NO REST FOR THE AWAKE - MINAGAHET CHAMORRO

The fact that even now, after most of the world has acknowledged that colonization is an evil that must be eradicated, people still debate its merits and occasionally argue for its return, is a testament to the complexity that comes with colonization. Regardless of the ways in which people (sometimes myself included) try to propose colonialism as being a simple binary or something with clear moral boundaries, the process itself and the way it becomes deeply entrenched and embedded, means that long after the colonizer's flag is gone and no one is whipping or punishing anyone directly, people will still embody the logic of the colonizer's assertions of their superiority or the necessity of their dominance. In Guam we see this manifest in so many ways, despite Guam being one of the oldest remaining colonies in the world. People argue that Guam didn't suffer or isn't suffering. They argue that without colonialism Guam would be filled with pagan, naked savages. They argu

Several years ago this poem was used in the Inacha'igen Fino' CHamoru at the University of Guam as part of the poetry recitation category. This is a Middle School category where students have to memorize and then recite a poem written in the Chamorro language. I was honored that year when the other Chamorro teachers, who were and continue to be far more versed than I am in the Chamorro language, asked me if I would be so kind as to submit something. I had written this poem years earlier, while I was in grad school and working my way through a few books by Indian poets and authors such as Rabindranath Tagore. At that point I was fluent in Chamorro, but constantly feeling alone in the language as I was staying in San Diego and couldn't always make it out to the Guam Club in National City for the senior lunches or the nobenas. During that period I ended up translating hundreds of poems and songs, some of which you can find archived on this blog, in an effort to keep my min

Japan is at an interesting crossroads at present, with regards to nuclear power. Prior to 2011 Japan had 54 nuclear reactors providing approximately 1/3 of all the electricity to Japan. After the March 11th earthquake and the subsequent meltdown at the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant all of those reactors were shut down. The shutdown of these plants became a means for the power companies in Japan to obtain hardship subsidies from the government but also increase rates. There have been regular rumors of power outages and conservation, with the power companies all threatening that without nuclear power they cannot meet the needs of the country. The nuclear power issue has constantly popped up again and again as Japan, a nation which is strongly antinuclear in a sort of populist way, has a corporate that is eager to make money off of its nuclear power infrastructure. There have been pushes to restart these generators not just to begun feeding energy into the country again, but also as

This BBC article connects so many different things, I am tempted to write three pages linking everything together, but I also feel that the disparate parts also speak for themselves. How poetic is it that things like climate change, global warming and the rising tides in the Pacific become the means through which things long buried and denied like Japanese imperialism and American nuclear atrocities are brought to the surface? ************************** June 2014 Last updated at 01:59 Climate change helps seas disturb Japanese war dead By Matt McGrath Environment correspondent, BBC News     Rising sea levels have disturbed the skeletons of soldiers killed on the Marshall Islands during World War Two.  Speaking at UN climate talks in Bonn, the Island's foreign minister said that high tides had exposed one grave with 26 dead. The minister said the bones were most likely those of Japanese tr

Published on Thursday, August 29, 2013 by Times of India Why America Cannot Live without Wars by Chidanand Rajghatta WASHINGTON – On a day marking the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King's "I-Have-A-Dream" civil rights speech, the United States is poised to unleash another nightmare some 10,000km away in the Middle-East. Washington's war machine is geared up for limited strikes against Syria because Damascus ostensibly crossed a red line by using chemical weapons against its own population, never mind that many regimes worldwide inflict atrocities against their own people by other means. Why a President who came to office on the strength of his anti-war credentials - especially on the phony war foisted on Iraq - is running with the war hounds, is something of a mystery. But the rest of the Washington establishment is champing at the bit to unleash missiles on the Syrian regim

Yasukatsu Matsushima is a strong, but polite voice for Okinawa's Independence. I first met him last year while he was in Guam doing research. I took him and Ed Alvarez, who was showing him around the island, on a hike to Pagat. I later met him again when we both spoke at a conference on decolonization in Guam and Okinawa at Okinawa International University last May. He returned to Guam in July of last year with Masaki Tomochi another Okinawan professor, and I took them and two Japanese professors on a rainy hike to Pagat. I am fortunate that this trip our paths crossed again. Yasukatsu may seem unassuming and quiet when you first meet him, but make no mistake, he is very determined and very assertive in his advocacy for Okinawa's independence. In both Okinawa and Guam independence is something considered impossible, taboo or anti-Japanese/American. It is something that is crazy and worse yet something that would disrupt the existing dependent relation

The Grand March for the Peace of Gangjeong received 45 messages of solidarity from around the world (one of them from me). All of them were translated into Korean so that the marchers could see the support and encouragement they were receiving from far off places such as Germany, Palestine, Ireland, India and even East Timor. Some of the messages are pasted below: ********************************** Taro Abe , Nagoya, Japan 皆さんの活動に心から敬意を表します。 「済州島平和の巡礼：カンジョンの平和のための大行進」 の成功をお祈りしています。 阿部太郎（名古屋市・日å本） 여러분의 활동에 진심으로 경의를 나타냅니다. "제주도 평화 순례 : 강정의 평화를위한 대행진 '의 성공을 기원합니다. 아베 타로 (나고야 · 일본) I sincerely express my respect to your struggle. I pray for the success of the 'Jeju Island Peace Pilgrim: Grand March for the Peace of Gangjeong.' Abe  Taro  (Nagoya, Japan) ………………………………………………………………………….. Elliott Adams , Past President, Veterans For Peace, USA  I served in the Republic Of Korea as part of the US Army, I have been to Jeju. The destruction of Gangeong