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From an Island in Palau

    Ponciana Rafael is a coworker of mine at an Elementary school in Glendale.  Over the past two years, I heard snippets of her stories from Palau, but I was never able to sit and chat with her.  This project gave me the opportunity to do so.  I spent a Saturday afternoon at Ponciana's home sharing a few "drinks" and enjoying her wonderful stories of Palau and  how she migrated to the United States. The following testimony is from an interview conducted on April 30th, 2005. For a full copy of this transcript and recording, please e-mail me.

  

     My name is Ponciana Rafael. I was born and raised for the first fourteen years of my life in Angar, Palau which is the smallest island of Palau. And, at age fourteen, after eighth grade I traveled to United States bringing my two nephews and a niece. And, we left Palau September 1, and we made our way to Yap. We stop at Yap and then from Yap to Guam. When we got to Guam, we got detained for two weeks because we didn’t have passport and …. Due to the fact that I didn’t speak a word of English, I understood, but didn’t speak. I had a sister that was going to the University of Guam at the time and she’s the one that came and pick us up at the airport. And, because we didn’t have our passport, they went through all my stuff. They opened all the suitcase, boxes, they took my purse, dumped it out, scared the life out of me. Not to mention the three little kids that were with me. And my sister was screaming to let her come and translate for them because, you know, they were scaring me. And, they wouldn’t let her. And, finally they let her … they released me and my niece and my nephews and we went with my sister. But, we had to stay with her at all time while we were there. We couldn’t even go visit my other sister. Cause, were you live in Guam in Military air force. And so they’re very strict about when you coming there and you don’t the right document or right paper work. They tend to come over to the house unexpectedly and check on you. Make sure you’re not trying to sneak in the country, without permission. We lived on the base anyway. It wasn’t hard for them to find me or come and check on us. After two weeks finally our passports showed up. So then we traveled to Hawaii and from Hawaii we went to Los Angeles and from there to Michigan. And all along the way all I had to explain where I was going was three by five piece of card that said who was, where I was going and please help me get to my next flight. And, that’s how I traveled from Palau to United States. With that little three by five card.

“If I left here, I would miss my oven.  I would miss my microwave. I would miss constant running water. The showers. The warm showers... I would miss my friends the most.”

 

     When you travel from Palau to Hawaii you get out, you’re outside. K, and they bus you to the terminal or the customs or something, where they go through your stuff. But, once I got to LA it was inside the building. And, they were nothing but a bunch of white people. Not to sound racist, but, I’ve never been a place where there were a lot of people that blonde, blue eyes, you know. Different color of hair, different height, even tall women. I’ve never seen tall women. And women are taller than men. And I was just in awe of TV’s surrounding you. I’ve never seen a TV. So, to see the monitors … now, I know they’re monitors, but back then I thought they were TV’s. Wow, we can watch movie, you know, while we’re walking. This was pretty cool. But, I was you know … they keep telling me walk this way, walk this way, you know, you gotta go this way. And that’s when I knew I was in … and I’m like we landed inside, instead of outside. Is there and outside to this place? Am I gonna get lost? Or end up somewhere and they’re gonna ship me off to another place. And all I could do was, “I hope my sister shows up soon.” And then some tall man came and asked well you have eight hour layover. I knew what that meant because my brother in law had called and told me if they ask you if you wanna to stay for layover, say “no.” And that’s the only word I needed to know. “Yes” or “no”.

     It was scary, because for one, I didn’t speak English and two; I was just a kid myself. I was only fourteen. I was straight out of eight grade. And, I’m traveling across Pacific Ocean to another country I’ve never been to with three little kids with me. Was not dressed properly because it was already cold in Michigan. We had no winter clothes. Had sandals and shorts and t-shirt. And, I … first time I ever felt what it was like to be in cold weather. And, it was already cold. It was like, forty degrees when we landed. And, I thought I had landed in ice box. And, I asked my sister at the airport, “Are we in a ice box?” She said, “No you’re at the airport, the terminal. It’s cold here.” I said, “Oh.”

     Families back there is very big. A lot of times the older kids, and I, been pulled out of school to help the parents raise the little ones. For example, my whole family … we had fifteen. There’s fifteen of us. Two of from my dad’s first marriage. Which my sisters never claim. I claim them all, because they’re both … even though they’re half brother and sister; they’re still my brother and sister. But, growing you know all my nieces and nephews. My sister moved away, left them behind. I took care of them and went to school myself. And a lot of them were my own age, but. But, that’s how it was when my sister was growing up. They got pulled out school to work in the gardens and gather whatever. We didn’t have stores or hospital or anything like that, so. A lot of food you had to go and find it. It’s there, around the house. There’s vegetables and stuff growing everywhere. You just had to go pick it, or dig it up or go hunt for it, or fish it out of water. But, your parents can’t do that for all the kids are at home. So, a lot of times the siblings had to pitch in and do that work and that’s how you got pulled out of school. I consider myself lucky that I made it all the way through high school. I guess that’s what my mom wanted me to do. That’s why she send me here. And another thing a lot of girls get pregnant right out of eighth grade and have kids.

 

“Bats, for instance, are one of my favorite food.”

 

     Think you know people from the island have it easy and it’s beautiful. Yeah, it’s a beautiful place to live but the stress of raising kids and not having enough food sometimes, but you really don’t need money unless you drink, or smoke, or drink coffee. And, that’s pretty much what you need money for. Otherwise, everything is grown right there on the island. If you know what’s edible then you will never starve but, if you depend on that stuff then you need money. My dad only made thirty dollars a month fishing, on a fishing boat.

     You know, back home we’re all same color. My dad always taught us that we all bled the same color blood. Growing up we used to be drilled that all the time. It didn’t matter what color outside.... cause we had Japanese people come down. They looked different. But, we didn’t look at them that way. And, Americans, black ... soldiers that came. So, my dad taught us never to look at people. So, in high school I used to hear this ... I was the only colored ... that’s another thing. I was the only dark skinned person in that whole entire high school. And, didn’t even know it. Cause, I had a lot of friends that treated for who I am, not the color of my skin. But, then there were lot of kids that, you know, “That black, that negro girl ... that little girl, I heard my be little, but she’ll kick your ass and tear you up and blah, blah, blah,” And, I’m like, who they talking? Who’s the nigger girl? And, my friends would laugh because they knew they were talking about me. And they go, “Oh, don’t worry about it.”

 

 "The life over there so simple you know how to survive on island. You can build fire anywhere. You could cook anything. There’s food everywhere.”

    

I got a lot of discrimination from teachers; my math teacher especially. Cause, high school back east, you know, they still have those heating systems in the wall. It’s no central heating. And, so you have to go to your class in your jackets. It was just cold. And he would make me take my jacket off and throw it out the window. And, then after his class I would have to go out and get it. He told me I wasn’t allowed to wear jacket in his class. And then everyday if, all I had to is turn my head and he’d make me sit under the ping pong table in the back of the room and if I couldn’t see the words that was my problem. But, I didn’t know I could tell my brother all that and my sister. I thought it that it was just the way Americans treated students if we were bad. I didn’t know I was bad. I could’ve been warned. “Don’t turn your head, you know, you’re supposed to be looking at the board.” But, didn’t matter what I did. And, I got stuck with that same teacher. His name is Mr. Stevens. I even know where his house. What town he lived in. I never forget his name. And then when my nieces and nephews that I brought here to the state went through him, they went through the same thing. But, they were smart enough to say something about it. I didn’t. I didn’t know about it. And, they used to say you know don’t date this, they called the black guys the “n” word, they said because they’ll rape you and throw you in a ditch. Well, I didn’t know what that word meant. Different color than what I’ve seen. Cause, in that town there was no black people living there. That town is very all white. But, I didn’t feel any prejudice. I didn’t realize I was being treated that way until I left and then hear my nieces and nephews tell me about. Cause, when I came here to Arizona When I graduate in 1976. That was like, um, what is that ... what’s the significant of that year? Bicentennial. Mmhmm. That year. When the first time I really got a harsh reality of what racism is all about. Because you know, it’s so... diversity. You know, you got Mexicans, you got black and they’re all right here. Where over there I didn’t see any. I didn’t consider myself dark. I thought I was just (inaudible) but, that’s how they treated me, and not just my math teacher, a few other teachers. But it was cool. I survived it. I made it through.

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 MM 05/11/05
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