Chamorro Public Service Post #22: Suette Si Nano

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Juan Malimanga is one of my favorite parts of the Pacific Daily News.

It serves a couple purposes for me. Number one, it helps me practice my Chamorro everytime I read it. Number two, it sometimes makes me laugh with its silly jokes. That being said, sometimes the jokes confuse the hell out of me because of weirdness in the translation or references to things I'm unfamiliar with. Number three, the comic can be useful for helping to explain certain aspects of the Chamorro culture, especially parts which aren't as commonly references nowadays due to cultural changes. And finally number 4, I use the comic to help teach the Chamorro language. For my Chamorro language classes last year I regularly used Juan Malimanga strips to practice speaking and translating Chamorro. We would work through them panel by panel, until we reach the punchline. This was the moment when most of my students would groan because of the silly pun that joke was based on.

  

Below is the text from the panels from a Juan Malimanga strip that I read recently.  I've included the translation as well for those who can't read the Chamorro parts. 

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Panel 1:

Nano's dog is chewing on the leg of a sofa.

Kika: Handa! Handa! Basta mangasngasngas ennao I patas I sufa!

(Shoo! Shoo! Enough chewing on the leg of the sufa!)

Panel 2:

Kika ordering Nano to take his dog away.

Kika: Nano! Nano! Maila fan ya un konne’ I ga-mu ga’lagu!

(Nano! Nano! Come and take your dog!)

Panel 3:

Juan joins the scene in order to make a joke.

Juan: Maolek sa’ I pumalu na ga’lagu siha manggaiulo’, lao enao ga-mu Nano siempre bula termites.

(It's good because other dogs have worms, but that dog of yours Nano is definitely full of termites.)