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Age of Rediscovery - Pacific 
A few days before Magellan spotted the Island of Leyte, he made a brief stopover in Guam of the Marianas Group. He was able to load provisions for his expedition's ultimate destination, the Spice island. He claimed the island for Spain and named it Ladrones because the natives stole his life boat. The Guamanians had been unfortunately called Ladrones (Spanish for thieves) until the turn of the century.

When the ships landed in the Philippines in 1521 (the name later given by Villabos on another Spanish expedition in 1542 in honor of Crown Prince Philip) he named the archipelago-San Lazarus. Cebu was already a sprawling commercial center in the south east Asia when he found the island. At that time it is estimated that there were almost million Filipinos living in the country. Diseases brought by the Western explorers to the American continent almost wiped out the Indian population who lacked immunity. The Malay-Polynesian did not suffer the same faith and there was never a need to import black slaves from Africa.

The western world started colonizing the islands of the Pacific. The ocean was named Pacific by Magellan because of the calmness of the ocean after his successful navigation of the treacherous strait in the southern tip of Chile.

English, Germans, and other Europeans would later follow suit. The notorious Earl of Sandwich's obsessive gambling vice gave way to our quick meal of “sandwich” when he demanded that his orderly just bring him meat placed between two loaves of bread. He never left his gambling table in London until the King banished him in a remote island in the Pacific under the English crown. The island is now called the Sandwich Island. When the English astronomers discovered a new planet they wanted to designate it as King George planet in honor of King George. The immerging young nation, the United States, did not agree because of the aftermath of the revolution at that time. The new planet was then known as Urunus in the tradition of the Greek mythology.

The fabled Easter Islands were named by the Dutch explorers because it was rediscovered on the Easter day, April 5. It should be noted that the island was already discovered long time ago by the ancient seafarer from south east Asia. Even a Polynesian accompanying Captain James Cook in a brief visit to the islands was able to communicate with the islanders without any difficulty. This proved that the Pacific Islanders had navigated eastward double the width of the Atlantic Ocean centuries before the western navigators even venture west of the Azores.

The 15th century therefore is just an age of European discovery of another part of the world. In the western countries’ attempt to build empire, they explored and exploited the enchanted islanders. The Pacific marine culture tailored to the land and sea was replaced and a paradise was lost forever
Nestor P Enriquez
phix7@yahoo.com Nestor Palugod Enriquez
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From: ish fabicon(fabicon@EMAIL.MSN.COM)

FOREFATHERS
there in the island where the waves rock the beaches of sand and stone, my father was born. there, in his childhood, he skin dived to learn the wisdom of the stonefish and the sea horse. music to him were the songs of the maya and oriole; his dreams
caressed by habagat and amihan winds;his temper teased by bamboo and cogon; his religion buried in the ancestral hills where molave and narra shot its bulging muscles into the mercy
of the mountain gods.

my father roamed the wilds and tamed the carabao so that ricestalks could bloom in fields of green; he spanned the seas in his leaking baroto; cajoled the moon so that he could make love with fire and rain; he smiled when his anger ceased in the sweltering heat of afternoons; he braved the anger of typhoons and volcanoes willed to him by the gods; he danced under moonlight, tattooed in brown
blood ...and the strangers came and my father offered them his bowl of rice; let them drink his native wine; let them sow the seeds in his island; let them teach religion; let them harness his native intelligence to join the family of man.

but the wars came. my father an avid reader of rizal, bonifacio, mabini, aguinaldo remembered how his father honed his bolo to fight those who wanted to take away his freedom, his land, his joys and his soul. my grandfather took to the mountains when the burst of the krag spilled blood in pasong tirad. my father remembered the agony of betrayal in bataan;

he cried cradling his dead son in his arms when the bayonet of war pierced the young man's heart. alone, my father bore the anguish in peace. DOC Simpson