NO REST FOR THE AWAKE - MINAGAHET CHAMORRO

For the past few months my Saturday morning Chamoru coffee shop classes have been structured around two activities. Each class begins with the translation of a Chamoru song into English. Usually the students get to the pick the particular song, or at least the type of song. Second, we go through a longer narrative, sometimes a story, a speech or a poem in Chamoru and also spend time translating it and practicing reading it. As a result of this, I've been translating lots of Chamoru songs lately. When I first started learning Chamoru, gi minagahet, I was terrible at transcribing Chamoru songs. I hadn't grown up with the ear for hearing or catching Chamoru and so my transcriptions of songs were often wildly inaccurate. For the first few years I had people both politely and impolitely correct my attempts at transcription and then translation. My ear for Chamoru has gotten better, but I still struggle sometimes with particular artists who may have their own flair for pronunciat

Published on Wednesday, August 21, 2013 by The Guardian/UK 'Sending a Message': What the US and UK Are Attempting To Do State-loyal journalists seem to believe in a duty to politely submit to bullying tactics from political officials by Glenn Greenwald The remains of the hard disc and Macbook that held information leaked by Edward Snowden to the Guardian and was destroyed at the behest of the UK government. (Photograph: Roger Tooth) Guardian editor-in-chief Alan Rusbridger on Monday night disclosed the remarkable news that UK authorities, several weeks ago, threatened the Guardian UK with prior restraint if they did not destroy all of their materials provided by Edward Snowden, and then sent agents to the basement of the paper's offices to oversee the physical destruction of hard drives. The Guardian has more details on that episode today, and MSNBC's Chris Hayes interviewed the Guardi

It is interesting how I am often seen as a very confrontational person by some; how some people see me as an angry aggressive activist who at every moment fights the power and challenges things. I do think of myself as a critical person in some ways. I am very critical of certain structures of power, most importantly Guam's relationship to the United States. I am very critical sometimes of the way power and race operate at the University of Guam, but I am not the type who articulates this at every turn. I do not go around shaming Americans with every chance I get. Even if I have very serious critiques about the presence of the US military on Guam, I do not go around spitting on them. Part of this is simply because of who I am. I am not a confrontational person. I have never really seen the value of it. I have always sought to find more indirect ways of accomplishing things. Perhaps you could call this a cultural thing, as most people tend to articulate Chamorros as being like thi

I just came home from the "We Are Here" Protest, or as some might know it as, the "Guam: Where America's President Refuels" Protest. Esta i protest yan i ti nahong i maigo'-hu gi painge muna'yafai yu', and so I'll write about it and post photos of it tomorrow. To say the least it was inspiring and fun.

From We Are Guahan : In order to engage and educate the public on the "Compatibility Sustainability Study" or "CSS", We Are Guåhan is inviting you to join us: at a village meeting on November 16, 2011 at the Yigo Senior Center (next to the Yigo Softball Field) from 6:00pm – 8:00pm The purpose of the CSS is to protect the quality of life for all residents of Guam. The village meeting is an opportunity to learn more about issues discussed in the CSS such as land use, noise, health and affordable housing. For example, according to the CSS, the number of helicopter operations at Andersen Air Force Base will more than double by 2014 to over 100 flights a day. The CSS also states that there will be about 400 airplane operations a day at Andersen. The noise from airplanes and helicopters flying overhead will affect over 2,500 residents in Yigo and Dededo. The CSS gives our leaders an opportunity to proactively address issues such as night-time flights over ou