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What's It Like to Live on Guam?
Author unknown (I added a little to the article)
Guam's Climate
The temperature here is pretty constant throughout the year; it's almost always
fairly hot (in the high eighties, Fahrenheit). It feels hotter than it actually
is because of the high humidity. It gets a little cooler (a few degrees) in the
"winter," that is, around January through March. It is never cold or even close
to it, although people who have lived here awhile complain they are freezing on
those rare days when the temperature drops down into the 70s. The only way to
get cold on Guam is to go into places with air conditioning. Some places go nuts
with AC.
Guam has two seasons, the wet season (July - December) and the dry season
(January - June). For people accustomed to Temperate Zone climates, the
differences between these seasons are subtle. Some years we have a wet dry
season or a dry wet season, making the distinction even less obvious. During the
dry season, the winds typically intensify. These are the trade winds. The
weather may be dry enough so that the grass turns brown and we get a lot of
brush fires. Intermittent streams may dry up. During the wet season, we get rain
several times a day.
Even during the rainy season, Guam is mostly sunny. It is rare to get those
kinds of days where the whole sky is gray and overcast and it rains all day.
Usually our rain clouds are small, intense packages that dump their contents
torrentially and then move on. The rain is pleasantly warm, although if you are
on your way to someplace air-conditioned when it hits, you may not appreciate
the shower.
Although Guam doesn't get as hot as many places in the United States interior
get during the summer, the sun here is more direct, and therefore more
dangerous. It is easy to get sunburned here, and skin cancer can be a serious
problem.
Typhoons
People sometimes call Guam "typhoon alley," because they hit us so often. A
typhoon is the same thing as a hurricane.
I have been told that an average of one typhoon hits Guam every eight years. I
don't know if that figure is just plain wrong, or if we are living in special
times, but since 1991 there have been at least a dozen. Most of these have been
little typhoons or ones where the eye missed Guam, but a few of them have been
very serious storms. The most recent of these was Super typhoon Pongsona, which
hit Guam right before Christmas, 2002.
Guam is exceptionally well prepared for typhoons. Homes are concrete bunkers
built to withstand the winds. It makes for ugly architecture, but after going
through a typhoon or two, you wouldn't have it any other way! Furthermore,
people are well educated about how to prepare for typhoons. The government
issues warnings of incoming typhoons, and many people enjoy "typhoon tracking"
by plotting the locations of the eye of the typhoon as the positions are
announced on the radio. Predicting the time and place of arrival of a typhoon is
tricky because they move erratically. Predicting how big the typhoon will be
when it hits is also tricky. With Typhoon Omar (1992), everyone was told to
expect a "banana flattener" or small storm, and it turned out to be a monster.
Other storms have turned away and missed Guam at the last moment. On several
occasions, schools were canceled, the typhoon missed the island, and everyone
had a beautiful, sunny holiday.
There is usually two or three
days warning before a typhoon may hit. Then, everyone makes sure that they are
well-stocked with canned food, drinking water, batteries for flashlights and
radios, and fuel for stoves. Then the storm shutters are put up or they cover
the windows with plywood, pick up fallen coconuts around the house, and put away
anything that might be blown away during the typhoon. The bathtubs are filled up
and some garbage cans with water for flushing the toilet. We clean every bit of
laundry we can find and wash all the dishes. Pregnant women go to the hospital
because the low pressure associated with typhoons can induce labor. Stupid
people head to the beach to go surfing on the big waves brought in by the
typhoon.
Nervous boat owners move their boats to the harbor of refuge and tie them up as
well as they can. Some boat owners stay on their boats for the storm. People
concerned about the safety of their housing go to the typhoon shelters that have
been set up in the public schools. Everyone else goes home and waits. Everyone
listens to the radio as the storm moves in. The winds gradually pick up until
they are screaming and moaning like a jet about to take off. The power goes off.
Sometimes it comes back on again, but usually it's off for the duration of the
storm. We get out the fluorescent lamps or the Coleman lantern (although the
latter is smelly and hot), and look for things to do that don't require
electricity or much light. Even if it's day outside, the storm shutters make the
house dark inside. We listen to people calling in to the radio station,
describing what the storm is like for them. We occasionally risk a peak out the
bathroom window (no shutters for that one), although if it's night, there is
nothing to see. We check the windows and doors to make sure that no water is
coming in. The typhoon is actually somewhat fun until the water starts to come
in. The typhoon drives water against the house with the force of a fire hose,
and water comes pouring through any existing crack, such as the space under the
door. Almost everyone has at least some water come in during a big typhoon. When
the water starts to pour in, we get out the buckets, the mop and the towels and
mop it up as fast as we can, while trying to figure out how to seal (or reseal)
the crack. After awhile, our arms ache from wringing out towels. All those nice
clean towels that we washed before the storm -- all are used up trying to keep
the water under control. People calling the radio station describe windows being
blown out, tin roofs peeling off, storm shutters being carried away, air
conditioners being blown into the house, all followed by torrents of water. If
we're lucky, the radio station succeeds in staying on the air, because that
voice in the dark is very comforting.
Afterwards, when it's safe to go outside, we go out and look at the damage in
the neighborhood.
Then comes the really dreary part of the typhoon: the recovery. People made
homeless by the storm have to rebuild. On Guam, most homes come through
relatively okay, but homes with tin roofs take a beating. People try to dry out
their rugs and blankets in-between the rains that move through. The power is off
islandwide, of course, but a lot of people have generators. The generators are
noisy and smelly and very annoying to those of us who don't have generators.
With power off, there is no refrigeration, no lights, no air conditioning, no
computers. Some people lose water, too, but after Omar, the government put
emergency generators on the water pumps, so most of us didn't lose water after
Paka. Unfortunately, some of the emergency generators had been stolen, so some
people were left without water.
Without air-conditioning or
refrigeration, the bacteria and mildew in the house flourish, and it stinks
inside. The ants invade. The exhaust from the neighbors' generators fills the
house with terrible, headache-inducing fumes, made worse by the smoke coming
from other people burning garbage. It becomes worth the time and effort to drive
for forty-five minutes to get a cold drink with ice in it.
When the power comes back on
at last, it is too glorious for words.
Location
You cannot imagine how far
away Guam is from North America until you fly there with a toddler.
Guam is south of Japan, east of the Philippines, north of Australia and just
far, far away from everything, located in the western Pacific about 13 degrees
north of the equator. It's the southernmost and largest island of the Marianas
Island Arc. The island chain forms part of the eastern margin of the Philippine
Sea.
If you travel here, you may
fly from, say, San Francisco to Honolulu. That part of the trip takes almost six
hours. Then you fly from Honolulu to Guam. That takes about eight hours. We
usually travel from Detroit to Narita Airport in Japan. That takes twelve to
thirteen hours. From Narita to Guam is three and a half hours.
From Guam to Manila, in the
Philippines, is about two hours. It's a little more than five hours to Bali. If
you just want to go to Chuuk in the Federated States of Micronesia just south of
here, that takes just a little over one hour. If you're not very ambitious and
you just go to Saipan in the Northern Marianas, that takes a mere forty minutes.
Geography
Guam is about 30 miles long
and of variable width, about 8 miles maximum. To drive from the southern end by
Cocos Island to Ritidian at the northern end takes about two hours. It can take
a lot longer if you adhere to the speed limits (45 mph is the maximum legal
speed on Guam), or if there's road construction (there always is), or if you get
behind a school bus (they seem to run 24 hours a day), or if you get behind
someone who has filled up the back of his pickup truck with sand and is dragging
his rear on the road, sparks flying, sand blowing off, and the tires flattened
by the weight. (Hauling sand is a popular road activity on Guam.)
The northern half of Guam is
a high limestone plateau dipping gently westward. If you are near the edges of
the plateau, you see towering cliffs, beautiful reef, and a few white or pink
sand beaches in the embayments. The drives down the cliffs to these northern
beaches take you through beautiful limestone forest terrain. The jungle is rich
with cycads, palms, ferns and pandanus.
Up on the plateau, away from the edges,
you wouldn't even know that you're on an island. The land is flat and dreary,
overgrown with tangan-tangan, an ugly little tree that was planted on Guam after
World War II to cover the denuded land and prevent erosion of the exposed soil.
The tangan-tangan took to Guam in a big way, and has taken over the island. It's
a scrawny little tree with small leaves like a sumac, producing masses of small
brown pods that make the tree look half dead. Northern Guam is also densely
populated and overdeveloped with the ugly little concrete bunkers that we live
in here because of typhoons. The flowering trees and shrubs that people have
planted in great abundance mitigate some of the dreariness: plumeria,
bougainvillea and hibiscus, and the wild plants such as chain-of-love,
philodendron and poinsettia.
Southern Guam, on the other hand, is
beautiful. It consists of rolling hills and mountains, higher in the south and
the west than in the north or the east. The southeastern side of Guam has tall
ridges and pinnacles of limestone, in places almost achieving haystack
topography. In the west are the tall, jagged cliffs of volcanic rock and red
clay. The volcanic rocks are covered with sword grass, forming a barren and
beautiful savanna, carved by streams and cascading with waterfalls. The
population is much less dense in the south and the villages are prettier.
Getting Around on Guam
Guam is just a little island,
a little flyspeck in the Pacific... or so it seems until you want to go from one
place on Guam to another. Then you realize just how big Guam really is!
If you are going to live on Guam, you have to have a car, unfortunately. The
roads of Guam are overcrowded and consequently in fairly poor condition, and
there are always construction projects disrupting traffic in the busiest areas.
But there aren't any other realistic options for getting around on Guam.
There is a limited public transportation system, but the buses run infrequently
and irregularly. You have to schedule your life around the public transportation
system, and then have a back-up ride in reserve.
It would be lovely to be able to get around Guam by bicycle, and there are
people who do it, but bicycling on Guam is truly dangerous. There are no bicycle
paths, and most of the roads have no shoulders. There is just no place to ride a
bicycle except out in the middle of heavy car traffic. There are two kinds of
cyclists on Guam: the children who cruise the small neighborhood streets but for
the most part stay off the main roads, and the adult sport cyclists, most of
whom are aggressive Statesiders who ride in the middle of the main roads and
obstruct traffic. The latter engender so much resentment among car drivers that
many cyclists complain that they have been deliberately attacked. Another hazard
to bicycling on Guam is the high incidence of drug-impaired (alcohol and ice,
mostly) drivers on Guam's roads. Drunks pick off a lot of cyclists. Yet another
hazard is dogs. Guam has a very large stray dog population, and they believe
that cyclists were placed on Earth just for their enjoyment. Guam would benefit
enormously from the construction of a system of bicycle paths. A lot of people
would bicycle if it was safe, and it would help reduce the car population on
Guam's roads. But, with the current economic crunch, the prospect of building
bike paths on Guam is virtually nonexistent.
Many of the same problems that beset cyclists on Guam also apply to pedestrians.
There are some areas with sidewalks, but not many. A distressingly large number
of schoolchildren walking to their bus stops have been struck down by cars, as
have several joggers. Pedestrians must travel with large sticks to beat off
dogs.
In spite of the fact that Guam suffers perhaps more than its share of drunks and
hot dogs, we also enjoy an exceptionally large number of generous and
accommodating drivers. Guam's drivers are always willing to let another driver
into or out of a tough spot, and it is commonplace to see three lanes of heavy
traffic stop to let someone make a left turn out of some business on Marine
Drive.
Surviving on Guam: the Economy
Guam's economy is based on
three main industries: tourism, the military, and employment in a Government of
Guam agency. That last includes the utilities, the schools and the university,
so you can begin to imagine how big the government is. Then picture that every
agency except the schools and the university are overstaffed, especially at the
administrative levels, and then you can really get some idea about how big the
government payroll is!
Unemployment is up to 15%
here on island, and some people are saying that that's a low estimate. We also
just found out that Standard and Poor's has lowered our bond rating to a BBB-.
There are three main problems. (1) Tourism is 'way down because of the Asian
economic crisis. Japanese and Korean tourists have been the backbone of the
tourism industry here, and now they can't afford to come. (2) Military spending
is down here as it is everywhere in the United States, and several of our bases
have closed. (3) The government is continuing to spend money as if it still has
plenty, except on education, which has borne the brunt of the budget cuts.
Recently, the Guam
Legislature imposed a hiring freeze on GovGuam, coupled with an
incentive-to-retire program. This caused a vast migration out of GovGuam of many
vital workers, coupled with the inability to replace them, and created open war
between the Legislature and the Governor, who wants to be able to hand out
patronage to his supporters. The hiring freeze was lifted for nurses, teachers,
and other essential personnel, and seems to be fraying in other agencies as
well.
If you are living on Guam and
you do have a job, the main problem you encounter is the staggeringly high cost
of living on island. The good news is that it isn't as bad as it was a few years
ago. So many people are leaving Guam now that rental and real estate prices are
dropping steadily.
The prices of gas, groceries,
and utilities continue to rise, however.
Housing:
Guam's homes are typically
small concrete bunkers reinforced with rebar to withstand typhoons and
earthquakes. These homes are not terribly attractive as a general rule (although
some of the wealthier homes on Guam are pretty), but they are functional. Both
real estate and rentals on Guam are expensive, but these prices are coming down
as the population of Guam declines. Land is sold by the square meter!
Some things to consider
before buying or renting on Guam are:
· type of roof: tin roofed
houses may not be eligible for typhoon insurance, although some are.
· water availability - some
areas have notoriously low water pressure. In Mangilao, residents in
second-floor apartments have to shower and do laundry in the middle of the
night. It's the only time they get water.
· dogs - a problem
everywhere, but some neighborhoods are better than others. Paulino Heights Road
in Ipan is overrun with dangerous dogs, including packs of pit bulls, who will
tear up your garbage, steal things, make noise, kill your cats, and threaten
people who bicycle or jog.
· noise - there are no noise
control laws on Guam, or at least none that are enforced. One neighbor with big
speakers can ruin an entire neighborhood, and the limestone bedrock transmits
the low frequencies very well - your whole house will vibrate.
· crime - as anywhere, some
neighborhoods are safer than others. You can get a clue by driving through an
area and seeing how many houses have bars on the windows.
· traffic - Guam's roads are
overpopulated, and certain parts of Guam are chronically congested: Tumon,
Agana, Tamuning. You may not want to have to drive through these areas to get to
work.
· typhoons - beach houses are
more susceptible to typhoon damage than inland houses.
· earthquakes - recently
builders have taken to tearing out a hillside, piling up the debris to make a
ledge, and then putting a house on this unconsolidated, clay-rich foundation.
This is not good practice in a seismically active area, so watch out for these
places.
· termites - there are very
few wooden houses on Guam, but even concrete houses have wooden doors, molding,
and so forth. Guam has a lot of termites, and they can get into your books and
furniture, so avoid houses that have termite infestations.
· typhoon shutters - if you
are renting, your landlord should supply these.
· bluegreen algae - a
blackish cyanobacteria that grows on stone and concrete. It leaves ugly stains
on walls, and its presence on a concrete roof will substantially increase your
air-conditioning costs. It is easy to remove by water-blasting.
Surviving on Guam: Health and Medical
Which do you want first, the
good news or the bad news? The good news? Well, the good news is that Guam has
no malaria, no rabies, and no mysterious and horrible tropical diseases such as
yellow fever, sleeping sickness and so on. Occasionally a case of dengue fever
turns up, but as I understand it, the afflicted people seem to have caught it
off-island. There is a certain incidence of leprosy among the immigrants from
the Federated States of Micronesia, which you may be in danger of catching if
you get intimate with someone who has an active, untreated case. The worst
public health problem here is tuberculosis, and that problem is world-wide.
There is also a high incidence of diabetes here, as well as a high rate of
teenage pregnancy. (The first American baby of the year 2000 was born here on
Guam to a fifteen-year-old girl.) But this is supposed to be the good news part.
The other good news is that there are a lot of world-class doctors working on
Guam.
The bad news? First of all,
there aren't nearly enough doctors to serve the population of Guam. If you need
to see a gynecologist or other specialist, you make your appointment three
months in advance. The clinics run mostly on a walk-in basis combined with
appointments. Either way, you may wait two hours to see your doctor, and at some
of the large factory clinics, you may never see the same doctor twice.
More bad news: there aren't enough technicians to run medical equipment such as
mammogram equipment. It's hard to get scheduled for one. And Guam has a shortage
of the equipment itself. Even when you do manage to get tested, the results
often take a long time to come back, if they ever do come back. Most analyses
have to be performed off-island.
More bad news: the civilian hospital, Guam Memorial Hospital, is not accredited.
If you are in the military, however, there is an accredited naval hospital.
Recently conditions at Guam Memorial Hospital have gotten much worse as more and
more of the experienced nurses have left for better jobs elsewhere. The hospital
is suffering such a severe nursing shortage that they've had to close infant ICU
and the surgery ward. Public Health has been forced to cut back on vaccinations,
dental care and outreach programs.
If you look at the obituaries, you will see that an awful lot of people die
young here.
Surviving on Guam:
Education
Guam has 26 public elementary
schools, 7 middle schools, and 4 high schools. We also have the Guam Community
College, and the University of Guam, both of which are public institutions. In
addition, Guam has a large number of religious private schools, including
Catholic, Episcopalian, Seventh Day Adventist, Baptist. A few years ago, the
military established a separate Department of Defense school system for military
dependents. This was done because the public school system on Guam is not in the
best shape.
There are some good teachers, even excellent teachers, here on Guam. Another
good thing is Guam's Gifted-and-Talented (GATE) Program, but children get too
little time in it for it to do much good. But even a little is better than
nothing.
If you have a child in the school system, that child can expect to be bullied,
sexually harassed, and beaten up. In most of the schools, nothing is done about
these problems, or if something is done, the procedure usually involves
punishing the victim along with the bully. This leads to even more bullying,
because the child who is basically well-behaved is afraid of getting into
trouble, and therefore fears to lift a finger to defend him or herself, whereas
the bully doesn't mind getting into trouble at all. If the victim seeks help, he
or she gets into trouble for tattling. It is the publicly stated viewpoint of
many teachers here that teasing and bullying are normal parts of childhood that
make the victim stronger and teach children how to get along with other people.
Some teachers even side with the bullies, claiming that their victims deserve
what they get. The rule of thumb here is that nothing significant will be done
to curb a bully until he puts a victim into the hospital. A few of the private
schools attempt to control bullying.
The teachers are underpaid in comparison with mainland US teachers, and on top
of that have to endure a higher cost of living here. The schools are chronically
short of textbooks, library books, toilet paper, school supplies and copying
equipment. Teachers end up having to supply their classrooms out of their own
paychecks. Some science classrooms have no running water or no electrical
outlets, making it difficult to impossible to conduct labs. Some of the high
schools and middle schools have bizarre class schedules with classes lasting
only thirty minutes. At the secondary school level, the standards for teacher
certification are very low. Teachers are not even required to have a bachelor's
degree in the subject they are teaching. Absenteeism among teachers is very
high. Sometimes teachers simply vanish. The GovGuam fiscal year ends at the end
of September, so many teachers retire at that time, a month into the school
year. There is no money in the budget to hire substitutes, so the kids are
either watched by a school aide or sent to the cafeteria for the period.
Vandalism of schools has continued to be a significant problem. Many teachers
have lost year's worth of accumulated teaching materials.
Not surprisingly, Guam's standardized testing scores rank along with Washington
DC down at the bottom of the national pile.
So, what do you do if you have a school-aged child? Well, we homeschool Kevin
and Laura and they really love it
The school system in place
here is probably the number-one injustice being perpetrated against the people
of Guam.
The
University of Guam (UOG)
UOG has between 3000 to 4000
students, and almost 200 faculty. Last year (2000) the WASC Accreditation Agency
placed UOG on probation. This means that UOG is still accredited, but has two
years to correct serious problems with autonomy, funding, academic freedom, and
the library.
For students:
· Students can get a good,
solid, relatively inexpensive education at the University of Guam. Most faculty
members care deeply about their students (something that was extensively
commented upon in the recent WASC Accreditation report), the class sizes are
small, and students get a lot of personal attention. Because of the small class
sizes, professors can afford to assign a lot of writing, research and hands-on
projects. Many UOG undergraduates get practical experiences that other students
wouldn't get until graduate school. The University has an open admissions
policy. Students with weak backgrounds in math and/or English can catch up to
the college level with developmental courses.
The University of Guam has a solid biology program with an excellent record of
getting its graduates into medical school, veterinary school, and graduate
school. (I would advise you to take freshman chemistry somewhere else and
transfer the credits, however.) Biology students have the advantage of studying
in a tropical environment with reefs that provide a natural laboratory. The
biology department also boasts a world-renowned herbarium. For graduate
students, the Marine Lab provides a world-class marine biology program, although
it has been gutted recently due to faculty attrition. The graduate Environmental
Sciences program is also excellent.
For students interested in the Pacific and/or Asian area, UOG offers courses in
Tagalog, Chamoru, Chuukese, Japanese and Chinese languages. There is a
Micronesian Studies program for graduate students, and both grads and undergrads
can select from a variety of courses in history, sociology, anthropology and
philosophy that specialize in issues pertaining to the region.
The nursing program is very good, fully accredited, and offers students unusual
opportunities for hands-on experiences because nursing students are used to take
up some of the burden created by Guam's severe nurse shortage.
The communications major, the anthropology major and the theater major are
another three excellent programs. UOG's theater department offers four superb
productions per academic year.
The problems students will face going to UOG are as follows:
The cost of living is high, and transportation options are limited. There are a
few small dorms.
The University is on probation. This means it is still accredited, but its
future is shaky.
The library is severely deficient, one of the reasons why UOG is on probation,
The faculty are leaving in droves, meaning that programs are unstable. For
example, the sociology major was suspended when all of its faculty left one
year. One faculty member was hired to replace the three who had left, and the
major has not yet been reinstated. This left several students scrambling for
other options.
The computers at UOG are dinosaurs. Internet access is barely available on
campus. Most faculty do not have Internet access on campus unless they are
paying for it through a private provider. As a result, most UOG faculty know
nothing about Internet. Although UOG has a computer science program, they have
to teach with grossly outdated equipment.
UOG has no major in geology, physics, or engineering, The chemistry major was
gutted when its premier professor retired two years ago. (The chemistry major is
still available, but is not nearly as good as it was.) European language
offerings are skimpy. There's no Latin, Russian or Greek, and although German is
on the books, it is seldom offered. You can't get more than one year (2
semesters) of French.
The People of Guam
The indigenous people of Guam
are the Chamoru people and their language is the Chamoru language. Approximately
40% of Guam's population is Chamoru, another third is Filipino, and the rest are
a mixture of Statesiders, Koreans, Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese, and
Micronesians such as Palauans, Marshallese and people from the Federated States
of Micronesia.
The Chamoru language is an Austronesian language closely related to Malay and
Tagalog. Because of Guam's long occupancy by first the Spanish and then the
Americans, Chamoru has a lot of Spanish and English loan words. In fact, Spanish
numbers have replaced the original Chamoru numbers. Many common words are of
Spanish origin, and this had led people to believe erroneously that Chamoru is
just some kind of Spanish dialect or pidgin. But the Chamoru language's
grammatical structure and the majority of its lexical items are Austronesian and
not European. One unusual feature of the language is that accented syllables are
spoken at a lower voice pitch than other syllables. This is the opposite of what
we do in English and most other languages, where the pitch of the voice rises
when we accent a syllable. This characteristic of Chamoru gives the language a
distinctive lyrical quality that speakers can use to great effect, especially
when being ironic.
You may be wondering if it is possible to get around on Guam without knowing any
of the Chamoru language. You can, because English as well as Chamoru are
official languages of Guam, and English is universally spoken. However, it is
courteous and respectful to learn at least some basic Chamoru if you plan on
spending any time here.
All people of Guam are called Guamanians, whatever their ethnic origin. Do not
make the mistake of calling us "Guamians." People here get really touchy about
that!
Guam Pastimes
I think it is safe to say
that the most popular Guam pastime is the fiesta. Fiestas are feasts, held
outdoors, to which everyone on Guam is invited. It is impossible to crash a
fiesta because the hosts will welcome you even if they don't know who you are.
However, if you do attend a fiesta, it is a courtesy to bring with you a
contribution such as drinks, a food item, or paper products. When you leave, you
will be invited to take a plate full of food with you.
Fiestas are held for any and all reasons: birthdays, political rallies,
funerals, graduations, novenas, christenings, new house, family reunions and so
on. Whole villages hold fiestas on their church's saint's feast day.
Fiestas are the best places to sample Chamoru cuisine. There is always rice,
both white rice and the more festive red rice. Red rice is cooked with achote, a
seedpod that gives the rice a subtle flavor and its distinctive color. There are
usually flour tortillas and corn tortillas, cut into little triangles, and if
you're really, really lucky, someone will have made fadang tortillas. These are
made of flour from ground-up cycad seeds. The seeds are poisonous, and the flour
must be leached and rinsed several times to get the poison out. Most people
these days don't have the patience to make this, but it is delicious!
There should also be breadfruit, boiled in coconut milk. Breadfruits are big,
green lumpy things that grow on large and magnificent trees with huge, complex
leaves. I am told that here in the Pacific islands, the breadfruit leaf is a
symbol of life. The breadfruit tree produces both a male and a female fruit. It
is the starchy, fibrous white inside of the female fruit that is cooked for the
fiesta. It resembles potato slightly, and has a mild flavor and a lovely
texture.
Usually one has several types of barbecued meat, especially chicken, and some
fish in one form or another. At a really big, fancy fiesta, there might be a
whole roast pig. There will also be kelaguen, usually chicken kelaguen. This is
made of raw or cooked chicken marinated in soy sauce, lemon juice and boonie
peppers. If you are really, really, really lucky, someone will have made octopus
kelaguen. Heavenly stuff!
There will be salads of the usual varieties (macaroni, potato and so on), and
dinner rolls. And desserts, usually of a large variety, and maybe some soup.
Aside from food, fiestas
usually have music if the purpose is happy, or a service if the fiesta is
associated with a wake, or speeches if the fiesta is part of a political rally.
There will be lots of little kids running around, and dogs chewing on chicken
bones or anything else they can get. People take turns swishing flies away from
the food with paper plates. People stand around eating, chatting and laughing.
Children greet their elders with a kiss of respect, and mothers pass their
babies around. Sometimes the host will bring out a karaoke machine.
Another favorite Guam pastime
is politics. Elections here are hot, intense, close-up and personal. Guam gets
the best voter turn-out in the United States. In a population the size of
Guam's, about 160,000 people, you are bound to know at least some of the
candidates personally. If you don't know the candidate, you probably know the
spouse, a child, a sibling, a parent, or a neighbor. And if you don't know the
candidate, it is very easy to meet him or her -- just go to any fiesta or
funeral during election time and you'll get to meet lots of politicians!
The politicians plaster the island with signs and bumper stickers. People mount
huge billboards in the back of their pickup trucks, and loudspeakers blare out
cheesy campaign songs. The politicians hold "waves" in which they and their
supporters occupy a busy street corner and wave as people drive by during rush
hour. People honk their horns and wave back. Then there are motorcades, long
lines of cars covered with posters that form parades that can be miles long.
They drive by slowly, while the people in the cars honk and wave. These
motorcades encourage and enliven the candidate's supporters and infuriate the
candidate's opponents. When your own candidate has a motorcade, it is a measure
of the level of support for him or her. When the other candidate has a
motorcade, it's a nuisance that interferes with the flow of traffic. During an
election, there are endless rallies, fundraisers and fiestas. The tensions
build, the radio talk shows are full of hot talk, and the newspaper is plastered
with full-page ads featuring lots of mud-slinging and posturing. Finally it is
election day. All around the polling places, the candidates set up tents full of
food, signs and supporters. All day long, candidates drift through the tents,
kissing people and shaking hands, trying not to get fed yet more food, and
hoping to snag a few last-minute votes. Sometimes a few fights break out. You
can't buy alcohol on election days, but people know this, so they stock up the
day before. After the polls close, people stay up to watch the returns on TV. It
takes the next year to recover, and then it starts all over again because
elections happen every two years.
Another major Guam pastime is
going to K-Mart. They say that our K-Mart is the biggest one in the world. I
don't think they're referring to floor space, but to volumes of sales. K-Mart is
adored here because they really brought prices down on the island when they
opened a few years ago. They have so much stuff that you can't get anywhere else
on Guam. K-Mart's parking lot is full from morning to late evenings. K-Mart is
now open 24-7.
Other Guam pastimes include
hanging out at the beach, driving around in oddly modified pickup trucks,
cockfighting, hauling sand in one's pickup truck, burning trash, and painting
non-moving objects with the reigning governor's campaign colors.
Crime
Most violent crime here is
either drug-related or is related to family violence. The violent crime rate
seems to be about on par with other United States urban areas.
Drug abuse, especially use of methamphetamine ("ice"), is a big problem, and
results in a high level of theft, burglary, robbery etc. It is one of the most
debilitating problems on Guam.
Break-ins are extremely common, especially of cars. If you frequent beaches or
hiking trails, you can expect to have your car broken into from time to time. It
doesn't help to leave the car unlocked, because the thieves don't stop to check
if the door is open; they just smash the window immediately. The best defense is
to drive an ugly, old "Guam bomb," since fancy cars get hit more often than ugly
old ones. You can also judge the relative safety of a parking area by the amount
of broken car window glass on the ground. If you see a big pile of it, it's best
to park elsewhere or leave someone behind to guard your vehicle.
Car theft is also a big problem. Certain vehicles, such as Toyota trucks, are
particularly popular among car thieves. The thieves take the stolen vehicles
apart at "chop shops" and sell the parts.
By far the biggest problem with crime here, however, is that the judicial system
is essentially non-functional. There aren't enough police officers or employees
in the Guam Prosecutor's office. If you report a crime, police will come and
write it up, but that's as far as it will go. (No one has been prosecuted for
shoplifting for many years.) Most cases are dismissed by the Prosecutor's Office
because their allotted time runs out before they can get to the cases.
Nevertheless, Guam is not a particularly dangerous place. Normal precautions
generally suffice to keep people and property safe.
Pets
Boonie cats and boonie dogs
abound on Guam, and are available for adoption from Guam Animals in Need
(G.A.I.N.). It is also possible to get kittens and puppies free from friends, or
find them wandering around abandoned on the street or beach. Veterinary care is
easier to come by than human health care, and the wait is shorter for your pet
than for you at your clinic.
If you want a purebred animal, they can be purchased from a shop or breeder, but
they are extremely expensive.
The rules for bringing pets to Guam have recently changed, as of February 2001.
Guam is rabies free, and to keep it that way, a four-month quarantine had been
imposed on all dogs and cats brought onto the island. This quarantine is
extremely expensive and uses up a significant portion of an animal's life. The
recent relaxation of the law allows some dogs and cats to be in quarantine for
30 days instead of 120 days if: (a) the animal has received 2 rabies shots 6
months apart and within 90 to 365 days of departure, (b) a microchip is imbedded
in the animal by a certified laboratory, (c) a rabies blood test has been
conducted by an approved lab 90 to 365 days before arrival, (d) the animal has a
health certificate verifying the vaccinations, blood test and microchip, (e) the
owner has obtained an entry permit from the Department of Health and Social
Services, (f) the animal has passed another rabies blood test upon arrival, (g)
the pet is older than nine months old, and (h) the animal remains in home
quarantine another 90 days after arrival. If these conditions are not satisfied,
the animal will have to remain in the quarantine kennel for the full 120 days.
The entry permit costs $60 per pet. There is only one official quarantine
kennel, and they charge $815 to $1025 for the 30-day quarantine, or $1285 to
$2125 for the 120-day quarantine. Military personnel get a 20% discount.
Flying with pets is also complicated. Airlines will only accommodate a certain
number of animals per flight. Animals flying overseas must spend a certain
amount of time in a kennel mid-trip to recover, and can only fly if the air
temperature at departure time is within a certain range. All this may result in
your animal's arrival being delayed for several days.
Taking an animal from Guam is less complicated than taking one to Guam. Since
Guam is rabies-free, no quarantine restrictions apply when taking an animal out
of Guam.
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