like when you get up and how how does it work?

00;21;16;14 - 00;22;07;07
Amanda Wlaysewski
Well, there's a really neat contrast between the industrial, the machinery, the can mine, the smell of the old boats, everything that comes to Mackinac goes there. Today. There's vehicles and boats and like I said, machinery, buildings that are dilapidated. But at the same time you have that environment. It's just a really cool contrast between the commercial aspect of it and then and in the nature, then you see that that phenomenon of the fish come through and you see the swallows appear and then, you know, the kings are going to be there and you see the tundra caught in the pier and the colors change and it all happens in such a condensed time.

00;22;07;07 - 00;22;43;28
Amanda Wlaysewski
It's almost like it happens before your eyes. And a lot of the kids that work for me say, I feel like I've been here for a month and I just got here three days ago. You just it's a total time warp. It's kind of we call it the Twilight Zone or in some ways, but and there's a real beauty in the industrial type of can the old canneries and stuff like that that we find we love to explore, then we love to go see what people left behind.

00;22;44;01 - 00;23;08;07
Amanda Wlaysewski
A lot of those old canneries that aren't processing anymore, you know, they could have stopped processing ten years ago or 40 years ago, but you walk into them and if there are any kind of artifacts or remnants of it left, there's just this sense of people left for the day and never came back. You know, they just stopped working and never came back.

00;23;08;07 - 00;23;28;16
Amanda Wlaysewski
There's sweatshirts on the walls, there's tax on nails. There's, you know, writing on the wall from the break room. And even though for, you know, however many years, these generations of workers keep coming in from all over the country, all over the world, it's like it's the same crew. my gosh. They did that back in the seventies.

00;23;28;17 - 00;24;00;18
Amanda Wlaysewski
You know, they they partied there. They wrote their names around. They you know, it's just it's just so timeless to see that you can really get the essence of people working, doing that same work for summer after summer and to be part of that, it's like you said earlier, you're just it's such a relief to feel like you are you don't exist anymore because you're part of something so much bigger than you and you can just not exist for a while.

00;24;00;18 - 00;24;05;01
Amanda Wlaysewski
It's really relaxing, mentally and spiritually.

00;24;05;03 - 00;24;41;00
Mark Titus
I think there is such a truth in that for fishermen and using that word in ubiquity, people that are connected to water and fish that yearning for nothing ness of losing self in those moments. I absolutely remember that in that hard work and have felt that standing in a river and have felt that on the you know, on the boat of our buddy Steve Kerrigan's boat.

00;24;41;00 - 00;25;03;25
Mark Titus
David Jane, you know yeah. Picking fish or two in the hydro. Speaking of fishermen, what are your relationships like with the fishermen that you source, the salmon that you bring to us and feed the world? What is the workflow look like and what are those relationships like as a working relationship?

00;25;03;27 - 00;25;34;00
Amanda Wlaysewski
It's not in a couple of words. It's mutually dependent. We rely on each other. Oftentimes the fishermen are the only social contact you get when you make those deliveries. When we go down to pick fish off of the beach or take a delivery from the dock, it's just your little time to check in. It might be 30 seconds of, you know, handing fish tickets over the rail or you know, sending them down some jerky or something like that.

00;25;34;00 - 00;26;04;18
Amanda Wlaysewski
But you just have to time to check in. And then from a quality standpoint or from a supplier standpoint, the fisherman that we buy the fish from, they really get that the fish is going to be going through a different channel. It's going to be hand-cut that the the way that they have taken care of it in the effort that they put in to the quality, the handling, the icing, the bleeding, that's going to be appreciated on down the line.

00;26;04;18 - 00;26;34;08
Amanda Wlaysewski
It's not just going into the bucket with all the other apples. It's it's something that their identity gets to be be transmitted with that fish to the time it gets eaten or purchased by the consumer. I feel like I'm just the messenger or the delivery person because a lot of times at the farmers market or at our pick up events, people don't care about me.

00;26;34;10 - 00;27;07;27
Amanda Wlaysewski
They care about who caught this. How did they catch it? I used to gillnet a bear or I fished on the Kenai. They just have this connection to Alaska and they just are craving to share it. Nobody is really jumping to say, Well, I used to butcher fish or work into a chicken factory or something. There. They have that connection to the commercial fishing and if they don't, they've seen it some by some other medium on television.

00;27;07;27 - 00;27;36;19
Amanda Wlaysewski
Read about it in books. They just want some little piece of it. They want to be closer. And they do that through the fishermen. You know, they get it, especially Montanans. They get harvest, they get livestock, they get taken alive, living, being and turning it into a meal, food. And so there's just a there's a great connection. And that starts with the fishermen.

00;27;36;21 - 00;28;05;20
Mark Titus
I love this idea of continuity that you're suggesting. And I think that I didn't understand until we started hanging out that you source your fish primarily, if not exclusively from Setnetters, which is a different a different kind of gill netting than drift. Fisherman drifters. Can you can you give us the little for one moment on that and how that works and why it works in your operation?

00;28;05;22 - 00;28;29;09
Amanda Wlaysewski
Well, set netting is for stationary then drifters, so they don't really get to go out and search for the fish. They have a site, a designated site, and they are there. Screw anchors anchor in the net and they catch what they catch. It's different. A lot of people don't even have to use a boat for that. For the set netting.

00;28;29;09 - 00;29;03;03
Amanda Wlaysewski
They can just waders with the tub and they walk along and they're picking right us as the tide's going back out. So it's really it can be a lot more people would argue this because every setting outside is different. But it can it can be a lot more kind of like calm and quiet and closer to the resource versus a fast and furious boat where they're coming over the the rail and but everybody fishes a different way.

00;29;03;03 - 00;29;28;24
Amanda Wlaysewski
Some sites wouldn't people would never stand for them being described as calm because they're hot but it's a lot of exposure. You're right out there in the water. You're getting splash through everything in weather. Whatever the weather is, you're in it. You're not going into a wheelhouse. Your cabin might be a mile away. So in that way, it's pretty neat.

00;29;28;24 - 00;29;51;12
Amanda Wlaysewski
But the handling part of it, it's generally smaller volume because the fish are going into regular bags, not into holds. Well, they're both going into trailer bags, but the fishermen that we source from a lot of times were right there when they're picking the net and they're going right into a swell and we're taking them up to the hill to cut them slush.

00;29;51;14 - 00;29;52;28
Mark Titus
Meaning slush ice.

00;29;53;00 - 00;30;17;25
Amanda Wlaysewski
Yeah. So the best way that we've seen fish, the result of the flayed fish is that as soon as the fish is bled and bled alive, you put it in a slush of water so they can continue to swim. And, you know, get all that blood work through a system. And some of these fishermen, they're just they just really have the touch.

00;30;17;25 - 00;30;38;12
Amanda Wlaysewski
They're naturals. When you fill that fish and then put it through the vacuum packer, you can the vacuum packer tells no lies. It's going to bring up any blood that was in the bloodline. These things look like little pinholes. They're just cleaned. And it really it really makes a difference in the quality.

00;30;38;14 - 00;31;05;23
Mark Titus
Another part of that is so you're taking fish from the fishermen on the beach in slush ice. It comes to the front of your facility and you pull it out of the slush ice. And and then what happens? This is different than a lot of the bigger operations that are up there. How how is your operation unique and how you process the fish and what what ultimately do we end up with it at the on the table side of that?

00;31;05;25 - 00;31;34;14
Amanda Wlaysewski
So when the fish come out of the tail, what happens is Gary happens. Gary has been working with us for five years on the winter. In the winter he does the cod season out in the Bering Sea on the floating processor. But Gary's our header gutter machine. He breaks all of our hearts because he just every he has pretty much a claw by the end of the season.

00;31;34;16 - 00;32;11;16
Amanda Wlaysewski
You just beat from reaching for those fish and cutting their heads off and to watch him do it, I almost get jealous because it's kind of my favorite job. But he just has such a cool rhythm that those heads are just popping off and falling behind his shoulder into the gutter. And then he flips them over, runs his knife up the belly, pulls out the gaps, passes it to the next person, and then she's taken out the blood line and slimy and and getting it cleaned and staging it for being split.

00;32;11;18 - 00;33;01;09
Amanda Wlaysewski
So Koolaid put it, put it to two sides and it's just incredible because those guys have cut 50 £506,000 before lunch. Sometimes and you get into the grip to the groove and if there's no interruptions and everybody's feeling it, we don't even talk to each other for sometimes two or 3 hours. It's just we are kind of a little machine fish to fish to fish, and we have these container bands from Alaska Marine lines that will fill up the tops of the fish or the boxes of fish with our our finished product and and especially the first one when it's full, of course, we call the bobtail and they come and pick it up and

00;33;01;09 - 00;33;24;16
Amanda Wlaysewski
take it down to city dock to put on the barge and at the beginning it just looks so daunting because it's this big empty hallway of freezers and you think, God, how are how are we going to do that? And at the end, all of a sudden, the everybody looks up and you can hear the semi-truck coming in the driveway and they're like, already it's full.

00;33;24;18 - 00;34;06;07
Amanda Wlaysewski
And I tell him, See that semi-truck? You guys touched every single one of those fish. You did that. And this job isn't cool. It's not pretty. It's not they're not making a million bucks up there. But I think that's part of their reward is to just see that acknowledgment of the product of their labor. While we did that, it's it's really neat and they gain an appreciation for the resource to be honest it the first year at the cannery I didn't it I don't even remember caring or thinking about the fish.

00;34;06;09 - 00;34;30;17
Amanda Wlaysewski
They were like, you know, they might as well have been rocks or sweatshirts or you, you just saw them in a can going past you so fast and in such huge volume. And you know, when you're in a cannery, nobody really cares to fill you in on what's actually happening. They don't they don't explain. Okay, well, here's the process and this is why we do this.

00;34;30;17 - 00;34;54;01
Amanda Wlaysewski
They say you stand here and do this, okay, until you hear that buzz. And so you really don't make I did not make that connection to the resource or to the raw material. It was a job I couldn't wait to pour mug up to go and see my friends at Break. You made the connections with the people and you made it kind of with yourself because you did it.

00;34;54;07 - 00;35;20;03
Amanda Wlaysewski
You did the job and you got the paycheck and it's different. But here I see these people that work with me. A lot of them, they get there. They've never seen a salmon before. By the end, they know who caught that one. These are Nathan's fish. I love these guys. I love this fish. Or when we do custom processing and somebody didn't take that great care of their fish, they're so hurt.

00;35;20;03 - 00;35;48;27
Amanda Wlaysewski
They're like, why would they do this? Look at this stuff. All they do this, you know, if it wasn't bled or it wasn't, you know, kept it temperature because the fish intrinsically come out of that water, they are perfect. They're round. They're like little whales. They're so perfect. And our job, I think, is just to keep that core integrity or intact.

00;35;48;27 - 00;36;17;11
Amanda Wlaysewski
This all the way through don't don't cause any harm. Just you have the perfect thing. Just get it through the line. But what you can do to fish between the boat and somebody's plate is kind of sad if it's not taken care of really well. And I see that in a lot of big cities and grocery stores. You just see some fish in the case and you're like, What?

00;36;17;13 - 00;36;35;12
Amanda Wlaysewski
It's sad because you know what? What they could have been. So that's kind of sappy. But I just mean that those people that work with me, they gain a real appreciation and they notice the differences. They really they're learning something and they care.

00;36;35;14 - 00;37;00;06
Mark Titus
But I love this conversation where you really did a great job of fleshing out. I think the question I was trying to get at, which is where do you think that breakthrough happened for you and where do you think that breakthrough happens for the people that come work for you between this is just a product that I'm earning a paycheck on and having a coffee break every once in a while to.

00;37;00;08 - 00;37;13;21
Mark Titus
Wow, this is I'm passing along this incredible resource from this incredible place. How does that how did that happen for you?

00;37;13;24 - 00;37;40;23
Amanda Wlaysewski
I think about this a lot, actually. In my paper that I'm writing, I talk a lot about what is process mean and what's that what's happening in the transformation from, like I said in life, creature live animal life, fish to the food product and you know, I still ruminate about that a lot. It's hard to put your finger on.

00;37;40;24 - 00;38;08;08
Amanda Wlaysewski
I think part of it is that that energy that's coming from the fish part of it is what you put into the fish there. You know, people people are standing there for eight, ten, 12 hours at a time or more. Your brain goes to some pretty wacky places. You know, I it's happened to me. I see it. We call it the snap when somebody just snapped.

00;38;08;10 - 00;38;48;02
Amanda Wlaysewski
And you spend a lot of time thinking and you see people crying on the light, you see people laughing hysterically. Part of that is the lack of sleep and sleep deprivation. But, you know, not to sound whatever, but when you are so tired, we've talked about this before, I think you get closer to those spiritual realms, if you want to call them that or you're more easily or you're more susceptible to that, because I think your ego is the first one to say, Screw this, going to sleep, you know, and you're but you're still alive and functioning and working.

00;38;48;07 - 00;39;16;06
Amanda Wlaysewski
So you just that part of you is napping and you get to experience another part. And those are the things that I think that keep people coming back or that make them feel like they've done something pretty different or maybe something pretty special than your average job. You know, they're not behind the counter at a grocery store or whatever.

00;39;16;07 - 00;39;39;14
Amanda Wlaysewski
And not to say that those aren't really good jobs and people that's not that's not a worthy pursuit. We all know that. It's just to see the product of your labor from the whole fish to the end product. It's just not something you see every day and every job. You're usually doing one little section of that, not the whole thing.

00;39;39;16 - 00;39;58;05
Amanda Wlaysewski
And I do try to make sure that and probably some of my employees would argue with me on this one, but I try to make sure that I rotate them and get them out of the cannery or get them off campus for a couple of days, go down to the beach with my brother, see what's happening, and see where this fish is coming from.

00;39;58;07 - 00;40;25;17
Amanda Wlaysewski
Get down to the beach and go to the airport and see this fish get loaded onto a plane, go to city dock and see thousands of containers stacked up like giant Legos and just give them a little sense of the context of the industry and especially try to keep an eye out for people that are fading like not having a good time, not doing a good job, just get them out of here.

00;40;25;17 - 00;40;37;10
Amanda Wlaysewski
And they come back with kind of a renewed sense of this. Is this is cool. What I'm doing right now might not be that cool, but it's part of a bigger thing that is is important.

00;40;37;15 - 00;41;01;11
Mark Titus
So and I don't think it's a stretch at all to say you can touch a spiritual realm with doing these repetitive things. I mean, think of a whirling dervish or praying the rosary or, yeah, you know, chant a chant or a mantra. I mean, absolutely your get your your physical body repetitively doing something over and over again and you can free your mind.

00;41;01;14 - 00;41;27;06
Mark Titus
I remember writing that down when I was 19 years old. Doing that stuff was like, Wow, I've never felt more free than I do right now working in this country. I want to talk one more little bit about continuity and the fact that you oftentimes are receiving your fish from people that whose ancestors have been there for thousands of years.

00;41;27;09 - 00;41;46;14
Mark Titus
Are you cognizant that when you have those relationships with the indigenous people of Bristol Bay and how does that augment your feeling about this fish and this resource where it's coming from, especially when it's handled by people who have been handling fish like this for thousands of years?

00;41;46;16 - 00;42;14;24
Amanda Wlaysewski
Yeah. So it never really hit home to me or occurred to me as much as when I spent the winter in Naknek. I stayed up there over the winter and that gave me a whole new lease on life or a whole new appreciation for having fish in your freezer. It was cold, it's desolate, Groceries are expensive and it's kind of novelty.

00;42;14;24 - 00;42;41;04
Amanda Wlaysewski
They depend on that fish. We get to pack up our boxes of fish and go home to Montana, where there's a Costco three miles away and get whatever fruit we want, get whatever protein we like. It's not so up there and you just realize it's not as much as it's an enjoyable thing, as much as it's a family or a family tradition, it's a necessity.

00;42;41;06 - 00;43;22;20
Amanda Wlaysewski
They need it and they need it on several different levels. They need it for sustenance, they need it economically. But I think we all suffer when those that live there were so vocal about the Pebble Mine, They need it spiritually too. They need it in all senses of the word and when you take that and put it into a context where in three weeks more or less you have to get an entire year's worth of AMI income product inventory.

00;43;22;20 - 00;44;06;10
Amanda Wlaysewski
For them, it's their their household economy depends on three weeks. As far as the salmon go. Obviously, there's other things up there that they can eat, but it's just it's pretty neat. And I've learned that from them a lot. My friend Steve Anderson and her family have been bringing me fish since the beginning and they really have appreciated having a place like ours where they can bring it and get it back back impact, because a lot of times they're doing hundreds of fish from their Sunday and that's a big job to do in your kitchen or in your backyard.

00;44;06;12 - 00;44;41;03
Amanda Wlaysewski
It's messy, the clean up, the bears, the insects. So I really felt valued and appreciated by them. And as much as I value and appreciate them for their support of my business and just their friendship more than anything else, they're really special way to tap into what that place is all about. And if you're invited or welcomed into their life as a friend or a coworker or anything, it's a real gift.

00;44;41;06 - 00;44;44;29
Amanda Wlaysewski
It has been for me.

00;44;45;02 - 00;45;12;21
Mark Titus
Thank you for sharing that. And I, I completely agree. I'm going to move into food as activism for a minute here. And so we're kind of moving away from the land in the landscape, the source point, and now we're kind of moving back into the lower 48 here with people that are on the ground and want to do the right thing.

00;45;12;24 - 00;45;18;12
Mark Titus
Oftentimes don't know how. How can we save what we love by eating it?

00;45;18;14 - 00;45;42;00
Amanda Wlaysewski
I think that comes a lot from knowing where it came from, knowing something about where it came from. For me, that's the contrast I see now. I know so much about where the salmon I came from. I ask that question about everything in the grocery store. Now, who picked those apples? Who wax those apples? Who put the sticker on those apples?

00;45;42;02 - 00;46;19;21
Amanda Wlaysewski
You know who vacuum pack that? What kind of machine? Where's that been? Who cut that meat? Because now I know somebody did it or something. Did it. And so if if there's something special that something that's value valuable and people don't know about it, then they don't know when it's gone either. So I just think that that sharing of you could go back and, you know, things could have gone a different way a long time ago and Pebble Mine could have gone through and this fishery would be gone.

00;46;19;23 - 00;46;55;01
Amanda Wlaysewski
And the people that don't know about it wouldn't care because they didn't know in the first place. There's a lot of those industries that I don't have a grasp of what they were and why would I? This is we have an opportunity to change that here or just ensure that people know for a long time where salmon comes from, who's handled it, and that it's not a given, it's not something to be taken for granted.

00;46;55;03 - 00;47;18;19
Amanda Wlaysewski
It could be gone, and that would be a real shame. So I just know there's a lot of people who buy our fish that the first they buy the fish because it's better than what was in the grocery store or they fished in Alaska one time for vacation and they brought some fish home. They haven't had that good of fish since that time.

00;47;18;21 - 00;47;51;23
Amanda Wlaysewski
And so it starts out as a quality thing and an experiential thing. They had a good experience of it. But then the more we come home and we meet them at our pick up events and we share ways of preparing it in ways of eating it, they bond with it. And then the more than just a quality, they they have that connection with where it came from and that connection gets cemented when we sell out, when we don't have it, or when they ordered their fish two months ago.

00;47;51;23 - 00;48;19;21
Amanda Wlaysewski
And they're worried that we lost their email so that not necessarily fear, but that prospect of like, we might not get this or where is this or it's sold out. That's when it clicks that I really want. I really like this and I'd like it to be around for a long time for them. You know, it's, it's, it's a whole you don't know what you got till it's gone.

00;48;19;24 - 00;48;41;11
Mark Titus
Can you describe for me a little bit about how you distribute your fish and maybe a couple things that pop into your mind about some interactions you've had with people that have made those connections in person that that have perpetuated this story, that have made people really care about saving the source point from where these fish come from.

00;48;41;14 - 00;49;11;12
Amanda Wlaysewski
Sure. Well, we describe our distribution as somewhat of a Girl Scout cookie model. So people order in the spring and then they get a couple of months later and that is really made clear. This idea of this is not and this is not an unlimited or infinite source, it's a seasonal thing. So we're only going to get a certain amount.

00;49;11;14 - 00;49;44;10
Amanda Wlaysewski
And above and beyond that we're not sure. So that's kind of been an education point because people are so used to, you know, you don't go to the store and say, look. Ground beef is in season. That's there all the time. It's a given that we're trying to differentiate by saying this is not a given. It's a special seasonal thing that's going to come once a year and that that creates some excitement, some community, some sort of rallying around like, did you get your salmon?

00;49;44;10 - 00;50;06;17
Amanda Wlaysewski
Do you still have shares with you know, people are excited something new. And and the farmer's market has been one of the best venues that we could have ever imagined. Ten years ago when I started at the Butte Farmer's Market, I just thought, someday I'm going to make it. Someday I'm not going to have to do this anymore.

00;50;06;19 - 00;50;36;08
Amanda Wlaysewski
It's just a stepping stone. I don't feel that way anymore. I'm so grateful to have that not only a source of revenue in it and a place to unload a lot of fish, but you get to make those connections. And nothing has taught me more about what this fish has to be from a quality standpoint and what people want to know about it than those farmers markets, because you're having an actual exchange during the handoff.

00;50;36;10 - 00;50;57;22
Amanda Wlaysewski
You're answering questions. A lot of times you're answering questions and you have to say, I don't know. And then you think, Well, I better figure out. I better find that out, because when you get asked again, you're going to want to know the answer. So it's a real exchange on both sides to see what do people not know about this and what do they want to know?

00;50;57;25 - 00;51;23;07
Amanda Wlaysewski
I remember at One Farmer's market, Ilene and I were at the Bozeman winter market and there was this couple next to us. They're probably in their early seventies. They always brought their dog and they sell lamb. And every week you will. Every other Saturday you show it rain or shine, three feet of snow or not, whatever the temperature is in Bozeman, Montana.

00;51;23;09 - 00;51;56;17
Amanda Wlaysewski
And you're just like, I don't want to do this right now. It's cold and tired. You're hooking up a trailer, you're loading boxes of fish, and then you're totally humbled because you pull into the parking lot with your Starbucks and your snacks and stuff, and you see this little couple haul in their carts, in their crates, and you're like, All right, I'll shut up now, because, you know, that guy has been up since 3:00 in the morning doing his bread and that guy, that lady was making jam all night long.

00;51;56;19 - 00;52;19;01
Amanda Wlaysewski
There's all these kind of artisan people bringing their products to market, and it's just it's really neat. But anyway, back to these two people. We love them and we were always giving them smoked salmon because the guy just loved smoked that loved our smoked salmon and we'd save the skins. When we did our sampling, we would save the skins and give them to their dog.

00;52;19;01 - 00;52;33;14
Amanda Wlaysewski
And we just lived for those little, little they were our friends for that reason. And anyway, sometimes they would bring a carton of eggs. You know, I don't know how to make a long story short, Mark, I'll just.

00;52;33;16 - 00;52;35;10
Mark Titus
Ask you to and great.

00;52;35;13 - 00;53;11;20
Amanda Wlaysewski
That they would bring a couple of cartons of eggs because they had chickens. But their big sign said, you know, millers, lamb or whatever. And this gal walks up to the table and sees the eggs there and she says, Are those lamb eggs? And I just overheard it because farmers markets are so watching metal, they're so fun and we were all just like, What did you just say that, you know, the old man was just like she didn't think he heard her right.

00;53;11;20 - 00;53;40;13
Amanda Wlaysewski
And she was like, These are are these Lenox? Because this thing says LAMB. And so basically the lady was like, get out of here to her husband. And she said, no, these are chicken eggs. But we sell lamb to and explain it to her. But I had ten stories like that where you just can see there are people that it's not because they're not smart, they just have never been exposed to where food comes from.

00;53;40;16 - 00;53;57;07
Amanda Wlaysewski
And I think in the back of her mind, like she thought she realized, wow, did I just say that? But she didn't know it was innocent. So it's like there's an opportunity to teach somebody that, but they just don't know.

00;53;57;13 - 00;54;21;23
Mark Titus
And that's a that's a a fantastic example. Couldn't couldn't dream up a better example than that one. And reminds me of my favorite question that I got while I was guiding in southeast Alaska and one of my guests was staring wistfully at the beach and there was a little Sitka black tailed deer on the beach, you know, grazing on grass and damn, that's a beautiful sight.

00;54;21;26 - 00;54;26;28
Mark Titus
How old said deer going to be when it turns into a moose?

00;54;27;00 - 00;54;27;28
Amanda Wlaysewski
yikes.

00;54;28;00 - 00;54;55;04
Mark Titus
It happens. Yeah, I said to him. So I would love to hear from you some wisdom about now where you are in your career in this process and this this beautiful story you just explained to us about, illustrating to people in a meaningful, experiential way, where their food comes from, comes from why they should care, and why they should care about the source point from where it comes from.

00;54;55;07 - 00;55;45;23
Mark Titus
Do you think that we can replicate this work that you're doing throughout our bioregion here in Salmon Nation, which we define as Northern California, clear up to top of Alaska? And if we were able to replicate knowing your food, do you see a way forward that can bring us out of this idea of just pulling food as a product out of a plastic receptacle that has no soul, no resonance, no chain of custody behind it, no content city that you've talked so beautifully about in this conversation, can we change perception that can we replicate the things that you're doing?

00;55;45;23 - 00;56;00;20
Mark Titus
And would you have advice for other people, small producers, small farmers, people out there that are working to do this kind of work in a meaningful way? And what would you do? What would you say to these folks?

00;56;00;22 - 00;56;22;11
Amanda Wlaysewski
Well, that's a that's a tough one, because I really had I set out to do this, you know, if I was in third period, English as a senior in high school and said, you know what, here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to go up to Alaska. And that's not what happened at all. I mean, that it just happened to me.

00;56;22;13 - 00;57;01;07
Amanda Wlaysewski
The opportunities were there. I kept saying yes. And like I said, it took on a life of its own. And so I guess to a small producer, I would say as so long as you enjoy it and you have to promise yourself that you enjoy it for real, just keep doing it. And there have been so many times, whether it's been putting out a smoked product or selling to this type of store or selling in this distribution route that I, I just got pissed at myself and said, Why do you keep changing up what you're doing?

00;57;01;12 - 00;57;32;08
Amanda Wlaysewski
You know, we just decided this is what we're going to do and now that's out the window. Well, COVID taught us, among other things, is that it's really important that you have the ability and the luxury of diversifying what you're doing and pivoting when you kind of have that idea. And usually it's not like I wake up in the middle of the night and say, here's what I'm going to do.

00;57;32;08 - 00;58;15;09
Amanda Wlaysewski
I'm going to grind the fish. That's not a perfect square. It's out of necessity that that spawn. And through challenges and through mistakes, the best things that we do in our plant or our process are from the times where we royally screwed it up and so just not to be hard on yourself and be hard on yourself in terms of doing things that as best as you can and giving it everything but, but not seeing things as a failure, but just as an opportunity to see a world that we know, something we know that doesn't work.

00;58;15;12 - 00;58;38;20
Amanda Wlaysewski
But and as far as the, you know, the local food or the understanding, the source of your food, just think about it. Get closer to it, ask people questions if you can, even if it's even if it's at a grocery store. I am in the habit, embarrasses people that I'm shopping with, of asking the person behind the seafood desk or at a sushi restaurant.

00;58;38;23 - 00;59;05;06
Amanda Wlaysewski
Do you know where your salmon came from or do you know it's wild and I might not learn anything about it. And the the you know, the consumer or the patron, you might learn and not learn anything about it on that side, but you'll certainly learn what they know about it or what they don't know about it. And I just really geek out on that.

00;59;05;09 - 00;59;10;03
Amanda Wlaysewski
Now I want to know what people don't know about their food.

00;59;10;05 - 00;59;15;24
Mark Titus
I think it's such a simple thing, but it's such a profoundly impactful thing that you can do.

00;59;15;26 - 00;59;42;20
Amanda Wlaysewski
I think a lot too, because now I'm having to wear a marketing hat and figure out like, what messages? How are people perceiving my business and my product that don't know me or don't know Bristol Bay? So I start looking at other messages that that are on food and you can just walk through the grocery store. It's like, what are they trying to sell people?

00;59;42;23 - 01;00;14;04
Amanda Wlaysewski
They're trying to sell us response of responsibility. They're trying to sell us environmental sustainability. They're trying to sell us being healthy. They're trying to sell us being frugal. They're trying to sell as being practical and beautiful. Whatever it's. They're not selling food as sustenance. They're selling ways that we want to feel about ourselves are ways that we want to be represented to the world, you know, by our choices.

01;00;14;07 - 01;00;31;18
Amanda Wlaysewski
And I see that in that now, in the choices that I'm making to try to see through those through those messages. And I know that when I eat eggs, they came from my mom's chicken. And I know.

01;00;31;20 - 01;00;32;13
Mark Titus
Not her lambs.

01;00;32;14 - 01;00;56;13
Amanda Wlaysewski
Yeah. Every time you can make those choices, do it. And every time you can think to ask a question, just do it because you are learning something. But they're also behind the counter. Maybe that kid will go and ask his boss, like, Where does this fish come from? And just encourage the care a little bit and maybe it falls on deaf ears.

01;00;56;13 - 01;00;58;06
Amanda Wlaysewski
I don't know that.

01;00;58;08 - 01;01;23;26
Mark Titus
I think people perk up. I mean, I've I've irritated the guy behind the fish counter many a time. But you know what? They remember? And we come back and have a conversation about that. And sometimes there's something else sitting in the counter. The next time I come back, we're going to start winding down here. This has been such a great conversation and I honestly, we could just keep going for a whole road trip here.

01;01;23;26 - 01;02;01;09
Mark Titus
But for today I want to just touch on two more things. The first thing is obviously this year for almost everybody, there has been a lot to process through and I know we've talked about and have experienced acute experiences of grief during this time, and I know so many other people in other families have as well. What is your role on your what is your take, rather on the role of connection like with a capital C throughout all of this?

01;02;01;09 - 01;02;03;09
Mark Titus
And what does that mean to you?

01;02;03;12 - 01;02;40;26
Amanda Wlaysewski
Well, I guess throughout any trial or out throughout any joy that life brings us, we learn what's important. What's important to us. We learn what really matters. And so much of that includes food, you know, so much of gathering, gift giving, so much of who we are as people or even as alive beings as eating and and sharing food together.

01;02;40;26 - 01;03;14;06
Amanda Wlaysewski
And so I think when people are having hard times, are good times, and they can celebrate with something special. And if I contributed to getting that something special to where they could put it in front of their family, I mean, that's that's enough for me. That's awesome. I know that people say they they save our fish for special occasion or they gave it as a gift and just to like play have played.

01;03;14;11 - 01;03;20;09
Amanda Wlaysewski
One small part in that is I consider pretty cool.

01;03;20;12 - 01;03;47;17
Mark Titus
Me too. All right. We have come to that time of the podcast where we're doing our goofy little game of asking you three questions here. So speed round. I then it's just imagining you're going to love this. You're just imagining if, if, God forbid, your house caught on fire, your plant caught on fire. And I'm not going on with, as I say that and you of course, get your loved ones out first.

01;03;47;17 - 01;03;54;10
Mark Titus
But what are what is the one physical thing you take with you? If it was all on the line.

01;03;54;12 - 01;04;16;08
Amanda Wlaysewski
Don't use that. I know it would be like an article of clothing. Some I have. I have these there like jogger pants. People call my hammer pants. I have literally been wearing them every summer. I wear them all the time. I take those. I don't know.

01;04;16;12 - 01;04;18;03
Mark Titus
They're just your hammer pants.

01;04;18;07 - 01;04;21;20
Amanda Wlaysewski
Security? Yeah, my security.

01;04;21;22 - 01;04;47;21
Mark Titus
No one has answered hammer pants yet. You've got a gold star. It's awesome. All right, let's. Let's call it your spiritual house now. And there's two things you can take with you that are the core qualities of your life. What are those two things? Two qualities about you or those those things that you hold in highest regard about who you are?

01;04;47;24 - 01;04;56;22
Amanda Wlaysewski
Definitely humility and resilience.

01;04;56;24 - 01;05;14;24
Mark Titus
You exude both of those qualities quite magnificently. All right. And lastly, is there any is there one thing that you would leave behind, too, to let the fire have its way with and purify.

01;05;14;27 - 01;05;19;10
Amanda Wlaysewski
My processing plant?

01;05;19;12 - 01;05;21;24
Mark Titus
I suppose it's a love hate relationship.

01;05;21;26 - 01;05;55;16
Amanda Wlaysewski
I guess, but nothing would make me. I don't want to leave it behind like everything else has been left behind and magnetic to just be a relic. for all the tears and the laughter and the everything that's gone on there. It would just be so awesome to see it burned to the ground, you know, become ashes and just not be like any waste from it or any material left behind it.

01;05;55;16 - 01;05;57;09
Amanda Wlaysewski
Maybe that's weird, but it's the truth.

01;05;57;10 - 01;06;17;02
Mark Titus
It's not. Actually, I didn't see that coming. I'd like that take a lot and it makes a lot of sense. It is a sort of a living thing. Last tiny little bonus question before we wrap up for this time. How does becoming doctor Amanda Laszewski fit into your broader horizon?

01;06;17;04 - 01;06;48;16
Amanda Wlaysewski
I know that some day I'm not going to be able to work like manual labor anymore and I'm not going to want to sit around, I guess. But at the same time, I haven't had time to get to create any sort of the narrative or any sort of discourse. From what I've experienced, I'm just housing it all, you know, and I can't wait to get it out.

01;06;48;18 - 01;07;15;03
Amanda Wlaysewski
I can't. It's just like going to be a conglomeration of all the people watching exercises they've done over the past 20 years. And that's what anthropology is. You know, why are people doing what they're doing and how are we mirrors of each other and, and yeah, this has been a super awesome field site for that type of research, if you call it.

01;07;15;05 - 01;07;18;03
Amanda Wlaysewski
So I hope I get the chance to see it through.

01;07;18;05 - 01;07;27;27
Mark Titus
You aren't kidding. I mean, you couldn't pluck out a more perfect little microcosm of human experience. Yeah.

01;07;28;00 - 01;07;28;20
Amanda Wlaysewski
Yeah.

01;07;28;22 - 01;07;33;14
Mark Titus
Well, until I get to call you Doctor. Amanda.

01;07;33;16 - 01;07;34;09
Amanda Wlaysewski
Never mind.

01;07;34;09 - 01;07;44;21
Mark Titus
What a pleasure spending an hour with you here today. And where can folks find your amazing salmon? And where can folks follow you on social media?

01;07;44;23 - 01;08;17;25
Amanda Wlaysewski
so we're at Jack Fish KBI, a.k.a Fish. That's the river that the neck Neck and the Queen Jack or what our near Bristol, Naknek, where we are and the Quebec River feeds Lake Erie ominous so it's a big word for great water and some of you are jack fish or order my catch scum because it's not that easy to phonetically spell out where I order my catch scum.

01;08;17;27 - 01;08;40;04
Mark Titus
Perfect. Well, until next time, happy trails, and we'll get this out. We're going to be listening to this in conjunction with a screening of the Wild and the. Yeah, the 19th. Today's the 19th. So it'll be the 20th of of of March. And thank you so much and can't wait to see you back up in Bristol Bay.

01;08;40;06 - 01;08;51;02
Amanda Wlaysewski
thank you. I enjoyed it. We'll talk to you soon

01;08;51;04 - 01;08;53;14
Unknown
How to use save what you love. How do you save what you love?

01;08;58;13 - 01;09;24;13
Mark Titus
Thank you for listening to save what you love. If you like what you're hearing, you can help keep these conversations coming your way by giving us a rating on Apple Podcasts. You can check out photos and links from this episode at evaswild.com. While there, you can join our growing community by subscribing to our newsletter, you'll get exclusive offers on wild salmon shipped to your door and notifications about upcoming guests and more great content on the way.

01;09;24;15 - 01;10;03;16
Mark Titus
That's at evaswild.com. That's the word Save spelled backwards Wild dot com. This episode was produced by Tyler White and edited by Patrick Troll. Original music was created by Whiskey Class. This podcast is a collaboration between Ava's Wild Stories and Salmon Nation and was recorded on the homelands of the Duwamish. People. We'd like to recognize these lands and waters and their significance for the people who lived and continued to live in this region whose practices and spiritualities were and are tied to the land in the water, and whose lives continue to enrich and develop in relationship to the land waters and other inhabitants today.