Environmental History & Ethnography of Guåhan

during my final stint on the continent, i travelled allll over the country: chandler, winslow, phoenix, & tucson, arizona; missoula, glacier national park, and other locales in montana; chicago, illinois; washington d.c.; and new york city! and of course, many trips up to LA, down to SD, and lots of quality time in my hometown before i said “see you later” to so many special loved ones. my original timeline was around march-april to leave for guam, but thankfully i advocated for an extension on turtle island; in fact, i narrowly missed typhoon sinlaku which took place in april 2026. it’s now early july, and somehow another supertyphoon is slowly but surely hurdling towards us. still sitting with this ironic twist of fate as i see people succumb to the horrors of july 4th— liberalized attempts of partying without feeling guilt, a spectacle-oriented version of thankstaking. i wonder if this internal, righteous, seemingly singular anger will ever dissipate but i don’t think so. i just finished reading lucy (1990) by jamaica kincaid and i feel her pain, even though we have massive differences personality and outlook wise. i am on the opposite end of the spectrum in terms of migration so i have much to be grateful for and still contend with as i adjust. for now, i will lay in my cousin’s super squeaky bed as the rain and wind mash about outside the shutters, beckoning us to take a peak when a new day arises. i hope the storm passes sooner rather than later and that our islands, our livelihoods, are spared. especially the cnmi, biba mariana islands 🇬🇺🇲🇵❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹

the thing that hit me immediately was the act of fasting— i did not know we were allowed two slall meals and a main meal, i thought it was one of the other, so i really fasted today. my ex was on a single meal diet when we reunited, i thought he was on the verge of develoing an ED. i do not want to do that to myself for the sake of lent, my mom is already worried enough about me. anyways, yesterday was a long but good day. my friend came to discuss indigenous librarianship—one of my dreams was to become a librarian, i am curious about it but naturally more debt ensues. we both fell into our careers by default, but i am grateful for where things are at and headed. my boss gave me flowers for the way i handle things gracefully and checked in about my job going up for permanency— i really appreciated that. i hope to continue but i also support whoever is the right candidate for the role. i attended meetings all day, preparing for people to leave positions by the end of the fiscal year. i hung out w my coworkers for a bit and my friend; it rained a bit yesterday. it rained even harder in the evening, especially by the time i got to my catholic class. we had a meditative prayer led by the deacon; it was hard for me to buy it, usually i am compliant/interested in this style of prayer. i think i still resent him bc he has that sense of hawaiian supremacy compared to other pacific islanders (when i told him i was from guam, he said they are different islands (ya, i know) and wasn’t very welcoming). i have to learn to let that go. we proceeded to talk about lent, our main leader didn’t let anyone discuss their ash wednesday experience. now that i am an actual teacher/professor/facilitator, it can be hard to see poor organization and facilitation skills in action. i have to work on that parable regarding hypocrisy and judgement, that asks us to not worry about other people’s issues when we ourselves each have a beam or splinter in our eye. i finished blue velvet when i got home—what a strange world we live in. why do terrible people exist? why is the world so strange ? bc god imbued us with freedom and that freedom leads us to very diverse paths, good, bad, & inbetween. c’est la vie. holding onto hope and hunger this szn

come and speak to me.”

Like anyone else in this world, I have been suffering. Actively and passively. Out of my own volition and at the behest of sources beyond my comprehension. It is hard to focus on an academic project, both its cultivation and completion, when there are so many distracting and destructive events occupying my brain space. I am no exception, merely an example. I fought tooth and nail to work two on campus jobs, one being my guaranteed position of a teaching assistant (thank you fee remissions and the opportunity to formally try out teaching) and the other being a mentorship coordinator for a retention project dedicated to my ethnic community. That same community protested for its creation and petitioned for my hiring, a position I had experience in prior but lacked sufficient preparation due to delayed hiring and yearlong drama which would pop off like a powder keg months later. Fall 2022 my teaching journey was interrupted by UC wide strikes, a welcomed but mysterious interlude which did impact my already COVID-lax approach to teaching. Winter quarter felt like a restive intermediate phase, a calm before the storm if you will. Afterwards, the joy of spring was met with drama and avoidance of the major task at hand. I sought fulfillment in the wrong areas, specifically in the sector of romance and relationships, rather than focusing on the most important and pressing matter of my master's program: thesis. I care, I really do. In the same way I still care about it today, I truly do believe in the promise and potential of my project, that of telling diasporic Chamoru stories engulfed in a complicated history of privileged yet ultimately colonial-ridden citizenship, that it scares me. In the battle between fight or flight, I am simply in a prolonged state of freeze. I hope it clears up soon, and the only one in control is me. Not my friends or my family, not even my intimidating uncle of an advisor. "Tick tock, time is up, you owe me." Truer words were never spoken and it's time to take accountability, translate my thoughts and feelings into action (aka put pen to paper/write it out/draft my chapters regardless of how terrible the initial errors might be--that's what editing is for!), and act right. I feel so many things as of late, and the numbing spell cast over me all last year is hopefully wearing off this fall. I will still continue to live my life, to work as a TA while I finish this thesis, but this season will be devoted to making sense of my community's tricky history through oral histories and archival research I have collected during the past couple years and creating something I can be proud of. I am a writer and I have hopes and dreams--I need to stop deluding myself into thoughtful submission and translate internal conflict and conviction into words on the page. Here's to progress, step by step, it's a battle but I am invigorated by Indigenous people around the globe, especially the Palestinian people as their resilience and love for the land and one another continues on for lifetimes to come. Despite the mass information spouted by the media and western nation-states, a free Palestine is worth fighting for in honor of its people for all eternity. <3

need to figure out plans for week and month ahead, get back into grind of research but that was a very nice, lovely, and welcome excursion both in and outside of my project.

pt. ii

we’ll see if this all comes to fruition, today is liv’s last day here so also gonna do fun stuff today (tuesday) after spending a couple hours at the marc. was supposed to return before 4 pm yesterday, but wanted to stay at hurao longer. i’ll bring her a weaving as proof :)

Also spoke on the phone with my grandma, can’t wait to see her and be more intentional (and of course safe) in terms of my time with her. Also hope to see my friend Olivia before she leaves.

back on guam, july 9th, 2022!!

so much can change in such little time. Just a couple days ago I was studying abroad in Bologna, Italy, with plans to stay there until June. I had such a marvelous time: making new friends, eating the best food, taking courses at the local university in Italian, immersing myself in the place and its culture. It was all cut way too abruptly, and I am devastated. The pain and loss from not being able to see this through is momentous, reaching almost as high as the peaks of the Alps featured here. This hurts more than any romantic breakup I’ve had, more than all the sadness and confusion I accumulated from not knowing my Italian ancestry that brought me to Italy in the first place. Maybe it hurts because this was something I sought for myself, something I put the time and effort in to obtain, something that was invaluable and no one could take away from me. It’s an experience that ended way too abruptly, but despite how sad I feel I couldn’t imagine it any other way. I wouldn’t want it any other way. I really came into my own, I gained a sense of comfort and confidence I never found myself capable of before, I was studying, speaking, thinking in Italian. It feels like a fever dream now, who knows if it actually happened, but I know everything happens for a reason and I have to be thankful that I am back home safe and sound with my family. As for the corona virus uproar, I need some radio silence before deciding where to get my news from and am in the process of deciding where to get my intel from. Best of luck to everyone, enjoy life and all its little moments 💓

As for everything else that I typed out but didn’t copy and paste over (sigh), just praying for my Kānaka Maoli and Taíno cousins fighting the good fight. Chamorros are on a completely separate page, dependent, reliant, and very much buying into the “liberation” narrative of the amazing, godly American savior. Tomorrow is Liberation Day in fact, the 75th anniversary. I will be attending the parade to observe, not really out of respect (sorry, more on that later).