NO REST FOR THE AWAKE - MINAGAHET CHAMORRO

  Put si nanå-hu biha, i puti'on gi langhet-hu, i anghet-hu para i kotturå-ta yan i lengguahi-ta.        Put si nanå-hu, i pilan gi langhet-hu, un chalåni yu' sa' achokka' guaha na biahi echong yan matahlek yu' gi chalån-hu todu tiempo un pupulan yu'.        Put i guinaiyå-ku, un na'kabåles i korason-hu yan i familia-ku. Hu agradedesi i guinaiyå-mu yan i sinapotte-mu mås kada diha gi este karerå-ta.      Magof Ha'ånen Mannånu nu hamyo na tres ya hamyo todos ni' mannåna.

  Recently Senator Will Parkinson introduced a resolution to I Liheslaturan Guåhan calling for a full examination of statehood or another autonomous status. In his statement explaining the resolution he equated statehood for Guam with ensuring the island’s survival.   Is statehood really the only choice for Guam’s future?   This Friday, May 2nd from 5:30-7:00 pm at the Guam Museum, Independent Guåhan will be holding a community forum discussing some of the implications of what statehood might mean for the island. This event is free and open to all. Former UOG President and non-voting delegate for Guam Robert Underwood will also offer his reflections as part of the discussion.   Artwork in flyer courtesy of Teihini Davis   **************   Three Things You Should Know About Statehood for Guam 1.         Unlike Independence, where all people have the right to be free and right to self-determin...

  My third oldest child Lulai has officially started cultural dance.   Twice a week, at the MTM Community Center, she dances with Siñora Max Bigler-Tainatongo and the group Guma' Kinalameten i Taotao Tåno'. She is only three years old, much younger than the rest of the dancers, and literally doesn’t know yet the meaning of the word “discipline.” As such, during practices she more often than not dances to the beat of her own drum, causing chaos and confusion, rather than following the lead of others. Lao gof ya-ña sinembåtgo. But she likes it nonetheless.   For me, seeing one of my children in Chamoru cultural dance, is a beautiful moment of decolonization. For many people, they might connect decolonization to being political status change, such as Guam becoming independent or a state or a freely associated entity. Others might hear decolonization and think of it through some of the misconceptions out there of the idea. They might think of it as being, trying to go...

 Maila ya ta fambaila! Independent Guåhan is having an IndepenDaNCE fundraiser this Friday, March 28th from 7-11 pm at Good Company. There will be a Cha Cha Competition with prizes, raffle and silent art and book auction and mångnge music by Ma’lak Mo’na.    Tickets are just $15 and it includes a drink.    We are fundraising to support art and community projects that we have planned for the rest of the year.  Having an IndepenDANCE fundraiser is something Independent Guåhan has been talking, joking and dreaming about since we first started 9 years ago.  This will be a nice way to end Mes Chamoru this year and also hopefully get us primed for some important, creative community collaborations on the horizon. 

If you are looking for articles, essays, poems, and other random things written in Chamoru, about a wide variety of topics, then you should definitely check out "I Sakman i Fino'-ta." It was started in 2022 by Benny Anderson as a means of promoting Chamoru language and writing. Anyone can submit for the website, which is filled at this point with hundreds of short pieces written in Chamoru. The inspiration for the name is that the website is a vessel for the language in the same way the såkman was a vessel for the Chamoru people the past, using it to travel and transport. If we continue to use our language on a daily basis and pass it on to the next generation, it will continue to evolve and grow as we grow. It will stay with us on this journey. The published pieces come from active, current learners of Chamoru, first language speakers of Chamoru and second language learners of Chamoru. They are free to write about whatever they are interested in. You will find plenty of ...

English is my mother tongue, in the sense that it is the language that I grew up with and speak most comfortably. It is my first language. It is however not my favorite language, not the best language and certainly not i mas takhilo' para Guahu. I am a non-native speaker of the Chamoru language as I learned to speak it when I was 20 years old. It is natural for me in some ways, but still unnatural in others, primarily when talking about things that are difficult in general to express in a Chamoru lexicon. This is not only something that I struggle with, but as the Chamoru language has become more and more limited in how and where it is used, many people find themselves constantly switching to English since a potential part of their conversation is something few people have actually used the Chamoru language to convey. What makes speaking, thinking and writing easier is if the topic fits easily within some existing framework or lexicon for carrying meaning. If that framework...

Since I began working at the Guam Museum, repatriation of human remains, of artifacts, or cultural materials, has gone from being something that was just on a list of things that indigenous people struggle with in general, to something that is literally part of my job description.  For those unfamiliar with the term, since it can be used in different contexts, repatriation as I'm thinking of it here means the return of cultural properties, ancestral remains to their countries, their peoples, usually from museums, universities or other institutions. As the curation for the Guam Museum, part of what I do deal with seeking possibilities for repatriation of Chamoru artifacts and ancestral remains. Whether they have been taken away a few years ago or decades ago for research or some other reason.  (Rematriation is something I'll have to get into on another post. Less discussed, but critically important as we see the returning of artifacts, as less the end of a process, but an impor...

One of the most exciting gifts that I received last year, right in time for Christmas was from longtime singer and musician Joe Taimanglo. He sent me a box filled with Chamoru music lyrics books and tapes, since as the curator for the Guam Museum I am always interested in collecting, preserving and then educating about things from our past, but also as the producer for the Fanachu podcast, we've been digitizing and collecting Chamoru music for several years now. To date we've uploaded more than 400 songs to the Fanachu YouTube page .  I've had Siñot Taimanglo on the Fanachu podcast twice as a guest where he has been such a wealth of information on the history of contemporary Chamoru music. He keeps lists of Chamoru musicians, sometimes shares Chamoru music on his social media, still performs, and also writes posts remembering Chamoru and Guam-based musicians who have passed away.    Sumåhi filmed and edited a video of me unboxing this special box from Siñot Joe, filled wi...

After my third child Lulai was born in 2021, I had a month of paternity leave from working at the Guam Museum.  During this time, I would usually take Lulai at night for around four or five hours, to give her mother Desiree a chance to sleep or relax or do anything undisturbed for a while.  I would sing to her, rock her, hold her while she slept. It gave me time to think, to reflect, to watch things, to read. One of the things that I thought alot about at the time was Chamoru music and its future.  I never really made the jump to digital music platforms like Spotify, but I do listen to music on YouTube.  While I would be watching Lulai I would want to sing to her different Chamoru songs and I would look for them on YouTube and not be able to find the songs. I was frustrated because I had the songs on tapes or on CDs or on vinyl records, but my hands were full with a child, or the physical copies were packed away in boxes in storage somewhere and it would take forever...