The Need to Feed the World
I come from a long line of farmers.
I come from a long line of farmers. My parents were born with the passion to nourish and feed people. Their method of choice is food. Mine is emotional nourishment, personal empowerment, and hope.
They live to feed people; it is ingrained in the Chamorro culture. If you are not feeding someone who visits you, you are a disgrace to your culture. You can’t just offer them tea and a cookie. You have to offer them a full meal, either cooking for them or offering any quality leftovers in the refrigerator. If the person declines the meal because they ate already or they are not hungry, a true Chamorro will insist that you sit down at the table and eat the food, even if we have to spoon feed it into your mouth. I grew up watching my parents descend upon visitors as if it’s their last goal in life to make sure the person eats something before they leave our house. It felt like if the person didn’t eat, it was a reflection of their failure to be hospitable. Their parents were watching, and their ancestors were judging who can coax the person to reach for that spoon and scoop up a ball of rice.
The poor unsuspecting soul would either be so traumatized by this force-feeding event or come back hungry knowing that no matter what time they show up, they will be fed. I have seen firsthand people come to my parent’s home just to eat because they know without fail food will be placed in front of them if they walk through the door. People used to come unannounced and even uninvited just to feed their bellies. What added to the cause was that my mom is an exceptional cook, and everyone knew it. My dad was a good cook too, but he was often left in the shadows compared to my mom. It was my mom’s cooking and my dad’s gregarious personality that had every Chamorro person visiting us in droves, often in large vans of people knocking on our door.
My father’s father was a third-generation farmer so feeding people is in his blood. My parents didn’t spend their money on fancy cars and expensive vacations, they fed people. There were only four in our nuclear family and the average grocery bill was $600! This was at a time when milk was only $2.50 a gallon.
We didn’t eat caviar or champagne or wagyu steaks so you can imagine how much food we had! It was so much food that it actually ended up being wasteful. But when you grow up poor, starve for some months (farming season), compete with your ten siblings for food, and you come to the land of plenty (America) and see that you can buy anything, of course it makes sense to me that my parents loaded that grocery cart like there was no tomorrow.
This kind of mentality shaped me. This ancestral programming has deeply affected the way I feel about food and cooking. I hate cooking. If I never chop another onion or garlic again, I will live a blissful life. Feeding someone food does not bring me joy or pleasure. I love eating and trying new dishes, but I hate cooking. I hate everything about it. Deciding on what to cook. Organizing the ingredients. Grocery shopping. Cleaning the vegetables, sauteing the meat. Chopping the ingredients. Putting them away in the refrigerator or pantry. Washing the dishes. I hate it all. Every aspect of it. It does not float my boat. If we still lived in Guam and I had to inherit the farming land, I probably would have sold the farm. That is not my element. I love plants but I don’t want to grow anything largescale like that and be responsible for bringing food to people’s dinner tables. No thank you. I’d rather eat glass.
But these are my parents through and through. Even to this day, my dad in his late seventies cooks his delicious escabeche, which is not an easy dish and requires layers of cooking! In his apartment complex, he is known as the man to bring food to the families who cannot afford food. He barbecues on a holiday like Fourth of July and invites everyone in the complex to join him. He even grew a small garden and welcomed the rest of the apartment complex to partake in his strawberries, kale, and snap peas despite the apartment office warning him that he can’t farm anything on their grounds.
My mother is still baking her pastit and frying her empanadas late into 1 AM even after a full day’s work at her part-time job. They are still feeding people to this day! No thank you. I am going to sleep.
I know one day, years later, when they have gone to heaven and I miss them dearly, I will regret not learning how to make their favorite dishes. I know I’ll crave the delicious food that they cooked with love, but I have accepted that it is not my forte and a tradition I want to carry forward with me. What I will take with me is my parent’s good heart and their generosity to make people feel loved and appreciated. Whilst my parents used food as a vehicle to love people, I will use words as my vehicle to offer people love and joy. I hope I “feed” as many people as they have.
Excerpt from the manuscript, The Year I Forgave My Parents. Update on the status of the manuscript; I finished the first round of editing and now will do a second round before sending to the publisher for review. Thank you for all your support.
The first day of 2024. The last week of December was very intense. Everyone was shedding old ancestral programming that we can’t bring into 2024. People were processing a lot of unfinished emotions that didn’t get the attention they deserved. If you have been a hot mess lately and wondering what is going on, you are not alone. The end of the year usually hits like that.
Last week I was deeply affected by the death of my favorite actor Lee Sun Kyung. If you haven’t heard of him, he played the role of the wealthy husband/dad in the movie Parasite. I’m not going to go into the whole cancel culture of South Korea in this article because I want to honor his death with love and hope, not judgment and dissent. I pray that he finds peace in his heart wherever he is.
A New Year’s Eve tradition in my family is to create a vision board for the new year. We review our vision board we made the prior year and see what we have accomplished and what we need to modify or remove. We celebrate the goals we have manifested. We spend time in reflection and gratitude of the past year. We welcome the new year with new goals and wishes.
Happy New Year Everyone! ✨🎉