Chamoru Diaspora
Alaina Aflague Arroyo
University of San Francisco Pacific Islander Collective
Håfa adai guahu si Alaina Aflague Arroyo. I am a Native Chamoru and Latina woman and I am here on behalf of the University of San Francisco’s Pacific Islander Collective, a grassroots organization focusing on the voices and representation of the Indigenous Peoples of Oceania. Dankolo na si yu’os ma’åse’ for your invitation to share my testimony and to speak upon the Indigenous Chamorus to the United Nations Fourth Committee on Decolonization. I am also here today representing the voices of my ancestors, family, friends, fellow Chamorus and future generations of Guåhan who continue to fight for independence and self-determination. I was born and raised in the Bay Area region of California where I have lived all my life. My first time returning home to Guåhan was when I was at the age of seventeen, and today I am nineteen years old.
My testimony today will be focusing on the impacts of how militarization has forcibly removed, and continues to remove Chamorus from their motherland of Guåhan into the United States starting at the end of the second world war, and how this shapes Chamoru identity and experiences away from the island. I would like to begin with my experience returning home for the first time. Growing up being Chamoru in the diaspora, I was always surrounded by storytelling. I was told memories of growing up on the island, stories of practicing traditional Chamoru ways, and life during and after the war. I had envisioned what my homeland was like, however, when arriving to Guam in the summer of 2015 it was not what I imagined it to be. There were large hotel buildings, tourists in every village, and fences all around the island. One day we went to visit Haputo, which is a pristine beach on Anderson Air Force base up north of the island, where there is an ancient Chamoru village still standing in the jungle. I did not understand why it was essential to have a military identification card to enter this sacred site where my ancestors once lived. I have never once seen my history in front of my eyes, I have never seen a standing latte stone, or felt the presence of the spirits of my ancestors. I could not grasp the fact that Chamorus who do not have a military ID cannot ever visit this secluded, lush, and preserved region that contains cultural and historical significance, however those who are settlers of the land due to military purposes can have access to the land that belongs to us and our ancestors.
As we were driving up to Litekyan one day, my family wanted to make sure that we could make it before the time restrictions since I wanted to see the caves, beaches, limestone forest, and villages that are still remaining. While driving once again, I witness nothing but fences. Why is our history gated off? Why are there barriers to witnessing what it means to be Chamoru? Why does the United States restrict Chamorus to connecting with their culture and land? Why do they not want us to witness and connect with our history and what our ancestors left behind? Why do our people need military identification cards to have the privilege of connecting with their identity?
It was not until after WWII that the Mariana Islands which were predominantly populated by Chamorus, started to become a region where non-Chamorus occupied. Access to alternative ways of living off island, and the internalization of the “American Dream” started the foundation for Chamorus leaving their island to improve their lives and settle in an environment different from their own. United States militarization, occupation, and ways of living has removed Chamorus from spiritually connecting to their history and being forced to relocate to other regions due to economic situations and lack of resources, thus created by our administrative power post the second world war. Due to Chamorus being forcibly removed from their ancestral lands for the purpose of hyper-militarization, tourism, development, and capitalism, the homelessness and dependency of United States benefits through the military, is what continues the cycle of displacement of Chamorus from their Native lands and into the diaspora. It is an involuntary move from Guam into the diaspora for the sole purpose of survival amongst the Chamoru population specifically because of economic opportunity, healthcare, and social mobility.
Brain drain, meaning the departure from one country, economic sector, or field, for another usually for better pay or living conditions, is the purpose for diaspora and military enlistment. Chamorus in Guåhan are heavily recruited due to these many factors.
Not only are Chamorus being forcibly removed from the islands, but now the question is will we ever be able to return? The rising of prices of plane tickets to Guåhan has become only one of the many essential barriers for Chamorus in the diaspora to return home. As much as Chamorus want to return home especially our manåmko’, it becomes something that is more difficult to happen due to the healthcare provided in Guam and the financial barriers that come with that. Not only does the health care in Guam make it difficult for Chamorus in the diaspora to return home, but it makes it difficult for Chamorus in Guam to maintain a healthy living in the island without making it necessary to travel to other nations, such as: the Philippines, Hawaii, and the United States. Not only is the health care in Guam doing a disservice to the Chamoru people, but it has caused our people to move further away from Indigenous methods of healing, reciprocity, and medicinal plants and into the dependency of western medicine. How are we supposed to move away from western medicine and back into de-colonial ways of healing when the militarization of our lands is destructing the very plants that allows us to move back to Indigenous practices?
Generations of Chamorus who are born and raised in the United States grow up with a disconnection to the land of the Mariana Islands. Without the direct connection with the land and all that embodies it, how are we supposed to thrive as a Chamoru nation when Chamorus are continuously becoming more of a minority in our motherland? Making up 37.3% of Guam’s population, and the native language of the Chamoru people embodying 17.8%, and there are more Chamorus living in the diaspora than there are in our homeland. This decrease in percentage of Chamoru speakers is the product of forced removal of the Chamoru language and the banning after the United States re-occupied Guam. This forced removal of the language within the education system has created a sense of shame, trauma, and pain within our manåmko’ generation, thus not enforcing the Chamoru language to be spoken inside and outside of the household. Not only are the Native peoples of Guåhan increasingly becoming a minority in our ancestral land, but our language as well.
Once settling in the United States, generations who are raised in the U.S. experience an education system that erases all Native histories and accurate narratives, especially with the Indigenous Peoples on this very land of Turtle Island. Chamorus then do not have access to historical content that represents their own identity and history, in the United States history textbook we embody one sentence that entails the “discovery” of Guåhan by our colonizer Ferdinand Magellan. This erasure of Guam history in the United States dismisses the imperative information that acknowledges the history of the relationship between Guam and the United States, which further colonizes the minds of Chamorus in the diaspora because of the lack of information surrounding U.S. colonialism amongst our people and the trauma that comes with those relationships. This lack of acknowledgement of Guam history in the diaspora thus shapes a specific notion surrounding cultural pride and representation of Chamorus, in a way that focuses on specifically the culture and not the history of our relationships with our several eras of colonialism; which then challenges if this is a conversation surrounding history when we are still living through the colonization of the United States beginning in the year of 1898. Due to this lack of knowledge surrounding histories of colonialism in Guam, younger generations of Chamorus in the diaspora are then dependent on the experiential knowledge and perspectives from our elders. Our elders’ perspectives on our continued history of colonialism, especially with our current administering power impacts, shapes, and internalizes our viewpoints on our colonizers, history, and cultural consciousness. If our elders are the ones who have adopted the “American Savior Complex” but are conscious of the violations with our land and the ban of the Chamoru language when the U.S. reoccupied Guam, this then creates a confusion of pride between being “American” or being Chamoru. These factors produce a sense of confusion with identity, consciousness, and pride.
Considering the escalating tensions between the United States and North Korea, which continue to put the people of Guam's lives at risk along with the lack of meaningful engagement from the United States in Guam's decolonization process, it is imperative for the United Nations to send a visiting mission to Guam to engage the United States in the genuine decolonization process of Guåhan.
We offer our support of the draft resolution on the Question of Guam and ask that this body approve it in full with the inclusion of language specifically condemning the serious damage that the United States is planning in the Northern part of Guam to build facilities and firing ranges for U.S. Marines. The U.S. intends to destroy over 1,000 acres of limestone forest, prevent access to a sacred site, and will contaminate the island's largest source of drinking water without our consent. This threatens our natural resources and violates international law and our human rights. We urge you to take a strong position against these destructive plans.
I encourage the United Nations to take into consideration the causes and effects of how United States militarization is continuing the destruction of the Chamoru people through identity, culture, language, education, history, and location. Si yu’os ma’åse’ yan biba tao’tao’ tano’. Once settling in the United States, generations who are raised in the U.S. experience an