CHAMORRO EXPRESSIONS : NAPPA'

 

YANGGEN NAPPA' UN TÅNME,

SIEMPRE NAPPA' DOKKO'

If you plant nappa',

nappa' will sprout.

The other day I was sharing with an older man how this young man in his twenties is still a child in thinking and behavior. His whole day is spent on computer games, and his evenings are spent playing music and drinking with friends. No thought is given to furthering his education or finding a job to develop skills, earn a living and contribute to society.

But, his father is the same way. If it weren't for the fact that the father is very talented in one thing that brings in money without much effort on his part, since he's so good in it, the family would be penniless.

The older man replied to me with the above proverb. If you plant nappa', you get nappa'. Nappa' will grow.

The son was "planted" by the father (and mother). As the father, so the son. The Bible says, "You reap what you sow." The apple doesn't fall far the tree, and many other sayings like that from all over the world, in their own manner of speaking.

NAPPA'

Nappa' is the Chinese cabbage.

But the word nappa' is borrowed from Japanese nappa, which refers to the leaves of vegetables in general, especially those used for food.

The fact that Chamorros use a Japanese word for it, when Japanese influence in the Marianas did not start till around 1900, suggests that the cabbage is not old in the Marianas. Safford (1905) states that cabbage didn't grow on Guam, but does say that Japanese merchants were bringing in plant seeds from Japan by the time he was on Guam (1899-1900). So, more than likely, nappa' began to be grown in the Marianas thanks to Japanese infuence in the 1900s and so even the name is taken from Japanese.

So, at least from the early 1900s, nappa' has been grown in the Marianas and the saying came about. If you plant nappa', nappa' will sprout. Train a child a certain way, he or she will grow up that way.