"FRIEND" IN CHAMORRO

ABBOK

Believe it or not, our ancestors knew what friendship was long before their descendants borrowed the Spanish word AMIGO, for male friend, and AMIGA, for female friend.

And so they also had an indigenous word for "friend." ABBOK.

People usually ask, "But how is that word SAID?" Here it is :

But, like many Chamorro words, abbok slowly faded away. Much older speakers know the word, and those who are well-acquainted with Chamorro hymns have seen the word. But speakers even 50 years old are often unfamiliar with the word abbok.

Here are some examples from our Chamorro hymns using the word abbok. In the old days, the word was spelled abog. I will spell it abbok.

MAMES GA'CHONG, MAMES ABBOK. "Sweet Companion, Sweet Friend," speaking about Jesus.

ABBOK YU'US, APOSTOT YAN MÅTTET.  "Friend of God, Apostles and Martyr," speaking of Blessed Diego Luís de Sanvitores.

SEN MASÅMAI HAO ABBOK-HO. "You are very beautiful, my friend," speaking of Mary.

I have an aunt, now in her 70s, who says, whenever she wants to say she is close with somebody, "Gof umabbok ham." "We are very good friends."

AMIGO / AMIGA

Our mañaina (elders) borrowed Spanish words, even when we already had Chamorro words for the same thing. Why not? We do the same with English today. People like finding new ways of saying the same thing. We may need only one pair of shoes, but we have two or three pairs. Variety is the spice of life, even in language.

So, for the word "month," we can say Chamorro pulan or we can say Spanish mes. Our mañaina used either word. If you get injured, your injury can either be called dåño (from Spanish daño) or chetnudan (Chamorro).

So our mañaina also borrowed the Spanish word for "friend," even though they already had abbok. Since Spanish nouns have gender, either male or female, a male friend is amigo and a female friend is amiga. And this became the dominant Chamorro word for "friend." Many people prefer to spell it amigu.

CHAMORRO SONGS WITH "AMIGO / AMIGA"

Dozens of Chamorro songs use the words amigo or amiga, even in the song title. Here are just a few :

The Guam Sirenas recorded a song entitled : Mungnga Yo' Ma Fa' Amiga. It means, "Don't make me a friend." This same song can be changed to amigo if a male is singing. It means the singer wants to be more than a friend. He or she wants romance!

Here are some other song titles and their singers :

HA DINGO YO' I AMIGU-HO (My Friend Left Me) by Perry Borja

ADIOS AMIGU-HO (Farewell My Friend) by KC de León Guerrero

AMIGU-HO (My Friend) by Glen Paulino

AMIGU-HO (My Friend) Frank Bokkongo' Pangelinan

And there are more. As for abbok, I could not find a single song with the word abbok in the title. If there is one, please let me know. I am more hopeful the word abbok is used in the lyrics of a song, but at the moment I can think of none.

Many people think GA'CHONG means "friend." Not quite.

The precise meaning of ga'chong is "companion or accompaniment." Something or someone that goes along with, that is present with, that is joined to someone or something else.

Now, many times the people who accompany us (ga'chong) are also our friends (abbok, amigo, amiga). But not always.

That is why ga'chong is applied to non-persons, as well.

The food that goes with your main dish can be called its ga'chong. It accompanies the main dish. The rice or vegetables that go along with your salmon can hardly be called its friend.

Even when applied to people, ga'chong essentially means companion or partner, not friend.

So if you are worried this older woman is living by herself at home, you might ask who her ga'chong is at home, so that someone is there if she has an emergency. Suppose you find out a grandson is living with her, we would hardly call the grandson her "friend." He is her grandson and also companion at home.

If the teacher is dividing the class into pairs to partner up for some exercise or activity, she may pair you up with someone you don't get along with at all. But, like it or not, that person is your ga'chong (partner) for the activity. Not your friend; your partner.

And here's another good illustration of the true meaning of ga'chong. The placenta is a kind of organic wrap that surrounds the baby in the womb. When the baby is born, the placenta is expelled from the mother. There are two words we can use in Chamorro for the placenta. One is påres, which we took from Spanish. And the other is Chamorro : i ga'chong påtgon. The placenta goes along with the baby. This is true inside the womb, and once the baby is born there is no need for the placenta anymore so even that comes out after the baby. The placenta truly is the "companion" or "accompaniment" (ga'chong) of the baby. Even the other word, påres, comes from the Spanish word par which means "pair" or "couple," since the placenta always goes along with the baby, inside and outside the womb.

So here we can see that an organic wrap made of human tissue that supplies nutrients and oxygen to the baby, as well as remove waste, and which does many other things, can hardly be called the baby's "friend" in the ordinary sense of "friend."