NO REST FOR THE AWAKE - MINAGAHET CHAMORRO

When teaching about militarism I like to use two poems in order to demonstrate the ways that war, military service and sacrifice become naturalized in societies and also the way they come to be challenged. The first is from Roman poet Horace and one of his Odes, in which he coined the line "Dulce Et Decorum Est, Pro Patria Mori" or "It is sweet and fitting to die for one's country." In it, the poet calls upon Romans to develop greater fighter skills in order to frighten off the always growing list of enemies of the empire. The second is written in response to Horace and also to the patriotism and militaristic sentiment that it is meant to evoke. Written by British poet Wilfred Owen, who fought in World War I and died during the war, it illustrates a brutish and ugly face to war, ignoring the glorious odes which people may devise to get young people excited and invested in military service. The famous line from Horace, Owens refers to as "th

I finally got to watch both parts of the epic Chinese war movie Chi Bi the other night. For those of you who haven't heard of it, it is directed by John Woo, and was released a month before the start of the 2008 Olympics and was meant to be a show of China's movie-making force to the rest of the world. It is the most expensive Chinese film to date and now its highest grossing film as well. The title of the film Chi Bi translates to "red wall" or "red cliffs" in English, and is based on the battle of Chi Bi which took place almost two thousand years ago, and is infamously chronicled in the story Romance of the Three Kingdoms and the video game series Dynasty Warriors . To give a little bit of background on the event. This battle takes place prior to the Three Kingdoms era in Chinese history, and is actually a key reason why China had a three kingdoms era at all. During this period the Han dynasty is coming to a close, and different figures are vying for c

I've always thought it very interesting, that of all the things I write about on this blog, the posts which elicit the most comments or negative feedback are one's dealing with the Chamorro language. Its so strange, because I say some pretty negative things about the United States, militarization and have some pretty radical political and social positions compared to most Chamorros, but I don't get much feedback in that direction. Most of it is all related to me mis-using the language, abusing it, not speaking it or spelling it authentically, sabotaging it or perpetuating poor grammar or English-affect Chamorro. Its possible, that I could simply be the worst speaker of Chamorro in the world, and all of these people are angels who are doing the Lord's work in protecting the Chamorro people from my evil damaging influence. Sina, lao hu dududa este. One of the reasons that I think this may be the case, is that unlike issues of history, culture, politics and current even