Chamorro California Tour
Last month I did a quick “Chamorro” tour of southern California. While flying to a UN conference in Quito, Ecuador, I stopped off in California for a few days to visit family, friends and the lively network of Chamorro groups that have formed in recent years. I flew into San Francisco and over three days drove 1000 miles from the Bay Area, to Los Angeles, Long Beach and San Diego. For people who live in the states, this may not seem like a great distance, but for people on Guam, this is the equivalent of driving from the northern to the southern tips of the island 15 times. This tour was a personally enriching experience as I got to catch up with people I had worked with before and see projects that I supported at the beginning see completion and success. In Long Beach, I visited the Guam Communications Network and spent the afternoon with the staff there. GCN is the oldest Chamorro non-profit in the states. It was first started following a typhoon in the early 90’s, when communi