Group to help bridge cultures
By Vicki Viotti
Advertiser Staff Writer
Micronesians, a growing community of people coping with their immersion in a strange urban culture, are starting to create footholds and havens to make Honolulu seem a little less foreign.
About 8,000 Micronesians, many seeking work in the face of economic troubles at home, live in Hawai'i, according to the 2000 U.S. Census. It's a population that includes those from the Marshall Islands, as well as Guam, Palau and the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM). Even within these governments, there are separate islands, each with distinct cultures.
But Micronesians in general find the Western way of doing things unfathomable, being more accustomed to seeking help from family and community than from government agencies.
Into this void step people like Tender RickySach, a man from the FSM state of Chuuk who is forming a nonprofit organization called On'op Hawai'i Networking Association.
They'll start small, he said, in hopes that the association can open a resource center to help the Chuukese and eventually all the Micronesian groups navigate their way through Hawai'i.
"Back home, we rely on the help of the family," RickySach said. "Here, we have to live with the system."
The help is needed in all facets of life. Speaking through RickySach as an interpreter, association member Kition Soda said he remembers feeling overwhelmed by everything about Honolulu's urban reality.
"Here, Micronesians see a lot of things, and they don't know where to go," Soda said. "That's one of the advantages of a resource center."
But there are specifics, such as dealing with the flood of information that comes home with schoolchildren each day. Billa Enlet, a Mililani mother of three, said when she first arrived from Chuuk about four years ago, her youngest brought home forms she was to sign without understanding what they said.
"They're OK now," she said of her children. "But when they came back with their letter from the teacher, sometimes I don't understand ... sometimes when they get the paper, I put 'yes, yes, yes' — and the answer isn't 'yes.' "
Beyond adjusting to the school system, RickySach said, Micronesians could use direction in everything from finding a vocational training class to meeting requirements of job applications.
All of this means that pulling together a resource center is an enormous undertaking that will require a broad base of support, said Danny Rescue, senior consul at the FSM Consulate.
Rescue responded to the same need by helping to found a private mutual association of about 300 Chuukese to start, called the Chuwaiian Club, in which members pay dues to help cover expenses in the event of a family death or other challenge. The group — not unlike similar associations established by Koreans, Japanese and other immigrant groups upon arrival in Hawai'i — also will provide a place to promote culture among the Chuukese who live here, he said.
Meanwhile, RickySach has embarked on the long road toward establishing the resource center by seeking some pro bono advice from a consultant, Jim Cathey.
Cathey is helping the network file its 501c3 form to claim tax-exempt status, and is helping the group find seed money and develop a more long-term plan.
RickySach, who was deputy mayor of the Chuukese island of Oneop, said he doesn't expect to secure much money from his government. The FSM has just signed a new Compact of Free Association with the United States due to take effect in October, but the agreement provides for less American financial support than the previous 20-year compact did.
So private foundations will be the target for On'op, he said, and in the meantime the group hopes to find a temporary office space as a launching pad. Anyone with leads to resources can contact him at 372-5907 or by e-mail (tenritrs@yahoo.com).
If the challenge is great, so is the dream. The group feels a need to help fellow Micronesians, he said, but members don't want the outreach to end there.
"The intent is to work with Micronesians, but part of our goal is to work globally," he said. "The word 'on'op,' it has a meaning as the utmost result of peace."
Reach Vicki Viotti at vviotti@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8053.
