it was in the early 50's when my grandfather came to Guam by boat and then worked as a laborer at Andersen Air Force Base while staying at one of the many filipino labor camps in the northern part of the the island. i suspect this is how our family ended up settling in Yigo and eventually created a refuge of their own...amongst stragglers that were transients themselves and were both of human and canine species. my sisters and i are products of an immigrant filipino family on guam - yet i attribute the many colors of our coats to the artful ways our parents assimilated us with the common folk.

i can't help but analyze how i ended up married to a blue-eyed chamorro and i blame (a.k.a. thank) no others but my parents. my husband is not my first born's biological father but his upbringing has been synonymous having been raised in the very same household while i toiled away at college. i dare say i was ever the privileged, deprived, or spoiled...but somehow the balance of all those adjectives have been known to bounce in and out of my life, even now into adulthood. i imagine it's human nature to take apart one's identity and i find it almost humorous that i was raised amongst cultures that have been historically labeled as void of such cultural stability - the filipinos and chamorros are the epitome of those who've flourished from colonialism while striving for westernization. one could also argue this is the also very american. and so...i wear all these colors with pride. i am wholeheartedly american by my freedom, filpino by my blood, and guamanian by my heart.

0 comments