One Micronesia Podcast: remembering Edmund Wengu

[Music] and welcome to the one micro ninja podcast and in this episode i want to dedicate it to a friend and a true micronesian leader edmund wengel who passed away on august 20th 2020. [Music] edmund wenger also known to many as edibu was the definition of a true micronesian leader he was born on guam on february 27 1987 graduated an islander at jfk high school in 2005 and in 2006 he moved with family to the east coast and later in the years moved to hawaii but a part of him was always here in micronesia where he called home so in 2013 he moved back to guam and found his calling i had the opportunity to speak with some of his family members friends and colleagues they had so many stories and memories about eddie boo i first met ed in 2018 when i started with the organization big brothers big sisters of guam and kind of when i first met him you know he just has this really infectious smile and laugh and so you know i just like kind of saw him as like a very joyful person so the first time i actually met ed um was back in ponte 2014 he was the one that came check this up checked up on me and max kepway at our uh little dorms that we were at he actually came out of nowhere just came to pick us up um for i guess just for the purpose of you know his appreciation of us sacrificing you know our own time voluntarily just to represent and all that you know so just random man the first time i ever met him uh i was traveling to uh las vegas with the farm national team so i was walking through the terminal and uh he used to work for united i guess lived in hawaii so i just walked up and he was at the at the desk so i was asking i was like is it possible to switch my flight he wanted me to get out i met ed in high school and we were friends prior to us working together and i was glad i got the opportunity of working with him at the micronesia resource center a couple of guys we went and hang out we played volleyball practice and then i came across this very jolly always happy guy i saw the job announcement and i applied and he they called me and he was the one that interviewed me it was through friends of friends like in 2014 when i was still a university student when i first saw him i was uh you know his beard kind of took me aback and you know and we've [Music] we've been working together ever since yeah the first time i met him you know i was just uh very very impressed when i met him i thought wow this is a very smart young individual you know he's a smart young guy um very well spoken very well educated and just seemed really you know really on it like he was really ready to just help the people ed ed is one of the pillar members of mrc um that i first met him in action when the one piece of apartment first embarked with a partnership and the collaboration with maniello and mike region resource center we brought ed in here was a a young kid you know graduated locally went off to the east coast and wanted to come back home and do something for his community so i mean what's what's not to love about that [Music] you know back in 2018 i had moved on to another job and uh ed called me and asked you know hey we have an opening for our program director you know if you know anybody um you know please let me know and and i was like dude why not you you know and uh here is ed you know just as humble as as he can be saying you know um i don't have a degree i don't have experience i'm like what experience do you need you know and and so i wrote this letter and it was a recommendation letter and i i think it took him a while to to really gain the confidence to to to apply for the job as program director of micronesian resource center ed had only been with the organization for not even a year um so he was there before me but he had already really proven to the previous executive director that he had real potential for leadership and he had already been promoted to a case manager position shortly after i had taken over the organization the project director position opened up at the micronesian resource center and you know kind of the couple of months of knowing ed and kind of seeing you know the leadership that he provided and seeing how like the team you know really looked up to him i knew that he was really perfect for the position i believed in him from day one um you know i'm a big believer in in having people with a good mind you know educated mind and an educated heart um you know you have one or the other there's going to be failure but you have both man you're unstoppable and and that was him he had he had the heart he had the compassion and he had the the understanding of the needs of the community you know he embedded himself with the community and he embedded himself with a purpose he was doing a lot of good things he was a great role model for for young uh fas and fsm youth to look up to i i think his passion was evident in any anything he did and with any of the organizations that he worked with um so i i just really want people to always remember that passion and that caring and also that sincerity right you could really feel that he wouldn't you know there was no how my language is not bad but there was no bs right with him he and so i i really appreciate that visionary i already sat selfless and i don't think i can ever stop saying selfless he always puts others before him even though at work he treated us he treated us with equality everyone is equal um work could be very stressful but with just working with him he would make it not it would he would make it like fun he gives not only a hundred percent he can go above and beyond at the effort he brings to his work he'll do a hundred and he'll give you 150 percent sacrifice was the biggest thing i'd see from ed um his every time we've come into the office he'd be the first one there but he's all he'd also be the first one out to a meeting come back from one meeting another meeting comes up he's out come back in come out most people they're just like oh i gotta reschedule this meeting and wanted to make sure it got done like if he if he believed that if it was going to be possible he would have to do he would have to sacrifice a whole lot and that whole lot came from him um just physically his physical being his spiritual being his whole mindset and that was his work ethic man that's that's what kind of pushed the whole team to believe in what edmund was trying to trying to do his vision of just trying to make a better micronesia i always told him outside bro you're special you know like you're gonna do a lot of things in the future um it's just tough man because he has such a bright future and he just had that personality that he could just adapt in any situation that he was in and he could just vibe really well with everybody you know could be someone who won from true from different ethnicities and you're always comfortable with them and just hanging out was it was easy and he was able to bring people together and he made hanging out together easy but that guy just never stopped trying never stopped caring and no matter what success he had he remained humble you know i think i think there's a lot of us that just need that lesson in humility and service and um you know don't just stand behind a um you know a polarizing political stance and say i'm good because this is what i believe in and you're wrong and whatever it's working together and it's dialogue and it's it's truly being um there for each other you know that's what community is about and i think if one thing uh i learned from ed you know i mean he was probably 20 years younger than me or so but um i learned a lot from him ed was always coming up with ideas it was always writing things down and he always understood you know the importance of our work and our partnership and so ed played um like an essential and like crucial part in doing that so in kind of the reorganization in the reorganizing of the organization you know we had gone through this course um that was like a non-profit improvement plan and so you know for 10 weeks we like met and me him and another program manager met every week to kind of discuss you know how we were going to build the organization to to really combine all of the services that we put together i want to say that ed also you know kind of he helped us put together you know our vision for the organization which is a community of diverse cultures thriving together um towards success so you know he he was just such a big part of wanting to empower the community in all different kinds of ways you know he helped us put together you know the micronesian youth forum so we had that for the first year um last year and so with a partnership with gpd you know they had kind of reached out to us you know and saying like how do we kind of talk to the kids about this how do we how do we reach them and so you know through discussions you know he really kind of ran with the micronesian youth forum and and put it together kind of organizing all of the different guests that we were going to be having different breakout sessions the panel discussions you know um he also you know over the past two years the office has really grown and and thrived and been able to help more and more people and that's through ed's partnerships that he's been able to you know kind of uh harness during his his time as project director you know he the team always knew that if they were having a problem at like any sort of agency where there was a miscommunication they could go to ed and he would be able to you know go to the right channels and like talk to people and say hey like this is actually you know this is what the law actually says so like you you are required to you know accept this document or or things like that you know and he's he's just always been you know a cheerleader for the organization a cheerleader for the community um like just all of the all of the amazing things that he he's done it's it's it's truly inspiring um you know our organization does so much and ed was always there to kind of um go to any of the events that we had you know sometimes we have last minute things and ed was like okay no one else can go like i'm there and i'm like okay great you know like he was just always like ready to go and he's he was always ready to like find volunteers because you know he he wanted to get the fas community involved he wanted to have them coming out to volunteer so we had he brought on a bunch of steady volunteers and you know eventually some of them became employees when we had um positions open up you know and it was because ed saw their potential saw that you know these people they they can make a difference in our community they can become role models for our community like let's you know let's reach out to those people and get them involved in making things happen you don't even have a grip ready [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] wow [Music] [Music] let's carry on the legacy the good work that ed tried to do and all of that was you know basically or essentially to improve the livelihoods of our fsm community here on guam i think the best way to to honor and remember people is really just to carry on their legacy so if you knew that ed stood for something carry that on stand for that same thing as well if you knew that ed stood for helping our people better ourselves doing outreach into the community and helping those in our community who are struggling do the same thing carry on what he stood for that's the best way to remember him our people need our help and we all need to if we can help and we're in a position to provide any kind of support no matter how little that support is we need to be there and ed ed never gave up and so the rest of us shouldn't give up as well we need to be better as people to work together you know and if we if we give our honest effort every single day um and try to make our community better that's that's really all we need to do you know you could you could put ed's ed's short life on paper and all his accomplishments and you don't say anything about his race you don't say anything about his age you don't say anything about his education and you can say man i want to be like this guy i want to live like this guy did i want to do the things that he did and then you just you put ed's face there and you say here here's a young man who gave his all and he gave his from his heart you know and he tried to change people's minds and he realized it wasn't going to happen overnight and he realized he wasn't going to do it alone he needed partners he needed people like paul tebow from gpd he needed you know people like samantha from manitou he needed people from the homeless coalition he needed the community members that said hey i like what you guys are doing then and we want to work with you we want to see how we can help you spread your message and the message for ed was so simple you spell micronesia with the word one one micronesia [Music] ed my friend brother you know we miss you terribly and the work will continue in your honor man ed we really miss you but you know we understand it was your time everyone has a time but you used your time wisely while on guam and you you left a lasting mark and a lasting imprint on a lot of people and a lot of lives and i think your legacy will carry on [Music] thank you for everything i would tell ed i would tell ed thank you for everything and that you know we are going to miss you you know we're going to miss him so much and that i tell him oh my gosh like it's you know it's it's time for you to take a break and to take a rest you know and so just thank you thank you for your dedication and you know i i hope that you're you know you continue to to guide us and to motivate us and the team to to kind of finish the work that you started to you know we we're here and we we want to to do right by you and so just you know guide us give us little signs along the way that you know we're we're kind of doing you know what what you wanted us to do and you know we'll we'll truly miss you you know thanks ed for sharing your life with us man thanks for teaching me a lot about myself and helping me and my development as a professional i don't even know you know where to start just i just give them a hug and tell him hey everything's gonna be okay hopefully the biggest thing would just tell him i love him um and we got this from here you know we're gonna continue to we're gonna continue to have him live through us so our relationship is you don't really need to say anything to each other we can just already sense the vibe that's message i hope i can go back to his house and and have my lunch breaks there we always go to his house and it's kind of hard it's always just right next to our work so uh i'm just gonna i would text him and text him hey i'll open up your door i'm i'm coming i'm on my way and my message to it also is this is just right next to mine i wanna let you know that i'm still waiting for him to come back sorry thank you for everything i mean he was he was also my cousin which it was it we just got to know each other for those two and a half years [Music] i wish i had known them before so [Music] i just wanna i just wanna tell er thank you from the bottom of my heart thank you for believing in this we love him thank you for everything you did for our family i'm gonna just show him that i'm still here to support you baby i miss him so much i love you so much i miss you so much [Music] i'm trying to continue to work hard the way you always told me to to help our community because that's what you always talked about growing up we always wanted to be the ones to make a difference and you did and i'll just try to continue that on my name is melford james this is my brother brian i'd like to dedicate this song to our brother eddie such a loving and humble soul and a great leader in the micronesian community especially to the micronesian youth we'd like to give our love and condolences to the family rest in love always brother [Music] home is my heart's own home though i never really had one to call my own now i've been given a key by the carpenter of galilee with interest paid the titles made to me [Music] the place i've been dreaming of so long loved ones there to welcome me but his sweet face will be the [Music] everybody dreams of going home it seems lately i'm no exception but home is so much more than windows walls and doors it's a warm embrace or a smiling face is awaiting you [Music] where there is [Music] but his sweet face will be the first i see when my journey's over i am [Music] the place i've been dreaming of so long [Music] but his sweet face will be the first i'll see when my journey's over i am going home when my journey's over i am going home you

Channel: kuamnews

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Id: QrxUWf9N-Y0

Length: 26min 26sec (1586 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 03 2020