Underwater World

Here are some photos from our visit to Underwater World in Tumon.  I was actually shocked at how good it was.

We finished our evening with a giant pizza from Yellow Cab Pizza Co.  Yummers.

Sin dende eu no vou jogar

Thursday I got to go on the Navy base with a fella in my Capoeira class (we found out that we are neighbors) and some of his friends.  He and I were taught with the other students on base by the mestre (master) while the rest worked out.  We then went over to a student's house for avocados (yum!), rice, etc. for supper and to hang out. For Falls Friday Darren and I briefly visited Waterfall Valley Visited the super strong Chief Gadao with his half canoe in Inarajan (check out his story below the picture), then scurried over to Camp Meeting in Talofofo to hear Jose Rojas (he's the director of the office of Volunteer Ministries for the SDA church) preach the word about Gideon. Once long ago on the island of Guahan there lived a mighty chief. His name was Chief Gadao. Gadao was from a southern village called Inalahan. Now back in those days, villagers took great pride in their chiefs and would often sing songs of them and their great strengths. One day, a singing messenger was traveling through one of the northern villages singing his song of Chief Gadao. A chief named Mataquana happened to hear the messenger's song of his chief and became very angry. Mataquana believed that he was the strongest chief on the island of Guahan and he could beat any chief that he challenges. He got into his galaide' and headed for Inalahan so that he could meet this mighty chief. After a while of traveling, he finally reached a placed he believed to be Inalahan. He saw a hut close to the beach side. He decided to stop and ask the owner where he could find Gadao. The owner of the hut was a bit surprised and asked the chief why he was looking for Gadao. When Mataquana explained why, the man chuckled, because the man Mataquana was talking to was Gadao himself. Gadao then said, "I will take you to my chief but first you must sit and be my guest a while." The chief agreed. After all, he did travel a distance and needed to rest before his battle. Mataquana sat by a rock while his host was preparing something to eat. "Would you like something to drink?" Gadao asked as he shook a coconut tree and all the coconuts fell to the ground. He then took a coconut and squeezed it with his bare hands. Mataquana seeing this, thought to himself, 'If this man is this strong, his chief must be ten times as strong.' This scared Mataquana. He no longer wanted to battle Chief Gadao and decided to head home instead. He jumped into his galaide' and started to paddle for north. Gadao could not resist and jumped into the galaide' and began to paddle the opposite direction. The two chiefs were so strong the galaide' split in half sending Chief Gadao into a mountain indenting it creating a cave. Today, that cave is known as Chief Gadao's Cave.

Guahan- Guam Inalahan- Inarajan Galaide'- Canoe  At 4:30 AM Saturday morning Darren and I visited the Emergency Room for a suspected peritonsilar abscess.  Thankfully he is okay and his airways are not blocked, but sadly he still has sharp pain with swallowing and can barely talk.  I hope and pray he gets better soon!  The rest of the day he lay in agony.  I went to camp meeting for church but then came back to the house to make sure he was still breathing.  I kept Darren company today while he is still recovering, but went for a few hours to my capoeira group's baptizado beach picnic.  I unfortunately missed the baptizado (It was on Saturday and I wasn't sure how I felt about going to it on Sabbath.  Plus, I wanted to stay with Darren and make sure he was okay.), but it was still fun to have fiesta today with Mestre Paulo Batuta from San Diego and Las Vegas, Contramestre Manchinha, Contramestre Malandro in Oakland, and Instuctor Zumbi from South Korea as well as visiting, hang out with everybody, and working on moves.  We also visited a Chamorro Village being built right near the ocean.  It is going to be a sort of "Plymouth Plantation" style interpretation center to keep the Chamorro culture alive.  I was quite impressed because the men living there can play sea shells and have carved numerous canoes out of logs. I dropped by the apartment to see how Darren was doing again, and he agreed to go with me to watch the Roda.  It was super fun gazing in awe as the mestre, contra mestres, and instructor played each other and the students. The first video is from some seriously intense capoeira tonight.  Instructor Zumbi got a bloody nose from hitting it on his knee.  Ouch.

Piti Channel Tuesday Night Dive

Darren and I dove our first solo night dive together.  We saw lots of fish, nudibranchs, but even more urchins!  It was a bit scary diving through the various tunnels under the road because of the intense surges and the urchins covering the ceiling and walls.

Bile Bacteria Bay and Magellan

Saturday night we were watching the olympics and playing games at a friend's house when Aaron suggested that we do a 5K on Sunday--meeting up at 5AM and then running at 6.  I was wishy washy about it due to the early call time, but Sunday morning Darren dragged me out of bed, dropped me at the starting line, and then he went back to sleep (he had to go to work at 8AM).  Aaron, me, and a heap of other runners ran down the Tumon strip and back.  Aaron and I were both shocked because he got second in his age category and I got first place in mine at 26 minutes and 12 seconds.  (We both got seventh place over all in the men and women categories.  All the 30 and 40 year old women kicked my bootwah).

After Darren got off work and I had a much needed nap, we went on our first solo shore dive at Bile Bay.  There was a sign at the entrance that said no swimming within 400 feet due to bacteria, but we fully ignored it.  Probably not too smart, but we had fun.

Umatac has been having cultural nights all month because March is the month when Magellan "discovered" Guam.  Really, can one "discover a place that already is inhabited?  I think not.


Umatac bay where historians have claimed that Magellan made his first landing on Guam