NO REST FOR THE AWAKE - MINAGAHET CHAMORRO

--> I would love to do a research project on Yokoi. His name always comes up in the most random places. The connection that he felt to Guam is so unique and so interesting, and his actually gets in the way of us understanding it. He returned to Japan a hero, but seemed to chafe against that characterization. In his mind he had failed in so many ways, and the hero status he received missed everything he was and every value he cherished. The quiet jungles of Guam seemed to understand him more than the country he returned to. There was more meaning to that spartan existence than the flashy and fake Japan that he returned to. You could argue that his soul remained in Guam while the rest of him returned hooe. Here is an interview that a UOG student conducted with her grandfather Jesus Duenas, one of the two Chamorros who discovered Yokoi in 1972. I came across this in the most random way earlier today on a very old version of UOG's website. ***********************

I've been successful this summer in going on a hike at least every two weeks. I've been referring to these as my "Secret Hikes" Here are some pictures of the last four:

I'm writing up my 2012 Guam Political Sign Awards. For those who need a reminder about what this entails, I thought I would post below my awards for the last election, in 2010. ******************* 2010 Guam political sign awards Wednesday, 10 Nov 2010 01:22am by Michael Bevacqua |  Marianas Variety News Staff The political signs are slowly getting taken down around island and so before we forget that for close to a year our island was covered in a sea of slogans, promises, and smiling faces, Id like to hand out my 2010 Guam Political Sign Awards. These awards are decided by me and me alone, there is no panel of judges who have debated or voted on them. The categories are neither fair, nor uniform, and they change for each election depending on what signs are out there. These awards are meant to be fun and funny, and rarely serious. These are not meant to attack any candidates, but are instead given to celebrate how invested our island

I am in this picture, I am the white-t-shirted blur to the left in the background. For me this captures very much my feeling of walking in a sort of dream two weeks ago. After months of trying, myself and 20 others were given access to the Fena area of Naval Magazine on Guam. For those who don't know, Naval Magazine is a site for storing all sorts of weapons and bombs, and so access to the base is very restricted. We went as part of the Heritage Hikes that I help organize for We Are Guahan. While Heritage Hikes are always open to the public, because of base security issues, for those on base, we are always limited in the amount of people who can join and each person has to submit their SS# and sign a waiver ahead of time. I grew up on Guam with very few people in my family who had base access. We rarely ever entered the base and being able to shop at the commissary wasn't something that we seemed to care about, or at least not openly. As such the bases on Guam are often total

My art show at I.P. Coffee is still up for those who are interested in seeing my latest pieces. Email me at mlbasquiat@hotmail.com if you have any questions. The week before last I typed up an artist statement basically explaining to those who were interested, where the notion for the show and its title "Before the Storm, After the Fire" came from. In explaining myself, I ended up using the old Quantum Physics paradox/experiment famously known as "Schrodinger's Cat." Except my version, as you'll read in the first paragraph, is localized to become "Schrodinger's Karabao." I would have given this a completely different name, like "Tun Sakati's Karabao," but since most people already have no idea what this means, I decided not to make it even more obscure. ******************************* BEFORE THE STORM, AFTER THE FIRE Michael Lujan Bevacqua - Artist’s Statement Put fabot, imahina na guaha un kuåto, ya gaige gi este na kuåto,

Please consider signing this petition titled "To Prevent the Construction of a Mounded Landfill on top of Inarajan Watershed at Layon, in Dandan, Municipality of Inarajan." I'm pasting the entire text of the petition below, and a link to its online form can be found here . I would love to write more about this issue right now, there is so much going on and so much to be said. If you've ever wondered why some of the more conscious people on Guam refer to the Federal Government as "Federales" in a sneering or fearful way, one of the reasons is happening right now, over the landfill issue and the attempted exortion of the Government of Guam to the tune of almost $1 million dollars a week . Unfortunately I can't spare the time right now as I'm rushing to finish up a book chapter so I can get back to work on my dissertation. (The pictures in this post are all from the tinanom yan halom tano' on either the land around my family's house in Mangila

I watched Shiro's Head: The Legend last week and one of the stupid jokes that I made with people, is that you can't really be sure it was filmed on Guam. As a film which is billed as the first Guam/local major motion picture this might seem stupid, but the joke is that for all the landscape they showed of Guam, there were no political signs! For those of you who don't know why this is an issue, every two or four years (for some races) the roadsides of Guam become crowded with signs for Guam's legislative, mayoral, congressional and gubernatorial races. For most people on Guam, unless they have had the opportunity to meet a candidate at a funeral, party or other public event, these signs are the main way of "getting to know" the candidates. For some the candidate's face is most prominent, making what they are wearing, how their hair looks, or what kind of facial expression they are making crucial in determining whether people feel that they can trust/li

At present I'm trying to extend the scope of my blog and its readership beyond just Chamorros who stumble across my blog because they are googling around trying to find the lyrics to the song Apo Magi or Japanese businessmen and American military who are searching for massage parlors on Guam. This shift was prompted when I received a new visitor to my blog, Carbondate, a progressive military blogger who is currently stationed on Guam. The name of his blog is the command post , and he has some very good commentary there, on the presidental races in the US and New Orleans, which everyone should check out. Last month he wrote a post about my blog titled " Chamorro Blogger: Remnants of Colonialism " which not only linked people to this blog, but also informed people in the United States in a very straightforward and clear way about Guam's status as a contemporary American colony. It is rare to see people from the United States on the internet speak so frankly about this w