Worried about Y2K Glitches? CNMI’s post-war baby is undaunted

While much of the global community may be worrying about Y2K glitches, not so for Ms. Lola Tomokane, a vender of refreshments at the Last Command Post in Marpi.

But she acknowledges the severe drop in the number of tourist arrivals that has adversely affected her mom’s business most 52 weeks a year for 24 years now.

Ms. Tomokane said that perhaps the worst years since she started selling refreshments years ago has got to be the receding Year 1999.

“These days I’m lucky if at the end of a four-hour day here I return home with more than $10 in the cash bag,” she related. “Business has really gone sour especially this year”. She noted too that although such is the condition these days, “At least the little money I make daily is saved to pay for my utility bills.”

How did she start out as a refreshment vendor in the isolated northern end of the island?

“My mom used to work as a tour guide in one of the tour companies here and noticed that no one sells refreshments beyond San Roque Village”, she said.

“That was the basis of our decision to start our small vending business twenty-four years ago and still at it,” she related.

“Now my mom has retired from her job and attends to little chores at home,” she said. “She still can be productive even as a senior but I think it is company policy that employees take mandatory retirement at age 62,” she said.

“But this policy needs to be reviewed if anything else but to grant our elderly who speak Japanese the opportunity to stay active and productive in their twilight years,” she observed. “Now, tour companies bring in their own tour guides from Japan.”

“There’s a drawback here. They are young and most have no idea of the history why, i.e., they call a certain place in Marpi Bañadero or other names like Matansa before the village is named San Roque,” she said.

“This is an important issue–tour guides having knowledge of the background of historical names of places here–so they can convey the correct information without groping for words.”

On slow days, Ms. Tomokane trims hedges around the Last Command Post to help the MVA clean-up brigade keep the place nice and clean. “It isn’t my responsibility but then there’s nothing wrong with helping because I care about maintaining this place tidy and beautiful,” she said. “Beauty is the wealth of our island.”

Lola also related being the first post-war baby in the islands the other being Tom Dueñas of San Antonio. “Never mind all this talk about Y2K problems. I think Tom and I deserve some recognition for being the first among them all to be born right after the war,” she chuckles.

Ms. Tomokane doesn’t have any plans of giving up selling refreshments for she too looks forward to a more prosperous new millennium. And she’ll continue her mom’s little business heading up north everyday Y2K glitches for most who are edgy over glitches when the new year rings in. Happy New Year Lola!