Poison in Paradise -- Attacked by a Drunken Man with a Baseball Bat!

Rear window of my Toyota Yaris after baseball bat attack

Rear window of my Toyota Yaris after the baseball bat attack.

On June 20th, 2019, just after I took my father-in-law to his home in Piga Subdivision from the Dededo Senior Citizen’s Center on the island of Guam, after turning right onto the main road of Chalan Koda, I saw a car ahead that was stopped about 50 meters from the intersection. I drove around the car on its left and then saw a man standing in the middle of the road holding a baseball bat. As I drove slowly past the man, he violently swung his baseball bat and smashed the rear window of my Toyota Yaris! Imagine my shock! This is the stuff of nightmares! I found out later that the driver of the car I went around had stopped and even backed up because the man with the baseball bat was throwing rocks at him!

The road is called Chalan Koda in the north part of the Village of Dededo. It’s a rather narrow country road with potholes on both sides of the road. There is always traffic on it and I always slow down when approached by oncoming traffic in the opposite lane because I veer to the right as far as I can where the road is bumpy with holes so as not to rattle the car too much. It’s a road I must drive on 3 to 4 times a week to take my father-in-law home. I had no idea it is also a dangerous area with disgruntled people from the island of Chuuk who live in the jungle next to it. More about them later.

I was all shook up and pulled the car over to the side of the road. Almost immediately 3 men came to see if I was alright. One was the driver of the car I went around. He said he witnessed the whole thing and tried to get a video of it but failed. I called 911 and had a man talk to the police to explain where I was. About 10 minutes later the police came and sped past us as if they knew where the culprit was. About 30 minutes later a police officer came and talked to me and the witness. They believe the suspect is from one of the four islands of the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM) from the island of Chuuk. The four islands are Yap, Chuuk, Pohnpei, and Kosrae. Besides these 4 there is one other island, Palau, that is also in Micronesia but independent of FSM. Among these 5 island people who moved to Guam, mainly the Chuukese people are the troublemakers. The ones who are unemployed drink in the daytime and attack innocent people with rocks, slingshots, and even machetes! Why? In my opinion, it’s probably out of jealously. Most of the Chuukese people are not like them but are hardworking people with jobs. They are ashamed of their fellow countrymen. Except for the Chuukese people, which is only one of the four islands of FSM, there is no other racial profiling on Guam! There are minority Black people, White people like me, Japanese, Koreans, Japanese, Russians, Filipinos, and other island people including the northern Marianas Islands which includes Saipan, Tinian, and Rota. And of course, there are the Chamorro people who are native to Guam. Only the Chuukese have the reputation of being troublemakers.

This is sad because so far besides the man with the baseball bat, every person I have met from the island of Chuuk has been nice to me. My next-door neighbor is a pastor from Chuuk. The local market sales lady is from Chuuk. Some of my co-workers at DFS T-Galleria are from Chuuk. I was even picked up by people from Chuuk when I used to hitchhike the first six months after coming to Guam before we bought the car! I never felt intimidated by them. One of my co-workers, a Japanese lady told me that when the Chuukese drink, they become different people. Alcoholism is a problem on Guam. Liquor is sold at every food shop. Alcohol is the “poison” in the paradise of Guam. Booze is toxic. That’s why it inTOXIcates.

It will cost me and my wife $400 dollars to have the back window fixed in spite of the fact we have car insurance. The insurance company says our policy is a $400 “deductible” whatever that means. Rather than get a rent-a-car from the car dealer, we will use the car as is till we get it fixed. The day after the attack we went to the Home Center to buy thick transparent plastic and attached it with duct tape to keep the rain out. Then we went as instructed by the insurance agency to the car dealer to get an estimate of the cost and see if parts are available. The car dealer ordered the part and they will come sometime in the middle of next month, July, 3 weeks from the attack. $400 out of a paycheck is a big sum for us as it is more than what I make in two weeks and about half of what my wife makes. If any of my readers who appreciates my work on this website would like to donate to help me and my wife Tess pay this money to the car dealer, I would sure appreciate it! We must give the dealer cash. We asked if we could pay in installments but that is not in the car dealer’s policy.