Meditations from Micronesia

Thursday, June 27, 2013

Guam’s Elected Attorney General – Fighting with the Governor Isn’t a Flaw; It’s a Feature

Originally Published in the Marianas Variety on June 18, 2013

Those who suggest that Guam should return to the “good old days” when Guam’s Attorney General was appointed by the Governor forget a critical part of their own history. From the Congressional Record of the 1998 amendments to Guam’s Organic Act: “Public concerns revolve around political interference with investigations, inefficiency of case work and dismissal of the Attorney General without cause. In response to the growing number of complaints, a survey was conducted to determine an acceptable resolution. It was clear that respondents (sixty-nine percent) favored an elected position.”

In 1996 former (appointed) Attorney General and then-Senator (now retired superior court judge) Elizabeth Barrett-Anderson submitted testimony to the House Subcommittee on Native American & Insular Affairs in which she said, “the people of Guam expect the Attorney General to protect their interest above all else. An appointed Attorney General unfortunately must respond to a great extent to the concerns of the Governor.” Senator Ben Pangelinan testified a year later that “it has become inherently clear that the appointed Attorney General is not capable of isolating himself or herself from political interference.” He argued the Attorney General should be “accountable solely to the public,” in a position to “isolate himself or herself from political interference.” Finally, he observed, “It is fundamental to the underpinning of our democratic process of openness and fair play that the Attorney General not be used as an apparatus of the head of the executive branch, for the power of the law is too great and pervasive to be used as a political tool of a single person.”

Guam’s three elected Attorneys General – Doug Moylan; Alicia Limtiaco; and Lenny Rapadas – have each had their critics, sometimes with good reason. It comes with the turf.

Charged with what he believed to be a mandate from the public to prosecute public corruption and to compel public officials to follow the law, as Guam’s first elected Attorney General Doug Moylan tested the limits of the office, and was criticized for what some perceive as tilting at nearly every windmill that came into view – from criminally and civilly prosecuting former Governor Carl Gutierrez and his political appointees, cases he lost, to suing then-Governor Felix Camacho to compel him to appoint members to the Procurement Appeals Board, a case he won; from trying to assert control over litigation by stipulating to a consent decree in federal court involving the Earned Income Tax Credit while the Governor was off-island to appearing as counsel and confessing error on behalf of the Guam Election Commission; from suing the Guam Police Department and Department of Corrections to compel them to pay overtime to being sued himself for refusing to sign off on an attorney-client contract between the Guam International Airport Authority and a private law firm for no apparent other reason than that as the Government of Guam’s “Chief Legal Officer” he didn’t have to. (Disclaimer: I was involved in many of these cases.) Finally, in a case that went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court and was decided after he left office, Moylan successfully challenged the Governor’s interpretation of the term “tax valuation,” in that part of Guam’s Organic Act’s which proscribes public indebtedness exceeding 10% per year of “aggregate tax valuation of the property in Guam.” Every one of the cases Moylan won or lost helped clarify the role of the elected Attorney General on Guam. And win or lose, no one can ever say that Guam’s first elected Attorney General didn’t try to hold the government and public officials accountable to the voters who elected him.

Alicia Limtiaco’s short time in office may be remembered more for her interest in addressing international human trafficking as a stepping-stone to the U.S. Attorney’s Office than prosecuting local crimes and providing legal support to the host of departments, boards, agencies and officials that desperately needed it, but her real legacy as Guam’s second elected Attorney General is that she closed John F. Kennedy High School for failing to correct a decade’s worth of health, fire and safety violations. An appointed attorney general would never have had the temerity to challenge the government’s finances by closing schools as she did. She also sued the Governor’s appointed directors of the Department of Revenue & Taxation over the licensing of illegal gaming devices, with the Governor’s Office attempting to interject its own opinion of the law with legal analysis that had been authored by lawyers for the owners of the machines. Had Limtiaco asked the Governor’s permission before shutting down JKF High School or suing the Governor’s appointed directors to follow the law, she would not have received it.

Just like his elected and appointed predecessors, Lenny Rapadas who currently serves as Guam’s third elected Attorney General has had his share of criticism. Rather than accede to the Governor’s demand to negotiate settlement of a judgment in a tax collection case for what some see as pennies on the dollar, Rapadas withdrew, because one federal court has held that the Organic Act requires him to, a ruling that does not extend beyond income tax matters. Rapadas has declined to step aside voluntarily where the Organic Act does not require him to do so, most recently in federal litigation involving the closing of the Ordot solid waste landfill. And Rapadas has had to sue the directors of Revenue and Taxation over licensing of gambling machines again because the new Governor, based on faulty legal reasoning supplied by private lawyers, is saying that he thinks these particular devices are in fact legal. In each of these cases, it has been suggested, conflicts between the Governor and the Attorney General have arisen when the Governor’s decisions and legal analysis have been influenced if not authored by lawyers representing private interests and political supporters, not by career government lawyers in the office of an independently elected Attorney General answerable only to the voters.

We need only look to our neighbor to the north to see what happens when an appointed attorney general signs off blindly on whatever the governor puts before him. Both are facing criminal charges that would likely never have had reason to see the light of day if the CNMI’s attorney general were elected rather than appointed. Are these the kind of “good old days” we’re missing back home in Guam?

Tension between elected Attorneys General and Governors isn’t a sign of something that needs to be changed back to the way things were. It is proof that the system is working precisely as it was intended when we asked Congress to change it.

Robert M. Weinberg has practiced law on behalf of elected and appointed attorneys general in the State of Alabama; the Federated States of Micronesia (Pohnpei); Guam; and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (Saipan). He currently serves the government of Guam as an Assistant Attorney General assigned to the Civil Litigation/Solicitors Division of the Guam Attorney General’s Office. The views expressed here are entirely his own.

Thursday, November 25, 2010

From the University ~ Ask the Professor

I'm teaching at the local university as an adjunct in the political science department. My "regular" job is as a government lawyer for the Territory of Guam, most recently assigned to the Guam Memorial Hospital Authority as in-house counsel. A student in my freshman "Citizenship" class (a course about what it means, not how to become one) asked me if I'd be willing to be e-interviewed for a "professor interaction survey." Here it is.

1. Why might a student be interested in the Political Science major/field?

RMW: This is really a question that the student should ask him/herself. I’m not a career counselor, but if you’re in it “for the money,” you’re looking in the wrong direction, even as a pre-law major. It’s what the student’s passion is that is important. If you have an interest in understanding and some day helping shape and define “the common good,” then political science may be for you. If Shakespeare, philosophy, history and current events, politics, conflict resolution, logic and psychology excite you, but you can’t choose between them, political science may be for you. An understanding of political science is the means to many ends, but to succeed in it or any endeavor, you have to be dedicated to and passionate about the means itself. Viewing it as merely a means to a particular end will lead to disappointment because specific goals and interests will change over time. It has to be something that makes you want to get up in the morning.

2. How did you (the professor) become involved in Political Science?

RMW: My answer to the preceding question pretty well describes myself as a student. I did not know I was going to go to law school – which is only one avenue you can pursue with a political science degree – until my senior year in college. I went to law school because I wanted to learn to think like a lawyer, something I was exposed to during an internship in my senior year that I had one summer in Washington, D.C. I actually didn’t pick a major (Criminal Justice), until the beginning of my junior year or end of sophomore year. So, in my case, since I had to pick something, I made a choice in part because I liked the head of the Criminal Justice department (an ex-con from a Florida penitentiary who reformed himself through education) better than the head of the English Department (who had “issues” about the way Shakespeare should be approached), but with a degree in Criminal Justice, there’s not a lot you can do other than by a cop, corrections, or social work. Very few people who go to college really know what they’re going to major in, in advance; those that think they do, often change their mind along the way. I learned recently from her husband that U.S. District Judge Francis Tydingco-Gatewood was originally a pre-med major, who met her husband (now a dentist) in a physics class in college before changing her major to pre-law. As a lawyer, and a government lawyer in particular, I am of course involved in the real day-to-day world of political science. But even as a teacher, I’m involved in political science through giving back and hopefully shepherding future leaders in the process of becoming themselves, whoever that may be.

3. What might a student be able to do after graduation with a degree in Political Science?

RMW: Again, I’m not much of a career counselor. Teaching and the law are obvious possibilities. But teaching pays poorly unless you’re academically gifted, and law schools aren’t always impressed with someone who only has a degree in political science, as they’re inundated with thousands of applicants with those credentials already. Again, I personally believe that if you’re inclined toward the humanities, you have to look beyond the immediate ends of what you can do with a particular degree and focus on what a degree in political science can add to your overall intellectual make-up and skill set, and where it can take you next. The four year degree itself is one step along the way. Possibilities of where to go next are generally limited only by your tastes, imagination and immediate past experience, which is true in any endeavor.

4. What are some interesting facts about Political Science that the average person would not know?

RMW: One “fact” that the average person probably doesn’t think of is that we’re all amateur political scientists, whenever we’re talking about current events, how they affect us personally, and how they affect us as part of various collections or groups of people we belong to, sometimes thrown together by happenstance such as race, religion we’re born to, family connections, country of origin, even sexual orientation, but more importantly by choice such as political party preferences or where we stand on particular issues. Whether around the dinner table talking to family or around the water cooler shooting the breeze with colleagues, we’re all political scientists. You don’t need a degree or a title or a license to give your opinion on such things, or to participate in the “science” of politics in the various ways we’ve discussed in class (voting, jury service, etc.). But it does help to have been to college and have read a few books if you want to be taken seriously.

5. What are some things that a student can do now that will help a student in a job search in this field?

RMW: This I can answer, because I can tell you what I’m looking for in potential employees in the various organizations I belong to. The most important thing, beyond consistently good grades, is to show that you’ve got the aptitude to apply what you’re learning in other environments. One of the things I did when I got back from my internship in the Justice Department my last year of school was I went and volunteered at the local district attorney’s office. They were a bit flummoxed about what to do with me (as I am in my office when asked), but it did demonstrate initiative and willingness that I was willing to do it for free without even the expectation of academic credit, and I did learn about the internal workings of the local D.A.’s office, and it added another paragraph of real world experience to my resume’, even though I wasn’t paid for it. You’ll need proof of practice of the skills you’ll be using in a working environment. If you’ll be writing reports, you need good writing skills, and will need writing samples that show you know how to think and communicate ideas in a logical fashion; if working with numbers, you need to understand statistics and economics and spreadsheet analysis. If you’re working with people, you need good communication and presentation skills. When looked at in this light, college provides a real smorgasbord of potential skill sets you can add to your resume’. But you’ve got to get out there and be willing to work your way up through the ranks. Don’t expect them to come to you and just “know” how brilliant you are and what an asset you’d be to their organization. Prepare yourself to offer them the proof before going in. Make them “want” to know you. That means now is the time to start adding to those skill sets that have value in the real world.

6. Any other interesting information (i.e. internships, research opportunities, T.A. opportunities, volunteer work, part time jobs, graduate school information, any tips) that will make a student successful?

RMW: I am a big proponent of academic internships and volunteer experiences, for reasons I just shared. If you can’t find paid work, look for ways to volunteer in government offices, political parties, non-profit organizations, teaching and tutoring if you have the skills, ask professors if there are any research projects you can assist them with, to hone your research and writing skills. This not only adds to your resume’, it gives context to what you’re hopefully learning in class.

7. Any other helpful advice you might have for a student in general, or a student in this major?

RMW: The most important part about success as a student in this or any major, from my recent observations teaching (and from life in general), is that the student has to make the commitment to do whatever it takes to take away as much from college as possible. It’s trite but true: you get out of college (and life) what you put into it.

Most of these lessons I learned after the exams were over. The nice thing about life, though, is that it's never too late to learn them.

See you in class.

Sunday, September 13, 2009

Sunday, March 15, 2009

A Question from California

A young lawyer wrote me recently from California. I thought I might share it.

~Rob

To: rob weinberg
Sent: Saturday, March 14, 2009 9:04:07 AM
Subject: Question Re: Your Experience with the AG in Pohnpei, FSM

Dear Rob,

I am an attorney in California. I have recently been offered a position in the FSM's AG office, and I am strongly considering taking the offer. I have previously lived overseas in a developing island nation, so I have a little familiarity with the culture shock that comes with such a move. However, I also know that Pohnpei is its own unique place, and because of that, one can never truly prepare for such an experience.

I wanted to tell you that your blog is a fascinating read. It has given me more of an inside look into Pohnpei than any of the travel books or other internet sources that I have read.

I also have some questions regarding the job itself. I know you stated that it was like the Wild West out there, but how would you rate the quality of the projects that you were given? Also, what was the typical workload for an attorney in the office? Finally, because I am a newbie attorney who would essentially be learning on the fly in whatever job I held, what type of mentoring, if any, does one receive in that office?

Thank you in advance for your help, as any feedback is greatly appreciated.

Sincerely,
Michael

Date: Sat, 14 Mar 2009 02:23:18 -0700 (PDT)
From: Rob Weinberg
Subject: Re: Question Re: Your Experience with the AG in Pohnpei, FSM

Dear Michael:

What a pleasant surprise and request. Where to begin....

When I first arrived in Pohnpei in June 2003, and I doubt it's changed, it was six lawyers plus the AG, three on the litigation side, civil and criminal; three on the “law” writing opinions, drafting, and advising agencies. The AG himself spent a lot of time in the President's Office, especially giving the president political advice on dealing with the Congress or various departments, or foreign nations or the United States.

All the lawyers I knew and worked with in Pohnpei are now gone from the FSM, but that's not a reflection on the FSM. It's more a reflection of the expatriate mentality that draws people out this way, and sends them on their way to other adventures. They come; they go; some, only a few, stay and start families.

Let me say also that of the lawyers I knew on Pohnpei, one or two remain very close friends of mine. For a while, after I left Pohnpei, and after I came to Guam, a few of the friends I made and I were leap-frogging one another around Micronesia – from Pohnpei to Guam to Saipan, and in my case back to Guam. Perhaps the best friend I have, I met in Pohnpei, is now in Saipan looking to get back to Guam, but only because the economy in the CNMI is so difficult right now. If you tell me who you've been talking to, I may be able to get you some information about what kind of lawyers they are and what the office may be like today from an old contact who was the AG when I was there and is living in Washington State now. I am not familiar with the current Secretary of the Department of Justice, if it is still Maketo Robert, who appears on http://www.fsmgov.org/ngovt.html.

Working in a six or seven-lawyer office for an entire country can be extremely rewarding, if you have the right attitude. My view is that you're there to help them "be all that they can be," to guide them along the path they choose to true sovereignty and independence, not to foist your (colonial) attitudes on them or what you think they ought to be doing based upon your standards of how we do things stateside. As an attorney, my philosophy is that you are there to serve, and to bring your experience base to their justice system, which is modeled on ours. Their mileage may vary. And that’s OK. With the right attitude, you’ll gain the respect of your peers and the people you’re working for, and it can be a very rewarding experience.

Just so you know about other lawyers outside the office you may be running into, there were also a couple of other off-island lawyers attached to the courts as law clerks from the States (judges are not necessarily lawyers); a lawyer advising the FSM Congress; and a lawyer attached to another department like Commerce or Finance or something. There are only a handful of other lawyers in private practice that you regularly encounter, as well as a few from Micronesia Legal Services. All of the above are American. Very few lawyers are “home grown.” The couple that are from the FSM who practice law are from Kosrae, for some reason. [Editor's Note: The current Secretary of the Department of Justice is originally from Chuuk. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree from the College of Guam, now the University of Guam, and later graduated from California Western School of Law with a juris doctor degree.]

The diversity of issues you'll encounter is more than just civil and criminal litigation or advising local officials on routine legal matters. The job advertisement is no puffery in that respect. You’ll be shaping their very image of themselves on how to be a government. The projects you’ll be involved with are not merely the run of the mill legal issues you encounter in a state attorney general's office or district attorney's or city attorney's office, which are interesting enough in and of themselves; you will also encounter and deal with international issues involving immigration, fishing rights, territorial zones, and contractual relations with countries making investments in the FSM such as China, Japan and Taiwan. You'll meet and work with people like engineers and diplomats from Australia, and of course, the United States. Just in terms of purely “domestic” issues, you may be handling a boundary dispute or easement in court one day, defense of public officials in a civil rights action or breach of contract case in another, criminally prosecuting corrupt public officials another, and drafting contracts and agreements, legislation and administrative rules and regulations yet another. There is likely not a course in law school you will not have an opportunity to put to use. And there’ll be a few you’d wish you’d taken as well.

As to the statement in my blog that practicing law in the FSM was like the wild, wild west, my thinking was this: As far as lawyers you'll encounter, it's like the days of Judge Roy Bean: the ones with the law books make the law (or try to). When I was there, the FSM AG's Office had no access to Westlaw or Lexis. I expect that's changed by now. I know I tried desperately to change it while I was there. We literally did legal research via Google on the Internet. (And nowadays that's almost a workable thing with so many courts online.) The FSM Supreme Court has a law library, but the books were packed together in humidity so bad that if you can even get them off the shelves, you can't get them to open. Reporters and Digests and hard bound Shepard's Citations are 10 - 15 years out of date. Lawyers on the other side of, for example, a civil rights case may cite law that's 20 years old from some inconsequential jurisdiction in the U.S. (like a 1984 district court opinion from Kansas) as "precedent" and the local judges (again, not "learned in the law" necessarily) may think it's got some value. So, you've got to be on your toes when dealing with the lawyers over there. And something I found fascinating was how traditional or local law was incorporated in the judicial decision-making whenever possible or appropriate, especially in criminal, property, and probate law.

At the same time that you have to watch the lawyers on the other side in every little thing (which is what we do anyway), there’s a wealth of opportunity to influence the direction of the law, as there is so little precedent there, and they are lacking in the adoption of a lot of the model codes we take for granted here, whether in property and estate law, bankruptcy and debtor-creditor relations, taxation, juvenile justice, family law, whatever. The fields for legislation are wide open. Precedent from anywhere is fair game to be cited if it sounds remotely applicable.

As to being a “newbie” attorney and looking for mentoring, I doubt that you will find mentoring you might be looking for. But it’s a very good question. The truth is: You’re there to mentor others, especially the clients. If you have ten years’ experience, you’ve probably got plenty of skills to do the job without mentoring. The substantive knowledge in areas you are currently unfamiliar with, you can pick up on the fly. (Hell, everyone else does, and that’s the fun of it.) But if you have less than 10 years experience and don’t feel you have solid lawyering skills yet, don’t expect to find it in an office so small. The mentality is often that the clients want to be told by the lawyer what to do; my view is that the role of the lawyer is to empower them to think for themselves and to guide.

The types of legal projects I’ve already described. As to the volume of workload, I found it to be very reasonable. Plenty of time to put in a 40 or 50 hour week and you’re not asked for more, less actually, unless the Office is short for lawyers, which happens at times. As to secretarial or paralegal support, expect none. That way, you’ll be pleasantly surprised with whatever you get, if any. But in that area, it’s best to be prepared for being entirely on your own. There are also unexpected hardships. Despite air conditioning in all the buildings, the humidity is such that printing and copying, even writing on a pad with a ball point pen, can be difficult to count on. I toted my own laptop to and from work every day, and never did get a promised computer of my own. Humidity is very tough on paper and electronics of all kinds.

As for culture shock issues, I too thought that I would be prepared for it, as I too had lived overseas as a child. But growing up as an Army Brat in the 70's in Kwajalein in the Marshall Islands, basically just another military base, isn't the same thing as being an adult and a professional in another country that was, and to a large extent remains, dependent on the United States (and before that, the Japanese, and before that the Germans, and before that, the Spanish) and just thinks differently as a result.

Although it has cable TV and telephones and a movie theater with "first run" movies, it is still very much "third world" in terms of its mentality. The locals who work with and for you, and who you work for, have elevated passive-aggressiveness to an art form that is … unfathomable at times. There are socio-anthropological reasons for this, I think, and learning to understand the locals on their own terms so that your expectations are realistic is paramount to handling the inevitable culture shock. It can be particularly deceptive and unnerving precisely because of the appearances of American and western culture that you encounter most of the time. But make no mistake: These people think differently than we do, and that can be exasperating and inscrutably infuriating if you do not have a great deal of built-in serenity when you arrive. I thought I did at the time. It was nothing like what I have now.

There are a couple of ways people from other countries – the U.S. and Australia mainly – adapt to life in Micronesia. Some people, with families, bring their own emotional support network with them, and they seem to be strongest in terms of their adaptability. But if the spouse is not employed too, it can be a very isolating experience for the family. For those without families, there are two ways, perhaps three in combination, to build that critical emotional support network that they did not bring with them. Some people spend their off-duty hours exclusively in the cliquish company of other ex-pats, and are very contented. I didn't do that and disdained those who do. I went the other way, and went "native," so to speak, with a local girlfriend you've read about, spending much time with her family, lounging around the house in my lava-lava (sarong). But I didn’t do it right, either, as you’ve seen in the blog. And that became isolating too, dangerously so. I’ve learned much since that time about living between cultures.

Those that adapted the best were able to divide their time among westerners like the Americans and Australians, as well as spend time with the Micronesians, and were able to find a comfortable balance. They were able to mingle with westerners and not be judgmental and hyper-critical of the locals. They were able to mingle with the locals and not be taken advantage of. Or they were very solitary individuals to begin with and could do without either. But they were rare.

The most important piece of advice I got in the FSM, from a lawyer for the FSM Congress, about adapting to life in a different culture, and in the FSM in particular, was one I disregarded or simply was incapable of comprehending at the time: As expressed to me, if you have problems at home, they will be magnified three-fold in Pohnpei and the FSM. There is an expression that “wherever you go, there you are.” That became starkly true for me when it was too late to do anything healthy about it. There is simply no escape or geographical cure for whatever ails you wherever you are now, if anything ails you right now. No running away to an island paradise where your troubles disappear and you can “start over.” So, if you have any “issues” you didn’t discuss or share in the interview (and you know what they are), know that they will emerge and consume you.

At the same time, it is an island paradise, if lacking in many of the amenities we’ve grown accustomed to. Of course, there are no McDonalds or Taco Bells or KFC’s or any other kind of fast food restaurant. There are a couple of good restaurants where you can get some almost-American type food, and occasionally a steak, but only a couple, and you don’t want to eat out all the time.

As to food and groceries, if you love fresh tuna and other fish, the fish out here (meaning all of Micronesia and the Pacific) is the best in the world, in my not so humble opinion. The first time you eat parrot fish or other “reef fish,” or try Mangrove Crab, you’ll never go back to Red Lobster. But items you’d expect to find in a decent grocery store, especially fresh red meat (other than pork and chicken), and fresh fruits and vegetables are non-existent. Expect to be served heaping portions of rice at every meal, three to four times the normal amount you consume at home. Cabbage and onions and cucumber and root vegetables like carrots and potatoes you can find; fresh lettuce and the wealth of every other kind of vegetable you might find at home you will not find in Pohnpei. Apples and oranges you can find (usually); everything else – berries, melons, peaches, plums, grapes, you name it – you won’t find. On the other hand, banana, coconut, pineapple, papaya, mango and a few other “exotic” fruit grow wild all over. So your first purchase after you buy a car is a machete’ to keep in the trunk, for when you come across a downed banana tree. Avocado also grows in Micronesia, but the locals don’t eat it, and only feed it to their pigs. I don’t know why.

If you go, send yourself a care package of a year or more worth of herbs, spices, seasonings and sauces. Other than salt and pepper, Tabasco, Soy Sauce, ketchup and mustard are the only condiments readily available. You learn to buy things you see in bulk when you see it, because tomorrow it will be gone, and you may not see it again for months and months. You also learn that you buy some products at one store, other products at others, and that’s just the way of shopping. If you accept the job offer, I can give you a more detailed list of things to take in terms of household items, clothing, and things to leave behind in storage.

It’s funny that I received your email today. I was just thinking about whether and under what conditions I would return to Pohnpei. I certainly hope to go to visit again, and take my now four year old son there. His mother, of course, who I describe in the blog and with whom I have since parted company, is Pohnpeian, and longs to return and show off our son to her family. At one time, when I was leaving Pohnpei, I vowed to return to “do it right” next time. I doubt that will happen, as I am very happy where I am in Guam and am committed to the life I am making here. And I have nothing to prove like I thought I did when I left. If asked to return to Pohnpei for a limited time or for a special project, I’m sure I would go. But I am in a much better and far more serene place than I was in 2003. I am nevertheless tied to Pohnpei and its people forever now. And for all the torment I have described previously, I am the better for it.

I hope this is helpful. If you’ve gotten this far in the interview process as to be offered a job, you must have something about you that others have seen as well. Obviously, you have an adventurous spirit. Whatever you decide, or if my “brief” response has prompted further questions, feel free to call on me.

~ Rob

Editor's Note: In a followup email, I shared the following:

From: Rob Weinberg
Sent: Saturday, March 14, 2009 7:23:18 PM
Subject: Re: Question Re: Your Experience with the AG in Pohnpei, FSM

Michael:

If Marketo Robert is indeed the currenty Secretary of the Department of Justice, you may want to look at this, which I found poking around just now: http://www.fsmcongress.fm/pdf%20documents/SCR%2015-61.pdf.

Politics in the FSM Government is ... tricky, particularly when it comes to Chuuk and people from it. I can tell you more of what I think I know if you're still interested after reading the link above.

Thursday, November 13, 2008

Flipping Channels

Here’s something I've just noticed about myself in the last few days: Unconsciously since the election, I've been tuning in to national news. For years, I flipped past CNN and MSNBC, and the other “news” channels. I didn't care and I don’t think I wanted to know what was happening in Washington. For the last eight years there has been nothing inspiring in any of the decision-making at the national level. I was resigned to being a citizen of a nation whose policies and priorities differed markedly from my own sensibilities. There was nothing I could do about it, and since I am not one to criticize from the sidelines, I just didn’t bother to stay tuned in.

I was determined to come to Micronesia ~ Pohnpei, Guam, Saipan ~ as much to get away from the States as to broaden my horizons and seek adventure. I was in Alabama before and after the Clinton years, and the antipathy toward him in particular and Democrats in general supersaturated my working environment in the Alabama Attorney General’s Office where my supervisors and many of my new colleagues were conservatives and neo-Republicans. People I had to work closely with seized on every opportunity to vent their animosity at Democrats, liberals and libertarians in visceral often venomous ways. Politics and national policy wasn’t business; it was personal. And there was rarely anything rational about it that I could ascertain. On May 1, 1992, Rodney King asked “Can we just get along?” and the answer from then until just recently appeared to be “No. Quit asking.” Living in the United States was worse than living in a dysfunctional family. It had become toxic.

I became an expatriate, an expat, not just in its sense as a noun, “one who has taken up residence in a foreign country,” but more in its verb sense, “to withdraw (oneself) from residence in one's native country,” or as an adjective, “voluntarily absent from home or country.” To be sure, Guam, a U.S. Territory, and Saipan, in a U.S. Commonwealth, are definitely part of the United States; but we are very far away, and since U.S. citizens who permanently reside in the Territory of Guam or the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands cannot vote for president, or any other national office except to send one non-voting delegate each to Congress, what happens in Washington is something over which we have very little influence, let alone control. For the most part, I didn’t have a voice in it, and frankly I couldn’t be happier that those who did were thousands and thousands of miles away.

I didn’t want to hear it. Even in local races, Guam, where I live, seemed entirely free of the kind of personal acrimony that attends the political campaigns and arguments I witnessed among friends and acquaintances in Alabama and elsewhere in the States. Not only did I not have to smile politely at people promoting this candidate or bad-mouthing that one, I didn’t have to deal with any of it. So I had no reason to keep up with it in the national news. When I counted my blessings, not living anywhere in the continental United States during an election year has been very near the top of my list these past five years.

But ever since the presidential election, I've been feeling … I don’t know … interested again, even, may I say, eagerly expectant to see what the president-elect will do to reverse the course of the last eight years with respect to the wars, the economy, education, tax equity, health care, the environment, and civil rights in the wake of 911. I almost dare to hope that America may someday be in a position to lead the world by example again in a way I can be proud of. I know it’s early. And I’m no Pollyanna. While I find the comparisons to past presidents interesting from an intellectual point of view, it is much too early to say that our next president is or will be the next Lincoln or Roosevelt or Kennedy. I know that.

I mentioned to a very special someone the other night that if I were ever asked to return to the States to serve in Washington, I might be hard-pressed to say “no.” A month ago, I would not have thought twice before declining an invitation to return to the States anywhere. Thankfully, I’m not looking for a job, and I am fully committed to my life here in Guam, Where America’s Day Begins. But nowadays without even thinking about it, I linger just a little longer on the news when flipping channels. Rodney King’s plea for us to all just get along may have been a bit ambitious before. Not so much today.

Saturday, October 4, 2008

Epilog ~ Present Day ~ Guam

Epilog ~ Present Day ~ Guam

It's been five years... A lot happens in five years....

I wish I could say there is a happy ending to this chapter of my life. But there isn't. At least not right away. Or maybe a better way to look at it is that there is. But like I said, not right away.

I left Lynn in Guam the end of December, 2003, and began what I then hoped to be a new chapter in my life, where I hoped to recover from a series of bad choices that had seemed to plague me for years, years before I had come to Micronesia.

I spoke to Lynn nearly every day while I was away. I cannot say this was another of my bad choices, but a few months later, I brought Lynn to the States for a short while, long enough to conceive a child. We had intended to see if we could start a life together in the States, and to bring her girls with us when we settled, but it became necessary to send her back to Guam to deal with family matters. Unwilling to give up on either Lynn or Micronesia, I followed Lynn to Guam in early May 2004, unemployed at the time, but hopeful. Within a few days or so of my arrival in Guam, I found employment in the Guam Attorney General’s Office. Lynn and I set up house with her two daughters, and awaited the birth of a son in December. Although fraught with more inter-cultural and intra-family conflict, those days were perhaps the best of the times Lynn and I were to spend together. Work was challenging and rewarding for the most part, and my nights and weekends were spent acculturating to life among Pohnpeians in Guam.

I liked Guam. A lot. I liked the people, the work, the sense of community, the food, the scenery, everything about it. I felt immediately at home there, more so than I’d ever felt at home in Alabama; and proud to be there to help shape it and watch it grow. Although Lynn had many family members in Guam, including her mother, brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces and nephews, she longed to return to her own island.

My professional life was enjoyable, but Lynn was jealous of it, and domestic life for Lynn and me was anything but serene. Rarely did I spend time in the company of Americans except at work. Things were as idyllic as they could possibly be before my son was born, but after he was born our lives together became increasingly difficult. It is difficult to point to any one reason, except to say that my American and her Pohnpeian sensibilities were in constant conflict, and she was very unhappy, because she longed for home. In the end, try as we might (and we did try), coming from such diametrically opposite cultures, we could never adjust to one another’s expectations of each other, and we parted company when our son was around 18 months old. Not by agreement, or by my choice, or with any warning, although in retrospect the signs were there. And I grieved considerably for it all, when it happened, and for a long time after. Because I thought I had invested so much in us, and I could not understand why or how she could throw it all away, or what she thought she was throwing it away for. All over again, my life made no sense. And the depression that plagued me in Pohnpei, and even perhaps for years before I came to Micronesia, returned.

Depending upon your point of view, I endured either many more hardships or adventures in the year and a half that followed Lynn and my separation. Particularly painful to me, I was to be separated from my son for months at a time while I tried to find yet another fresh start in Saipan, in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, with the idea being that my son would join me there eventually, when I got settled and could send for him. It never happened. And I grieved the more, alone in Saipan. Because Saipan was not Guam. And Saipan was not my home. And because my son was without his father. In my grief and depression, old ways of thinking returned and I was overwhelmed by forces and emotions I could not understand. And although I did not believe at the time that I had created the situation, nor do I today, and even though I was powerless and helpless to do anything about any of it, I still felt responsible for all of it. Those are chapters of a different story, to be told another day, if at all. And I may. Someday.

A lesson that apparently had not sunk in deep enough in Pohnpei ~ that no matter where you go, there you are ~ needed to find expression and be repeated many times in different ways before I could finally understand it and come to terms with it. I would return to the States twice more in search of answers. And I would find only bits and pieces of the answers at a time, returning to Saipan thinking I knew the answer only to leave in deeper desperation and despair than when I’d left before. But eventually, I think I did. Find answers. And a kind of peace and an understanding. And I eventually came to realize that knowing the answer to the question “Why?” doesn’t make it better, nor does it ever really make anybody happy. Because the answer to “Why?” doesn’t really have anything to do with happiness. Or love.

On September 21, 2007, I returned to Guam, unemployed for several months, longer than anticipated this time, but eventually, in January 2008, I found simple, honest work that suited me, researching the law and drafting legal opinions for trial court judges of the Superior Court of Guam. It was less than half the pay I was making when I worked on Guam the year before, but very satisfying. I would and do see my son often, and through new friends I am finding a spiritual connectedness that had been missing for longer than I could remember. My focus during that time, and now, was on learning the lessons of humility, many that had been forced upon me, and many that I have come now to embrace. In this time, I have learned to welcome those lessons. And I began to learn gratitude, and the power of surrender and acceptance.

In February 2008, I took and later passed the Guam Bar exam; in August, I took and passed another part. I am to be sworn in as a full member of the Guam Bar on October 8, 2008, only days from now. Completely unexpectedly, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Guam asked me to assume the role of Interim Public Guardian, managing the personal, financial, medical and legal affairs of over 50 individuals with mental disabilities that impair their competence to manage their affairs for themselves. I have recently been invited to return to the Guam Attorney General’s Office. And there are many other blessings in my life today, including finding love again, but those too are stories to share, perhaps, another day.

Lynn and I have made our peace, and though we have not been together for a long time now, we have found a way to share more apart from one another than we ever did when we were together ~ a son whose parents may come from different worlds, and who are devoted to making sure he receives the best of both of those worlds. For all our faults, our son is a reflection of the best in both of us. And we are doing everything we can, each in our own ways, to see to it that he grows up happy, and healthy, and strong, and balanced, and beautiful, and loved. Most importantly, loved. And he is all those things. And I am blessed.

I am beginning to appreciate what it means to live in the present; to believe and have faith in something bigger than myself, to rely on something other than myself, what some call God; and to transform hope and faith from thought and word to deed. Those, too, are stories to share another day. And I will someday. Because sometimes, even in the middle of a life, there can be a happy ending. We need to know that there are happy endings, no matter how much pain we may endure along the way. Maybe that’s what life is: A series of happy endings along the way. Depending upon how you look at it and where you look.

You see, you can look at your life in all sorts of ways, from all sorts of angles. You can dwell in the past and the pain, or you can learn and grow from it. The way I look at my life then, is tempered by the way I am learning to live my life now. And if there is anything I am learning from the difficulties I have encountered in any small part of my life, is that it is just that: A small part of a life. And that's okay. I would not be where I am and who I am today but for the past. But I no longer have to live there. That is the choice we make. We are meant to be happy in this life. And we can be. Sometimes, sometimes a lot of times, we just need a little help and the passage of time to understand.

* * *

Wednesday, October 1, 2008

Monday, December 29, 2003 ~ Guam

Monday, December 29, 2003 ~ Guam

Lynn’s mom and family live in a two bedroom apartment in a part of Guam called Tamuning. I lost count at eleven or twelve with all the people coming and going, but Lynn’s mom and “husband” live there together with Lynn’s two older sisters, and their boyfriend/husbands and at least three children belonging to Lynn’s oldest sister, plus a brother of Lynn’s, plus an uncle or cousin or I don’t know what family relation, all living in one apartment, cooking off of one butane gas stove, with a rice cooker always being replenished and rarely empty. I guess we would call it slum living where I’m from, and I don’t understand why they would prefer living here in such conditions to Pohnpei, where there is more room to stretch out. But Lynn’s people are used to living in very cramped and confined quarters, everyone sleeping on the floor wherever they can. They say they come here to work and save money so they can go back to Pohnpei one day, but I don’t see anyone living above subsistence level or being able to save money in any meaningful way. I don’t understand what they think they’re doing here.

Lynn’s family keep to themselves and other Pohnpeians. Lynn’s oldest sister has three children with a Guam local, Chamorro they’re called, but she’s sleeping with someone else, of Palauan descent, I understand. And she’s never around. Everyone is friendly enough to me, trying to make me comfortable, knowing I’m uncomfortable sleeping on the floor, showering in cold water, being in such close surroundings with so many people. A dozen people sharing two bedrooms, all their belongings piled everywhere, with one bathroom and no hot water. I just got here and am just passing through, and Lynn asks if I can help out with groceries. I suppose it’s the least I can do.

Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Saturday, December 27, 2003 ~ Pohnpei, Chuuk, Guam

Saturday, December 27, 2003 ~ Pohnpei, Chuuk, Guam

Lynn and her girls, Brined and Renay, and I went flew from Pohnpei to Chuuk, and from Chuuk to Guam. Everyone had to get off in Chuuk, but women and their children were allowed to stay on the plane. The girls were already seasoned travelers by the time I had met them and were no trouble at all. But the flight from Pohnpei to Chuuk, and Chuuk to Guam was already seeming long and drawn out to me. Having said my goodbyes in Pohnpei, I just wanted to get wherever I was going to.

Flying into Guam was impressive and reinvigorating after living in Pohnpei only six months. It looked positively metropolitan from the air. We were met at the airport by Lynn’s half-sister, Lynette, who had been adopted as a baby by Lynn’s mom’s older brother and his wife. Lynn and Lynette chattered away, catching up with one another, while I took in the sights and tried to get my bearings.

I was tired when we arrived, but also energized by the sense of being back in a western world that was familiar to me, with more than one brand of gas station, fast food chain franchises I recognized like McDonalds, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell, four lanes of traffic, even the traffic lights themselves gave me a sense of comfort. There is an energy here that is absent in Pohnpei, of people who know what they’re doing and where they’re going, and why.

Monday, September 29, 2008

Thursday, December 25, 2003 (continued) ~ Pohnpei

Thursday, December 25, 2003 (continued) ~ Pohnpei

Christmas in Pohnpei. Not like what you’d expect in the States. The Christmas decorations have been up in some places all year round; just never taken down, I suppose. No expectations on the part of children of waking up to a visit from Santa Claus. I ask Lynn when the kids will get their presents, and she just says “Later. After.”

By mid-morning we head down to her village in Sokehs, where preparations are underway under the supervision of various aunties, pretty much the same as any other celebration I’ve witnessed: people bringing caseloads of chicken and pork ribs for the barbecue; numerous packages of hot dogs; large quantities of rice people made at home and bring to the village; breadfruit; taro; plantain bananas cooked in coconut milk; and deserts. By the time we get there, a couple of pigs are already in the “um,” baking over coals under blankets of palm leaves. I’m told there’ll be dog, too, which I am eager to try, knowingly this time.

When the food is ready, it will be brought to a covered structure they call the “naz,” the central meeting place where I went to ask Lynn’s mom for “permission.” After the food is blessed everyone will be invited to dig in. I’m usually invited, or pushed by Lynn, to go first, but I’ve never been comfortable being the first in line.

About the time the food is all ready, by the latter part of the afternoon, the men have begun pounding sakau for later. I’m very tired, and it is apparent to everyone, but I am trying to keep up appearances. I’ve been thinking about the immediate future; and I’ve been thinking about the immediate past. I’m trying to be hopeful, but I can’t see into the future the way I used to be able to. And I’m trying not to beat myself up about the past, but it’s hard not to want to put my regrets about own unfulfilled promises, and what “could have been,” and “should have been” into some sort of perspective. Lynn and my mom, from different points of view, are both telling me to stop thinking about the past, or about the future either, but just to do what’s in front of me right now.

The food is good. My appetite is returning, perhaps in anticipation of travelling soon and the days ahead. Dog isn’t bad at all. Tastes like the turkey.

I’d like to come back some day. I think I would. Maybe do it right next time. Maybe do what I came here to do in the first place. Be of service.

Friday, September 26, 2008

Sunday, December 07, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

Sunday, December 07, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

Ridiculous experience the other night: Some teen-ager was calling down from the street, "Fucking White Boy," and saying stuff about me being a black belt. Concerned for Lynn's safety, I went outside with my boken (wooden sword). He wanted to fight. I was feeling game. He left and showed back up with a machete'. Lynn pulled me inside and we called the cops. They showed up fast and asked if I wanted to file a complaint, but I said "no" because he was the nephew of a neighbor we'd already offended with loud noise late at night (I was asleep at that time). Turns out he was jealous that he wasn't invited to these "parties" Lynn was having while I slept; and was also concerned that I was hurting a relative of his while showing him some Kuk Sool. (Hey, Kuk Sool hurts, and when it comes to fighting, unless they've had training, they're whimps, and cry out at the slightest pain. They want to learn, but maybe I'm not the best teacher of this here.) He was drunk. I'm told it won't happen again and that he's sorry, although he'll never show up to apologize. I'm in the Pacific, which translates to "peaceful." Hmmmmm..... Not always so peaceful.

Strange dreams.

Monday, September 22, 2008

Wednesday, November 26, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

Wednesday, November 26, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

It’s incredible. How these people live, Lynn’s family and her village, anyway. They sleep on the floor, they fish, they farm, they pick fruit off the trees, they grow taro, rice is cheap, and they have family land they are born and buried on, handed down from generation to generation. They have no visible source of income. Basically, all they have to buy is rice, betel nut, cigarettes, beer and sakau. They rent video tapes (very cheap, a lot of it bootleg). The older women in the family dominate the younger women and the men. Lynn orders her younger brothers and sister around, and they think nothing of it. Living in a matriarchal society is at odds with my egalitarian sensibilities.

I thought I could do some good out here, but this place will never change. They have been too dependent too long. They have been dominated by the Japanese, the Germans, the Spanish and dependent upon the United States too long. The legacy of four hundred years of colonialism is dependency. They can never become a truly sovereign and independent nation.

My parents and my sister are relieved to hear I am coming home.

Friday, September 12, 2008

Saturday, November 1, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

Saturday, November 1, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

It's been another two weeks since I've put pen to paper, or finger to keyboard. Nothing new to report, so I haven't had anything to write about.

My leg is doing much better. Healing fast.

I was planning on going to Chuuk next week, but I was out of the office all week, sick ~ tired, no strength, no appetite. I don't know if it's residual infection, or some tropics flu, or the craziness of the place. Will probably go to Chuuk the week after.

Feeling better today. Will try and write more.

Thursday, September 11, 2008

Wednesday, October 15, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

Wednesday, October 15, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

My mother writes to remind me that you can't fool around with cuts in a tropical clime. I know about cuts, and the need to vigorously clean out any possibility of infection from living on Kwaj in the Marshall Islands, which is a coral atoll. There, of course, the problem was coral infection. Here, it's a matter of tropical bacteria. Anyway, I am improving daily.

My mother asks with a name like Isaac if the doctor is Jewish. Somehow I doubt it. Lynn thinks he's half Filipino, half Pohnpein. I don't know what his credentials are, but the mehn why here swear by him, and I was impressed enough with how they treated me. Certainly so, after having seen the inside of their public hospital when we went to visit Lynn's uncle's wife. Medical care is free here, but there aren't enough qualified doctors and nurses, and they never have medicine at the public hospital.

Tuesday, September 2, 2008

Tuesday, October 14, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

Tuesday, October 14, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

So, I went to the doctor yesterday. Recommended as the best on island. Private, not the public hospital. He's good. Bryan Isaac. Not sure of his nationality.

I described my symptoms from Thurs. night/Fri. a.m. through Monday to him. The flu-like symptoms seem to be dissipating recently, but the pain and aggravation in the leg was getting worse. If I was prone and got up, I couldn't walk until I stood on the leg for a minute, then I was fine. I was beginning to see inflamation, and possibly red spikes moving upward. Worried about blood poisoning. Started treating myself on oral and topical anti-biotics last night that I brought from the States, and already seemed better today.

Anyway, he said the flu-like symptoms were a direct result of a bacterial and perhaps streptoccal infection from the leg injury which I got when I dropped the washer or dryer on my leg on Thursday helping move it into the storage area for it. Strange to me, as there was no bleeding. I asked if I would react that fast ~ the same night ~ and that it would last that long ~ four/five days? He said yes, no question.

Hey took a blood sample, gave me a shot in the hip of something strong antibacterial to get me started, and gave me a 10-day prescription of something less strong than what I brought from the states. He said I should save that for real emergencies.

He told me to keep my leg elevated and heated. The pain is from the bruising blood pooling and when I move it has to find new places to go, and is in the way of where the joints and ligaments need to go. I suspected that, as I've seen that from martial arts injuries I've had. It's actually easier to be able to walk if I keep my leg from knee down vertical, so I may disregard that part, at least during that day. Heating it makes sense, and I'd thought of that, as it circulates the blood and moves the blood around and will help dissipate the pooled bruised blood.

Total cost for the visit, thanks to local insurance I subscribed to: $6.10.

Saturday night Lynn made me some home-made chicken soup, with onions, and cabbage, and (too much) garlic, salt and pepper. Quite good, though I could only eat a few drops. Nothing like chicken soup, the universal remedy for what ails you. (Funny, Lynn doesn't look Jewish.) Probably helped get started me on the mend.

Anyway, I'm on the mend. I don't think I mind being messed up as long as I know what it is. Then you know what to do to fix it. 'Glad I've found the doctor and am now informed. I feel much better already just knowing.

Monday, September 1, 2008

Saturday, October 11, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

Saturday, October 11, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

Whatever I had, I don't think it was food poisoning. Blood poisoning, from my own blood, maybe. I bruised my shin very badly moving the washer and dryer on Thurs. (I keep hitting the same spot on my shin, but this was a whopper.) I'm beginning to see blood bruising below the injury and above the ankle, circling that whole part of the leg. That's what I suspect it is. And just when I think I'll be OK, I wake up sweating. But if I cover myself, I get better. And there are some weird flu bugs around here. I've definitely not felt like this in a long, long time, if ever.

My sister asks if they have real doctors here. Yes, they have real doctors here. A public hospital I wouldn't go to, but there is a private doctor all the mehn why swear by here.

Lynn was totally great taking care of me. And she was very scared, especially Thursday night/Friday morning, when it started. Very worried, tried to get me to the hospital, but I didn't want to go to the public hospital, and didn't know who the private doctor was to go to, and thought it would pass by the next day.

I was reading the Montgomery Advertiser online an hour ago. The lead story was about the robbery murder of a 75 yr. old retired University of Alabama in Huntsville art professor. UAH is my undergraduate alma mater. I knew him. Not from UAH. He was a member of the board of directors of the ACLU, so I knew him from board meetings and ACLU functions. Sweet guy. I feel so sorry for the ACLU people I know who knew him. It must be hell for them. Two suspects have been arrested.

In other Alabama news I read the names of people I know (and have advised or represented) being considered for layoffs because the state's budget is so bad, because they refuse to raise property taxes (practically non-existent to begin with due to timber and corporate interests). That state is a real mess. And the most important thing on its mind doesn't appear to be making sure children are fed and properly educated, but ramming the ten commandments down their throats. And people wonder why I wanted to leave.

Saturday, August 30, 2008

Thursday, October 09, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

Thursday, October 09, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

It's been yet another week since I wrote last. Writing helps me process, but sometimes I just need to absorb, and not process.

Gnats, little ants, tiny little mite-like things crawling on my computer screen at the office and home. Unavoidable. More of the mite-like things at the office than here. I worry they'll fritz a connection inside the computer one day. Ants are incredible here. Leave some food on the floor for ten minutes and they're marching to it, to carry it away. Things like dead spiders too. If anyone comes to visit, and wants to stay at my house, ants are a fact of life. Haven't seen many cockroaches, a few small German variety is about it. Nothing like what we used to see on Kwaj, or that I used to see in Montgomery.

But I was musing yesterday that this place is really something in terms of poisonous or dangerous flora and fauna. The only animal species to be wary of are centipedes, which I've never seen, and the toads or frogs ~ which come out like a plague at work when it rains. No other indigenous animal life that is poisonous or bites, other than maybe the mosquitos, which isn't a problem at my house as there's good ventilation and not much standing water, as there is at the villages. Nothing like poison ivy or poison oak. Just about all the flora is edible or medicinal.

My household goods arrive tomorrow morning, my time. The ship came in yesterday. I notice new fresh food and different items in the store too. Must be from the same ship.

I don't know where I'm going to put the stuff that comes in. I've really gotten used to living even more spartanly than I did in Montgomery. I should have left my washer and dryer and bought them or a smaller version here. I won't be able to get them through the door of the little storage shed where the hookups are, and the landlord's not crazy about enlarging it. Also, I think this place has termites. Which will eat everything of wood I have. I was planning on leaving everything here when or if I leave, anyway.

I can see Mars with the naked eye here. It was supposed to be very visible about a month ago, but a couple of nights ago I saw a red star or something not far from the moon. Seemed stable, not twinkling like a star would. Could've been a geo-synchynous satellite.

I think we're going to get a T-1 line and Westlaw, the legal research database, for the office, which will bring our office into the 21st century, and really give us an advantage on the Law side and Litigation side. The Law side could use U.S. statutory exemplars. The Litigation side could use access to case law precedent from the U.S., which is used when there's not FSM law on point. And there's a big absence of that. Our online dial-up time for 8 lawyers-lawyer types, only five of whom can access it at a time as we share phone lines in pairs, averages $1100 a month! One shared account we all access. A T-1 for the whole office would cost $390, and we may be able to split that by halving it with another department in our building. Westlaw will cost about $400 a month for six account passwords. And I may have figured out some other ways to add to cutting costs, which will hopefully serve me in good stead with the acting AG.

Very passive-aggressive, these people here are. Say yes, do no. And the mehn why (Americans, not the Australians, who are quite like us, but have their own quirks) pick it up in short time. Say "sorry" enough times and that's supposed to cut it, and I'm learning to do that when things get confrontational. Getting frustrated, and showing it, trying to do so gently, with certain people piece-mealing me to death. Someone asks for a ride home ~ no problem, it's on the way, there's only one road that circles the island ~ then keeps you waiting at the last minute, or want to drop by some store on the way. Locals and mehn why both do it. I go to pick up Lynn and she asks me at the last minute to run favors ~ take a $2.00 bag of rice to her brothers, get this, do that. I don't like to say no, but I do like to plan my time, and have personal expectations of where I'm going to be when.

I should be going to Chuuk (Truk) soon. Probably early next month. Planned to go next week, but Congress is coming into session and we need lawyers around.

I got desperately sick the night my stuff came came. Woke up hyperventilating, sweating, shivering, skin painful, weak, no balance. Couldn't drink enough juice. Tons and tons of it. Was a little better Friday during the day, then at night and all Saturday it started up again, just couldn't move. Weak, couldn't sit up by myself. Threw up twice. Once when Lynn gave me some Tylenol, another when she tried to administer a local remedy of some local plant in steaming water that I was supposed to inhale with a towel over my head. It was too hot and steamy. I've never felt that way. Must have been some island flu. Feeling a little better now as I got some sleep and rest last night.

Not much else to write about as I've been dead to the world the last couple of days.

Friday, August 29, 2008

Monday, September 29, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

Monday, September 29, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

It's been a week since I last wrote anything. Just haven't been feeling very descriptive lately. Lynn will be 27 in November. We got back together (again) last night. The highs are so high. Too high. That much further to fall. Remembering Icarus. It's what happens when you fly too close to the sun.

No news on who is going to be the new AG. It'll be a few months, I'm sure.

My stuff from my house in Montgomery was supposed to arrive by ship yesterday. May be delivered to the house today, or tomorrow, or the next ....

I came home this evening and the front door was wide open. Must have been one of Lynn's girls, or maybe Lynn, who's usually very security conscious. We think we've heard people walking about on the front porch once or twice. I went outside with my boken, the wooden practice sword, which I'm comfortable with. Never saw anyone. I wasn't paying attention this morning to security. She must have been distracted, if it was Lynn. Nothing taken, not that there's much here other than clothes, a borrowed TV, a microwave, a small cheap CD/tape/radio player. My passport, a few other things. Amazing that nothing was taken.

I'm by myself tonight. I need some downtime from Micronesians and their children. There's only so much two and four year old intermittent crying and running around and fighting sleep I can take. The hydrocortizone I bought really seems to have worked on the oldest's bug bite scabs. She'd been on Guam and the food must have been different there, attracting the mosquitos in her village. I spoke to Lynn extensively on the phone tonight. Not even sure about what.

There was a soft knock on my side door shortly after I came home. (Micronesians knock (and talk) softly.) A boy around 11 years old, the son of a neighbor, said his father, Justino Gusto, asked if they could cut the sakau plant and some of the hibiscus tree, for sakau. (I've had his sakau, must be from here or hereabouts. Everyone claims the sakau on their property is better than elsewhere. But there's good sakau, and not so good sakau. His is good.) It was something to see the kid's older brother up in the hibiscus tree with a machete cutting off thinner branches. They strip and use the skin to wrap the pounded sakau, add water, and squeeze it out. Very interesting process I've described before. But to see this kid up a tree with a machete', so natural. My childhood Tarzan fantasy come to life.

Justino Gusto, also my former boss's landlord of a very nice house, runs a little store that sells cheap cigarettes, bottled water, soaps, betel nut, Ramen noodle soup (a staple, along with rice), Spam, canned tuna and salmon, a few other things. Actually, his 13-14 yr. old daughter runs it. And it's really just a convenience for his family and friends who live nearby. Many tiny little "convenience" stores like that, that only sell a few dozen items. Lynn may think I should keep the sakau plant for her family, don't know, will have to ask. (after talking to her, she said I did right) But these are my neighbors, and I always wave to the daughter on my way into the house. They were very kind to me my first or second night in this house, when I locked myself out of the house, wearing nothing but a pair of pants, and they let me use their phone and waited with me for a couple of hours until the landlord came with a set of keys.

Thursday, August 28, 2008

Monday, September 22, 2003 (continued) ~ Pohnpei

Monday, September 22, 2003 (continued) ~ Pohnpei

People here have so much anger and pain, at their helplessness over things they have no idea how to control, on so many levels, but they hide it behind smiles and laughter. And eventually it just boils over. In inappropriate ways. Sometimes with words, sometimes knives and machete's.

Saying "I'm sorry," doesn't change things. I'm going to hear that a lot soon from Lynn. And, yet, "I'm sorry" is an incredibly important part of culture here. I've seen how significant customary apologies are in the culture here. If someone does something to me, his family will come to mine to apologize. Mind-boggling, but incredibly effective. And maybe that's why they can sort of get away with it, in their minds. It's different from us. But there's much to learn too. Sometimes, hearing "I'm sorry" sounds shallow to our ears, but sometimes, saying and hearing it here feels more accepted and genuine than I've ever experienced before.

I'll never understand why some people pick fights with me. And I was so good to them all weekend. I really was. There shouldn't be a thing as "too good." Maybe I was. And maybe Lynn was trying to find the balance of good and bad she's used to.

People vent their fears in anger. And that's probably what she was doing. She's afraid I'll leave her in two years, whether just leaving the island or for somebody else; that I want someone with education (she's bothered by me saying she's not educated in an early email that I let her read); or that what I really want is a mehn why (ex-wives/girlfriends/a woman at the office I have no interest in); or that her family will come to love me more than her; or that the more I learn to speak Pohnpein, the less I'll need her. It's just fear. None of it is true. It's just not true. I don't know how I can stop her from feeling that way. She's created classic self-fulfilling prophesies. And she's smarter than that. And we'll lose each other to fear.

An older aunt, one who talks to Lynn that Lynn respects, called here last night looking for her and Irene and Benido. She called twice. Worried, apologetic the second time for bothering me. I told her I left Irene and Benido where they wanted to be left, and were fine, but that I couldn't say about Lynn, or even where she was, as I don't know the geography well enough. Should be some interesting talk in the village today, and I suspect Lynn is really going to get it, from more than one auntie. Some I-told-you-so's will be happy that we'll split up; others will tell her how "pui pui" (stupid) she's been to do that to me, and drive me away.

Welcome to Pohnpei.

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Saturday, September 20, 2003 (continued) ~ Pohnpei

Saturday, September 20, 2003 (continued) ~ Pohnpei

Lynn and her two and four year olds are over this weekend, plus an 11 yr. old and 14 yr. old to be nannies/sitters/watchers. The four of them started out last night going to sleep with the two youngest on the futon in the living room, the 11 and 14 yr. old on the floor next to it. I got up this a.m., and the 2 yr. old was on the floor, the 4 yr. old the only one on the futon. They're all still sleeping. Perfectly comfortable. I'll be making a big breakfast.

It grounds me somehow, having people in the house like this. Weekends like this. Anyway, it's nice, pleasant. And for some reason, I like having people around me talking in a language I don't understand. It lets me be with my own thoughts. At the same time, more and more, I pick up a word or phrase or two, here and there, and I'm almost subliminally picking up the language. Lynn is quietly impressed how I pick up what's going on in a conversation, but it's really more guesswork from context than actually knowing what's being said.

And it doesn't feel like a houseful, though it should. So peaceful. Couldn't be more pleasant.

I was reading a paper from Guam. Most "news" I get from the Internet, but it's nice to read it in paper form occassionally.

I downloaded a free demo typing-tutor program for Lynn. She used to be jealous of me spending time on the computer. Now, I can't keep her away from it.

I won a motion in a criminal case in Chuuk that I expected to lose. It was a motion to dismiss the defense filed based on the statute of limitations. I was sure I'd lose it, but won it. I'll probably be going out to Chuuk the second week of October to interview witnesses for trials involving this guy. May try and get in a dive.

Monday, August 25, 2008

Saturday, September 20, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

Saturday, September 20, 2003 ~ Pohnpei

Things are pretty stable at work. It's been a couple of weeks now since Paul left, and the grieving process seems over. You just can't and don't dwell on things here. I'll probably be travelling among Chuuk and Yap next month a bit. In addition to needing to interview witnesses on Chuuk in a criminal case involving election violations, on Yap and Chuuk there are some immigration deportation proceedings I think I'm supposed to be handling. Filipinos, I think, not sure of details. We have some Vietnamese "refugees" on Yap, but I think they're going to be repatriated. I'm not involved in that. And I'm about to be handed some deportation proceedings involving a Chinese guy who's brought six Chinese "working girls" to the island. Prostitution is apparently not illegal here, per se, but these aren't desirable elements, eh? Their entry permits have expired, and they've been told to get off the island, so it's just a matter of getting them to do so, whatever that entails.

I enjoy working with the Immigration staff, and the national cops too. Well, just about everyone I've come in contact with professionally. Within the office, of the four secretaries, I really only like one. Another, in charge of procurement, does things when (and if) she wants to, and it's getting really old. She's the one who never got my stuff moving from my house; I've had a computer that blew up the second day I was here, she's done nothing about; she's done nothing about getting more phone lines in the office so I don't have to share an Internet connection with Anthony, the lawyer next door. She tells you she's doing what you've asked, and have had approved, and it never gets done. The other two secretaries are just dead wood, and can't even take messages properly. The halls are littered with old and spent computers and printers and the like, piled up with old filing cabinets and boxes. Our copier machine constantly produces darkened images. The phones and intercom system are awful.

I've shared earlier about the Filipino man and boy that washed up on the shores of Yap some years ago. Their bones and the man's skull are visibly exposed in a storage shed next to my office building. The Phillipines won't pay to have the bones repatriated. They were buried on a beach to have the elements clean them up, like we used to do cleaning up shells we'd find that still had the animal in them. They should be buried, but there's no such thing as a pauper's graveyard here, and the bones would decompose in the soil here.

It was actually cold last night. Very heavy rains yesterday, especially in the first hours of the morning, which made me late for work. It probably wasn't that cold, but my blood has probably thinned out enough by now that it felt that way. I certainly don't sweat like a "puik" (pweek / pig) like I used to. It was the first night in a long time that I kept a shirt on after I got home, and didn't have the floor fans running.

My learning to speak Pohnpein is coming along, slow but sure. As more locals realize I'm trying to learn, the more they throw at me, the more comfortable I become and recognize words and phrases, and how to respond in a natural way. There doesn't seem to be a grammar structure like we have in English, but it could be that I'm only learning a word and a phrase here and there, verbs, nouns, a few adjectives, and haven't put together full sentences yet. But it's very simple.

It's close to 5:30 a.m. I've been up since before 4 a.m. The sun will start to come up soon.

I heard we had a tsunami heading toward Yap, FSM's westernmost state and closest to the Philipines. I don't know how high the tsunami is or will be when it reaches Yap, but it was 7 foot high off the coast of Hokkaido's Pacific coast.