SI VICENTE'N KARABAO

He was as big and as strong as a karabao.

And so Vicente was known as Vicente'n Karabao.

He stood at six feet, two inches and weighed 210 pounds, a lot of it muscle.

The short life of Vicente (he died in his early 40s) embodies much of what was characteristic of pre-Spanish Chamorro male prowess. Physical stature, strength, pride and competition are all found in his story; the same traits that were said of our ancestors before the Europeans came.

His name was Vicente Acfalle Champaco, but he really was Vicente Champaco Acfalle. He was born in 1902 when Chamorros still kept the Spanish system of using the father's surname first, followed by the mother's. But there is another story why he was known as Champaco, and not Acfalle. He was such a champion in anything physical that the American nickname "champ" stood for both Champaco and being a champion.

He made such an impression on the American Navy on Guam that he was written up in the Guam Recorder, the monthly news magazine printed on island by the Navy. Some of the information in this post is taken from that article.

CHINESE-CHAMORRO

His Champaco side was Chinese. His grandfather was a pure Chinese man named Gregorio (or Hilario and even Mariano) Champaco (or Cham  Puaco, and sometimes Chua Puaco), who came to Guam and eventually settled in Malesso', marrying a lady named María Tedpahogo Eguiguan. Their daughter Asunción (sometimes misidentified in documents as Concepción) married Macario Babauta Acfalle, the son of Eugenio Acfalle and Margarita Babauta. Except for Champaco, those are all indigenous Chamorro names. The Chamorro ran strong in Vicente!

WORKED FOR THE NAVY

Vicente started working for the Navy so his work took him up to Sumay and Piti, where the Navy had facilities.

He was so strong, it was said, that Vicente picked up barrels of water or what have you and easily tossed them onto the ships.

It was said that Vicente could easily dive to 120 feet below water and stay down for three minutes. Recreational divers usually don't go below 130 feet, and that's with an oxygen tank! He'd sometimes come back up with a fish in both hands. Once, it is said, he grabbed a fish out of a shark's mouth and kicked the shark in the nose. Hungry for lobster? It was said Vicente knew some deep-water holes where he could dive and fetch lobster.

A team of diving experts from off-island came to Guam once to teach locals how to dive. After seeing Vicente display his diving prowess, the off-island experts walked away humbled.

Our ancestors were said to be equally at home in the sea as on land. Our people could dive into deep water and stay down for long periods.

CHAMORRO COMPETITION

European visitors to the Marianas described our ancestors as being competitive in nature. There were always contests between people. They would challenge each other to show their physical strength or even debate each other publicly to see who could outwit the others.

These contests could be between close relatives, even between fathers and sons! In more than one story, chiefs grew angry when their little sons uprooted coconut trees with their bare hands, to the point of wanting to kill the son!

And so it happened with Vicente'n Karabao and his cousin, a man named Juan Champaco. Juan's son Jesus tells the story :

Vicente and his cousin Juan were helping to roof a house when Vicente challenged Juan to wrestle. "Get down and I'll test you, since you say you're so strong. But no one is stronger than me. I'm the strongest in Malesso'." Juan indeed was also strong. He only needed to shake a coconut tree to make a coconut fall down if he needed one.

Juan tried to dissuade Vicente from wrestling but Vicente wouldn't take no for an answer, so they wrestled and, in the middle of it, Vicente fell. Well, that angered Vicente to no end so Vicente swore that he would kill Juan and his whole family. Juan took his family to hide in the boonies for about a week, while his brother and the aunt tried to talk Vicente out of killing Juan and Juan's family.

Finally, it was at a cockfight that Juan saw Vicente there, and Juan told Vicente, "Let's stop fighting and reconcile. Here, give me your rooster and I'll enter him in the fight," and Vicente gave Juan the rooster because Juan was good at cockfighting and sure enough the rooster won and peace was restored between the cousins Vicente and Juan.

DEATH AT TINTA

In July of 1944, the Japanese in Malesso' knew that their time was up. The island was completely surrounded by American ships which were bombing the Japanese defenses on the island almost to oblivion.

Fearing that Malesso' people would somehow come to the aid of the incoming Americans, or that the strong men of the village would overpower and kill the small numbers of Japanese soldiers in Malesso', the Japanese started rounding up the people they feared.

In the first group, the Japanese arrested anyone they feared politically. Community leaders, teachers and anyone with a connection with the U.S. military were targeted. This meant Vicente'n Karabao, who had been working for many years for the U.S. Navy.

On July 15, with the rest of his group, he was put in Tinta Cave where the Japanese threw in hand grenades and bayoneted to death anyone they thought had survived the blasts. Vicente died there, leaving behind a wife, the former Ana Espinosa, and his children.

His name appears on the Memorial which stands in front of Malesso' Church. RIP