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My Grandma the Weaver, the Saltmaker, the Suruhåna
Story Contributor: Benny Tainatongo Anderson, Jr.
In this storytelling session Benny illustrates the ways in which his maternal grandmother preserved CHamoru cultural practices as a weaver, saltmaker, and Suruhåna. Additionally the listener is able to witness how her cultural practices impacted Benny’s lifelong efforts to preserve language and culture for CHamorus in diaspora.
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“Now that I think back at it, she was a medicine woman, we call them Suruhåna. She was a Suruhåna, she was a weaver. She would weave Pandanus leaves into mats, sleeping mats, baskets, and all kinds of stuff.”
“She was one of the few saltmakers in the village. It was very labor intensive. They would go to the beach and set up a whole station and they boiled ocean water until they got salt. She was very particular too. She didn’t want the salt right near the bay where everyone was going to. She wanted it closer to the reef where it was cleaner, so it was harder for them to set up stations.”
“I helped her gather ingredients like plants and bark for her medicine. I witnessed village members coming to the house with their babies, and she would administer medicine to the babies.”
“I’d always ask her about the scars on her hand and she told me about the war.”
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