One for Noah, One for Tali

After (what) 8 years of moving from Saipan to Portland, OR, Noah is coming home for a visit.  Last time I saw him was 2 years ago when Tali graduated from high school.  I wanted to give him something special - something that reminds him of his island roots, and that he will always be family to me.

It has been a while since I made one, but I cut a Spondylus (Thorny oyster) salape' or alas (money) pendant representing him, and a Tridacna (giant clam or hima in Chamorro) representing his big family (me included) always surrounding him with love and protection, no matter where in the world they are.  The Spondylus shell and beads were highly valued by the ancient people - nowadays, it is a symbol of their identity and connection to the past.   

Of course, I had to cut one for his big sister, Tali.  She got stuck in VA and pretty bummed that she couldn't visit Saipan.  I was bummed as well.  I will look forward to seeing her again, hopefully this year.

This bead is one of the prettiest I've ever found and cut.  Beauty and resiliency for my Tali.

I miss you both and love you very much.  Till we meet again...

Ti napu,

The Beachcomber

Can't Sleep Project

I couldn't sleep last night. I don't think I got enough rest since I got back and now my coughing has relapsed this entire weekend. I was pretty restless flipping through pages of my current reading materials and flipping through scenes of the movie I was playing. I was stuck in insomnia land and the sandman was nowhere in sight.

I noticed some cord laying around that I rolled together while I was on Managaha Island two weeks ago. I was invited by the SDA School to do outdoor classes and I decided to do a nature walk with the younger kids to talk about plants and natural history. At the end of the walk, I picked up a dried screwpine (Pandanus tectorius) leaf, ripped off the spines and started thigh-twisting the strands to cordage. The Chamorros name for this particular screw pine is pahong. I was surprised how tough the cord was after I rolled it. Here's a post with a tutorial on how to make cordage.
I also had a giant clam (Tridacna maxima) bead I took off from a necklace about a year ago that was just lying around unused. I decided to take it off of the nylon cord I had originally used and make a more natural piece. The Chamorro word for giant clam is hima and they called the shell money/ornamental beads, salape'.Hima is very difficult to cut and carve since its calcite-aragonite matrix is very hard, finely-packed and so crystal-like that it cracks easily when it gets heated. Here is the finished piece.
I had a few extra strands of the leaf to roll a smaller cord for the salape' attachment. It is pretty tiring to roll the tiny cord with your fingers.
I still need a lot of help with my technique. Can you see where I cheated? It's my secret.

Sadly, I did not have enough of the pahong leaf to use on the loop, and had to resort to using black nylon cordage. Here is a simple loop and knot for the necklace clasp.

Voila'. It's done.

Well, I am glad of the finished product since it is mostly all natural materials. I need more practice to really get the binding of these things done well. Come to think of it, I haven't had a lot of time lately to make any more necklaces.
I did accomplish to get sleepy after everything was done so the project suited me well for the time it took.

Ti napu.

The Beachcomber.

PS. Oops! I misnamed the leaf that I used. There are two types of native screwpines in the Marianas: Pandanus tectorius which the natives call kafu' and Pandanus dubious which is locally called pahong. I have a picture of both in this entry. Check them out in the Guam Forestry website.

Chamidae- Jewel Box of the sea

So far I’ve been sharing a bit of what I know of the importance of the spiny oyster family Spondylidea to the ancient people of Micronesia especially to the Chamorros of the Mariana Islands of Guahan (Guam), Saipan, Tinian and Luta (Rota). The Spondylus bivalve (marine seashells with two valves) is sessile, cementing their shells to corals or rocks, which the ancient people collected live or dead washed up on the beach. Usually it is the top valve that were cut and polished into salape’ (coin-shaped ornaments) that were bound together by natural cord fibers. At times the whole valve was kept intact, polished, and a hole or two were drilled in them to accommodate binding.

I’ve experimented and developed somewhat of a hobby replicating these artifacts and experimenting with other pendant shapes. I’d like to expand more in this blog what information I’ve collected on the biology and taxonomy of the Spondylus, but it is very difficult to distinguish between the species because of the numerous variations in shapes, forms, colors and sizes. I’ll put this part of my blogging on hold for a while until I get more information and better identifiable samples. Instead I would like to talk about a closely related family, the Chamidae.

The bivalves of the family Chamidae looks much like a spiny oyster because of their projecting spines and radial ridges. Because of their great beauty, they are commonly called Jewel Boxes. They are heavy thick shells that are a bit rounded, with the top valve flatter than the deeply concave bottom valve. I found that you could distinguish a Chamidae from a Spondylus by looking at the hinge and the muscle scar inside of the shells. The Spondylus has two strong interlocking teeth-like hinges (A) and one adductor muscle scar (A1), while the Chama has a single tooth (B) that fits in a groove of the opposite valve and two muscle scars (B1). An internal black ligament connects the valves of the Spondylus, while the Chama’s ligament is external.

According to the Micronesica Vol. 35-36, June 2003 issue (G. Paulay, ed.), Guam has about nine species recorded including Chama aperella, C. brassica, C. fibula, C. iostoma, C. lazarus, C. macerophylla, C. pacifica, C. spinosa and one unidentified. The absence of reference materials with good photo representations are hard to come by so this adds to the difficulty in positively identifying some of the samples that I have collected. The Marine Biodiversity of Guam and the Mariana Islands website has a few pictures that you can check out to help identify local invertebrates: http://128.227.186.212/reefs/guamimg/bivalvia/index.html

Chama limbula
On top of the difficulty in identifying what type of Chamidae you may have, finding shell samples while beachcombing is equally challenging. The following sample is a rare beachcombing find since the two valves were intact together. It is a Chama limbula (Lamark, 1819). It doesn’t look like a shell to be fascinated about from the outside since it is encrusted with white coralline algae and whatever spines it may have had have been eroded. Iinside it has almost a gemlike polished quality with purple coloration in the margins and a light jade-like green. The bottom valve is deep and the top is somewhat flattened. It is about 90mm at the longest measurement. I found it at Obyan Beach, Saipan in August 2005. I’ve made pendants out of these shells as you’ll read a bit latter on this post.

Chama asperella
The next few pictures below are the different views of the upper valve of what I think is Chama asperella (Lamark, 1819). It is a small Jewel Box that is mostly white with a pink umbone, or the pointed structure where the beak or the initial point of shell growth is. It is about 29mm at the longest measurement and is fairly strong and thick. Here's a picture of one in situ: http://128.227.186.212/reefs/guamimg/bivalvia/index.html

The next two set of pictures maybe C. asperella since they are mostly white, but they have purple radial coloration. This makes me think that they maybe a different species. There are not enough resources at the time for me to make a definitive call. They measure 2mm and 19mm in length respectively.

Unidentified purple Chama
The next set of pictures is the external and internal views of a common Jewel Box that you can find washed up on many of the Saipan beaches. They are usually eroded or covered with encrusting algae. I don’t have a positive identification for these purple Chamas yet but they are fascinating nonetheless. Can anyone help me with the identification? Are they just another variety of C. asperella? They are usually small with the largest pictured here at only 20mm at the longest measurement.




Unidentified pink Chama
The next set of pictures is of again an unidentified Chama of which I pick up fragments infrequently at Wing Beach, Saipan. It has a pink hue and a pronounced undulating growth pattern. Anyone know what I is? It is comparatively of larger size in size to C. asperella at 58mm lengthwise.

Unidentified orange Chama (C. pacifica?)
This small 28mm sample of an orange tinged upper valve of an unidentified Chama is fascinating to me since a few spines are still intact. I’ve also included a few picture views of some similarly colored fragments. Anyone know what they are? I'm kind of leaning towards Chama pacifica (Broderip, 1834) but am not totally convinced yet until I see a better sample.

Unidentified spondylus-like Chama
I mistook the shells pictured next in external and internal views for young Spondylus. A closer look though revealed two adductor muscle scars and the strange striped pattern that occurs in Chama limbula (visible when the surface is ground). I wonder if these are just young C. limbula of are they a different species. The valves are quite thin and light, and the longest one is only 29mm.

Chama lazarus and Chama brassica
Finally, pictured below is what looks like the Lazarus Jewl Box (Chama lazarus, Linnaeus 1758). It is generally easy to identify since they are almost often white, with large scaly flattened spines. I don’t have any intact samples with both valves but here are pictures of separate top and bottom valves with the inner and outer views of the shells. They are popular with collectors when intact and the ones that are highly prized have extended forked spines.

I thought all of the samples pictured below were C. lazarus but the more closely I looked, the top middle and right samples were not shaped round like the other samples and their spines are short and scaly. I think that these maybe Chama brassica (Reeve, 1846) instead.

A Jewel Box for your jewel box

I haven’t found any evidence in my research for information about the ancient Chamorros utilizing Chama for ornamentation. It is well documented though that the Solomon Island natives cut and polished Chama pacifica (Romu in their language) into ornamental beads. They actually bring out the shell’s red color by exposing them to fire. Their money beads are called Tafuliae and you can read about them here and see some pictures: http://toabaita-authority.blogspot.com/2006/03/note-on-shell-money-tafuliae-that-is.html It is amazing how Tafuliae looks vey much like the Spondylus salape' beads that the ancient Chamorros made!

While beachcombing, I happened upon a polished upper valve of what I knew to be a bivalve at the time. It had an amazing swirl of colors and patterns that was unknown to me and it was ovoid in shape, which made it easy for me to visualize as a pendant. After reading a bit more and comparing the few samples that I was able to pick up, I concluded that these were Chama limbula valves.

It seems that the Chama’s growth pattern on the top valve is an outward and forward moving swirl. As the animal grows and build upon its shell different colors are produced that may include white, browns, pinks, purples, and greens. A strange striped pattern occurs as the animal builds layers on top and away from almost the opposite side of the hinge. You wouldn’t know that these colors and patterns were present because in nature, the shells are often covered with coralline growth from algae or sponges, or they may even be eroded. To expose the colors, I had to grind the surface and chose (or guessed really) how much of the colors or patterns to expose. I usually leave the natural shape of the shell.

Below is the biggest Chama limbula valve that I happened upon thus far. It is about 50mm at the longest measurement, and is solid and heavy. It turned into a gorgeous piece.

The purple swirl patterns of the next piece surprised me when I ground into it. How can such a small object hold so much beauty? This one is about 31mm in length.

The next picture below was the first Chama that I found and made into a pendant. The ocean did the polishing for me, the shape is natural and uncut, and I actually just drilled a hole to accommodate the binding.

The next piece below has a very busy color pattern of brown, pink and white, and it even has a hint of blue. I paired it with a smaller type of Chamidae made into a salape’ or coin-shaped bead. The smaller bead is one of the unidentified purple Chamidea polished.

Thanks again for letting me share

The Beachcomber

Kelli's alahas

Harry B. loves the ocean and her creatures just as I do. He has been very kind in donating Spondylus shells for me to work with. The the only thing that he asked me for was a finished alahas for his wonderful wife, Kelli. Here is a picture of the Spondylus salape' that I put together for Kelli's alahas. These beads are of the classical color and shape much like the ancient Chamorros made them. Of course, I make them the conventional way using an electric rotary tool. I hope she likes the finished product!

Thanks again for letting me share.

The Beachcomber

Laurina and the moon

My friend Yerma R. sent me a forwarded email about National Friendship Week that listed several virtues of what a true friend is. The original email was sent sometime in October and I can’t seem to Google when the actual dates of the week are. Anyway, I usually don’t even read emails that are of the “FW:” kind but it just so happened that I have been thinking about posting about my best friend here on Saipan. I thought I should get some good solid quotations and sayings regarding friendship, but I decided against it because they don’t seem so genuine. I’ll just list a few things that I appreciate about my best friend recently here and end this blog describing a piece that I cut for her.

• You are quick to laugh at my stupidity, and quick to forgive my faults
• Once, we argued for a whole semester and didn’t talk or even look at each other. Now, our arguments don’t even last a day
• It’s important to me that we pray together, although I do most of the praying out loud
• I know that I can trust you with anything, and you will see anything through
• You think that I am so smart, and pretend that I am a genius even though you know that I am BS-ing
• When I got into a car accident in May, you cleaned up my house so that I would have space for my peg leg and crutches to fit. You cooked for me many meals after the accident, got mad when I wanted to work after a week, and became my personal RN
• You were willing to try new things with me even though they made you uncomfortable (sounds questionable I know, but I am just really talking about badminton and lifting weights …Hahaha!)
• You are my beachcombing buddy that always wants to go outside with me (oftentimes, the one telling me to get up off my butt)
• You’ve done my laundry, filed my taxes, lent me money and are my personal unflinching dermatologist (I am so glad you are a nurse)
• In public, you are fearless to let me know if I’ve got a boogie or if my breath stinks so that I don’t embarrass myself
• You are good at what you do and I trust you professionally as a colleague
• You laugh when you want to laugh. You sing when you want to sing. You do it both in your own style, but always with class
• Although you and I don’t have a lot of money, you are not cheap in our friendship
• Your heart is gold
• I am glad that you can eat a meal now without rice, but if the meal does come with rice, I still need you to limit my intake
• You believe and you are proud of me
• Your kids and your family love me because you love me
• Your friends think I am special because I am special to you
• You’re willing to see foreign films, documentaries, and anything I want to see that’s not so mainstream from the Block (but how far from mainstream can you really get at Blockbuster?)
• You don’t think I am effeminate when I sing and make actions to Best Days by Matt White
• You like reading my blog and are critical of the things I write
• You’ve seen me through three tough breakups and was always there when I needed you, and gave me space when I needed to be alone
• When my last GF proposed that we get married, you were willing to be my Best (wo)Man and wear a tuxedo
• You are strong when I am weak (because you know that I am all about the drama, baby)
• You understand my “idzi nu iptakcho pabo ya”
• The egotistical married jackasses that always seem to flirt with you have no clue that they are so tiny and so out of your league. Guys, you’re making other guys look bad for being so dumb!
• You know the most about mi Gabriella
• You can find anything that I lose in my house (She says that if "that" was detachable, I would lose it too!)
• You are so beautiful; thank goodness you allowed yourself that backless outfit!
• I thank God for putting you in my life everyday
  Etcetera, etcetera, etcetera….

This is my best friend, Laurina B. I could list so many more things about her here, but words will never do her justice, nor justice to how lucky I am to have her as a friend.

Here is my bru, Laurina with some of our friends (Jeanette, Grace, and Chi) at the Thursday Night Street Market in Garapan Saipan. Laurina always gets coconut juice while I get the beef barbecue sticks.

Laurina is wearing Pulan yan Tasi (moon and sea), a piece made of hima salape’ (giant clam money bead) and a square Spondylus pendant. Hima is hard to cut because it is dense and crystalline. It chips and cracks if it gets too hot while cutting, grinding or polishing. The square Spondylus piece is an uncommon color very different from the traditional orange colored Spondylus salape’ that the ancient Chamorros fashioned. The shell fragment that I fashioned it from polished quite nicely, but it was rough and eroded when I found it. Even though it is pretty solid, it is thin and only a few millimeters in thickness. This square design, I also owe to Laurina and it reminds me of the moon above the sea at night with its reflection in the water and the waves.

In Chamorro legend, the moon came from the god Puntan, who before dying, transferred his extraordinary powers to his sister, Fu’una and requested that his body parts be put to creative use. She created the beautiful island of Guahan using Puntan’s body: his back for the earth, his chest for the sky, his eyebrows as the rainbows, the right eye as the sun, and the left eye as the stars and moon. This legend illustrates the link that the Chamorro people believe they have to the sun, the moon and the stars. Just like the gualafon (full moon) Laurina brightens my life everyday on Saipan.

Thanks for being my friend, and thanks for letting me share once again.

The Beachcomber

Haguet: fish hook pendants

Saipan Triguy, Lewie T. asked about hooks that the ancient Chamorros used for fishing on a comment on one of my earlier posts. On this post, I'd like to share with you a bit on what I found out for myself regarding this topic as I also wanted to experiment with making fish hook pendants.

Fish hook pendants are very popular nowadays since they look quite masculine, evoking feelings of strength, skill, prosperity and a cultural connection to the vast blue sea. The most popular designs are based on functional and contemporary Polynesian designs, especially from Aotearoa (New Zealand).

The ancient Polynesians did not have metal on their islands so other materials that were hard yet be carve-able were used for their fish hooks or matau. Materials such as shell, wood, human bone, and whale bone and teeth were utilized much like in Micronesia.

Because of their popularity though, there are a lot of low-quality mass produced Polynesian-style carved hooks that you can practically find in any tourist shop or on the internet. Even admiring a decent looking matau in Waikiki’s International Market did not guarantee an “authentic” Polynesian hook as I was told, “No. This one is made in Thailand.” Here are two pictures of a bone Maori-style matau that my good friend Greg M. got while vacationing in Bali. It doesn't look too bad really, and it even has some nicely carved designs on the bottom of it.
I like the stories though that come along in obtaining a unique piece. A lot of people belive that these special pendants contain Mana or spiritual power and the essence of the maker and then the wearer. I am really a big fan of the Polynesian matau designs and will probably make some in the near future. How did the ancient Micronesians design their fish hooks? I asked this question as I explored the idea of making my first hooks based more on ancient Chamorro or Micronesian designs.

Like the Polynesians, the ancient Chamorros also used shells, wood, bone, and teeth to manufacture this very important tool that was relied on for obtaining food from the sea. The Chamorro word for hook is haguet. (Incidentally, haguet is very similar to the Tagalog word for hook, kawit or kalawit, again showing an Austronesian connection in the languages.) The most abundant fishing hook artifact that archeologist have found are made from tree oysters or tooth pearl shells from the family Isognomonidae.

Isognomons are closely related to pearl oysters (Pinctada sp.) and are bivalves that are flat compressed-shelled animals that encrust rocks and mangroves. Their interiors are pearly. Here are a couple of tree oysters that I have found on Saipan:

This is Isognomon ephippium or saddle tree oyster (Linnaeus, 1758) which I found in Luta (Rota, CNMI) in August 2005. It usually grows up to 12 cm wide but this specimen is about half of that. Its exterior is dark and black and the shell is flaky. Inside is beautifully nacreous (pearly) and tinged purple.

These are Isognomon perna (Linnaeus, 1767), also known as false pearl oyster or rayed tree oyster, that I found in Obyan Beach, Saipan. They are nacreous inside and their exteriors are an off-white color usually with broken brown radial stripes.
Here is a picture from the CNMI Museum of History and Culture, Saipan that depicts the process of making a haguet from an Isognomon shell. I really wish I had a better close up picture because you can see that the finished haguet looks very different from the actual sea shell.

The finished haguet is looks crystalline because the shell is ground down to expose the aragonite mineral of the shell. Isognomons produce a bimineralic shell composed of calcium carbonate (outer layer) and aragonite (inside later), a carbonate mineral. It is a hard substance and luminous to look at. Here’s a website with great diagrams of the shell: http://www.futura-sciences.com/fr/comprendre/dossiers/doc/t/zoologie-1/d/la-coquille-des-mollusques-memoire-de-lenvironnement_662/c3/221/p3/

Unfortunately, these shells are too difficult to fashion because of their crystaline structure which are too easy to chip and break when they get too hot from cutting or polishing. They are generally small shells as well which isn't ideal for making pendants.

Compound trolling hooks were also produced by the Micronesians. Again, I consulted The Catalogue of Prehistoric Micronesian Artifacts (Intoh) to look at some examples. The following pictures illustrate the shank part of the compound hook that is made out of the black-lipped pearl oyster, Pinctada margaritifera (Linnaeus, 1758). The shank is cut from edge of the shell and away from the hinge. These illustrations are from artifacts found in the Marshall Islands and Pohnpei.

This is a picture of a P. margaritifera valve that I found. It is bigger than the palm of my hands. It has a beautifully nacreous interior. Its natural beauty prevents me from cutting it into different pendants!

Here's an example of how a trolling lure would look complete. These lures are from Yap that can be found at http://www.pacificworlds.com/yap/sea/fishing.cfm.

The shank is supposedly shapped like a small fish and the pearl oyster is used to simulate a shiny silvery fish that bigger predatory fish would eat. The point itself could be composed of shell, haggan (sea turtle) shell, or bone.

This is my first attempt at a stylized compound trolling haguet. As you can see, it is not yet finished but I am using a piece of nigas (Pemphis acidula) found during a beachcombing expedition for the shank and a beef bone point. I inlayed a piece of rectangular Spondylus on the shank and will have to decide on how to bind all the parts together. I decided to use wood and bone because I really do not have (or have anough of) the actual materials that the islanders used according to the examples that I have seen.

This is my first completed stylized compound haguet also made of nigas (Pemphis acidula) and a beef bone point. I read later after I was done making this hook that nigas was a preferred hard wood for making compound hooks on other islands. That was pure luck! Nigas is so hard that it is called ironwood at some of those places.

Here’s a picture of nigas at Coral Ocean Point, Saipan. The common name is small-leafed mangrove, but it is not a true mangrove. Nigas is a coastal tree that you usually see living on jagged coastal rocks. I read that they can grow into medium sized trees at places, but I’ve only seen them in bush form on Saipan. I also read that they are over harvested in many areas because they make good bonsai trees. Driftwood from this tree is usually a rustic gray but when you cut, shape, sand and polish it, it comes out as a rich dark brown colored wood.

Compound hooks are hard to make, but I will spend some more time learning a better way to produce them. Bone hooks need a little more investigating since the material is not as dense and is easy to scratch. I will need to do more research on how to properly make them, and even maybe order a book about bone carving.

Spondylus was not made into hooks by the ancient Chamorros. I wanted to experiment though and see how these would look like or how they would act as I fashioned them into hook shapes. Now, I am not the first person to fashion Spondylus into hooks mind you. I don't think a lot of people attempt it though because a good piece of Spondylus is an uncommon commodity. I've seen some designs that look as if the artisan was afraid to cut it. Mindfully so I say, since I learned that the fear is well placed as I have lost a few good pieces in attempting the twists and turns of a haguet. It is not easy!

This is my first attempt on making a Spondylus hook. I made it very simple out of a very solid fragment which held a beautiful intense orange color. I paired it with a hima salape’ (giant clam money) and a Spondylus salape’ toggle. Hima is very dense and it chips and cracks when heated making it hard to cut and polish. It was my first attempt with the material and the salape’ has tiny cracks that I decided to keep anyway to remind me of the learning process that I go through in this new hobby of mine. It symbolizes struggle and the hardness and skill you gain going through trials.

Here is another design. This has a hima salape' toggle and a Spondylus salape' on the left side of the cord. It is supposed to represent your korason (heart) and your love for the island.

Lastly, this is another stylized Spondylus haguet. The piece that I cut this from didn’t look too promising when I found it, but I am glad that I took the time to grind off layers from it until I carefully got the sheen that I wanted. This is a favorite piece. I paired this haguet with a Conus miles, or soldier cone salape’ bead.

Thank you for letting me share once again.

The Beachcomber.