Tasiilaq

The first people to reach eastern Greenland were the Saqqaq, coming down from the far north, followed by the Dorset culture. The Norse knew the coast as the first landmark on the voyage from Iceland's Snæfellsnes peninsula, and Thule migrants passed through in the 15th century. Later the south-east was largely deserted for two centuries as people moved back to the more crowded west coast, and it was not settled again until the late 18th century.

In 1884–85 the Danish naval captain Gustav Holm led an expedition to the Ammassalik coast, the area's first contact with Europe. By the mid-1880s about 400 people lived there, facing vanishing resources, malnutrition and disease. A permanent Danish trading station followed in 1894 under the name Ammassalik, "the place with the ammassat", after the capelin, a small fish; the first church was built in 1908, and the station became a colony in 1925, when 84 of its Greenlandic residents were moved north to found Ittoqqortoormiit.

Until at least the 1920s families left town each summer for hunting and fishing camps in the fjords and mountains. From the end of the Second World War into the 1960s the town turned from hunting to cod fishing. On 6 February 1970 the worst piteraq ever recorded tore through and nearly ruined it. In 1997 it took the official name Tasiilaq, "the place at the lakes", the name local people had long used.

Tasiilaq is the heart of East Greenland and the main place where East Greenlandic, distinct from the west-coast language, is spoken. The East Greenlanders, the Tunumiit, are widely believed to have had no direct contact with Europeans before Holm's expedition. They are known for the Ammassalik wooden maps, carved wooden pieces that trace the shape of the coastline, which Holm's expedition brought back in the 1880s.

The Ammassalik Museum keeps the town's history in the old church of 1908. Its replacement, built in the 1980s, has interior decoration by the artist Aka Høegh. The kaffemik, an open house with coffee and cake for a birthday or other milestone, brings neighbours together.

Visitors find people polite and interested in outsiders, especially those who speak English. Hunting and fishing remain part of local identity. The town has also faced hard times: in September 2021 alcohol was banned for two weeks after a surge of violence and suicide, and reports of domestic violence fell sharply during the ban.

Tasiilaq had 1,985 inhabitants in 2020, making it the seventh-largest town in Greenland and by far the largest community on the east coast. It is one of the fastest-growing towns in the country: apart from Nuuk, it is the only town in Sermersooq municipality to have grown steadily over the last two decades.

Many residents still fish and hunt, but administration and services now employ a large share of the town. The town has a hospital, schools, a children's home, a sports hall, a police station, a post office and a bakery, and it is the hub for the helicopters that serve the villages of Isortoq, Kuummiut, Sermiligaaq and Tiilerilaaq.

Life is shaped by isolation. There are no roads beyond the town, and in summer cargo boats also link Tasiilaq with Kulusuk. Tourism is small — in 2005 the town saw several hundred visitors a year from Iceland — and summer brings ice-cave tours, glacier hikes, kayaking and whale watching. Scientists also come: the Sermilik research station nearby studies the Mittivakkat Glacier.

Food in Tasiilaq follows the pattern of the Greenlandic coast: imported groceries from the Pilersuisoq store combined with fish and meat from local hunters and fishers. The town's old name recalls the ammassat, or capelin, a small fish, and cod has been the mainstay of the local fishery since the mid-20th century. Many residents still fish and hunt.

Suaasat, a soup of seal, whale or reindeer with rice or barley, is Greenland's national dish. For visitors, the choices are few: a hotel restaurant, the bakery, and the canteen in the sports centre with fried chicken, chips and hot dogs. Local people are the best guide to anything else.

Coffee is central to social life, served with cake at the kaffemik. A bar by the harbour is the town's main place for a drink, and prices for everything are high because almost all food arrives by sea or air. For parts of the year there is too much ice in the water for boats.