Horiseik hau haan hudi ho semana oin hau haan hudi...

16-22 September 2013

Yesterday I ate a banana and tomorrow I will eat a banana 

There is a lot of bananas for sale in the markets here and I reckon I am about to turn into a monkey given how many of them I have eaten and there are many more to go.  There are monkeys in TL and quite often see one in the street harnessed because somebody owns them.  Trust me, they are only cute from a distance and they have the potential to steal your lunch.

Just like home, the food choices have turned into a certain level of monotony, I wonder if this only a developed country phenomenon.  It is funny when I go out for something to eat, the local choice of chicken and rice is about 2-3 dollars, depending where you go, and sometimes it is a pleasant surprise to find one that sells a variation on the theme, an omelette perhaps.  Just watch out for the chilli sauce, it is hot!  The malae (a term of respect for westerners) choices are varied, however the prices tend to be about 6-9 dollars and pretty well anything is available, burger and chips (and variations), pizzas, Japanese, Thai etc.  

I have developed a routine of sorts that aids in making this journey a little more comfortable.  One aspect that is getting worse as the dry continues is the dust.  Everything is acquiring a certain dirt colour about at the moment as it has not rained for several months.  The locals overcome this by spraying their patch of dirt with water and in some of the poorer areas water from the open drains, which is effectively septic tank effluent (raw sewage).  I have been here long enough to not even worry about that anymore, just slow down on my Azúl Azmátiku (blue asthmatic).

It is hard to believe that I have been in TL for a month on the 23^rd, it feels much longer than that.  What better way to celebrate the milestone than to finally be learning Tetun.  Tetun and Portuguese are the official languages of the country, while English and Bahasa Indonesian are widely spoken.  It is certainly a hassle when at the markets where the numbers are given in a variety of languages, Tetun for dollars, Bahasa/Portuguese for the cent(avos).  It is interesting to note, that the older generations speak Portuguese and Tetun, middle generation mainly speak Tetun and Bahasa, while the younger seem to be able to speak well in all four languages.

I have another week of learning Tetun and hopefully by the end of week I can at least string a sentence together, rather than just key words such as hira nee (how much) and obrigado barak (thanks very much).  I hope that over time I will be able to join in the conversation and be able to relate more stories about miscommunication and mispronunciation that invariably happen.

Both Tetun and Bahasa have borrowed a number of words from the Portuguese and now English, given the large aid presence in the country.  Cement is a very common material throughout the world and they certainly sell it here, but it is known by another name.  When we first saw the signs, we thought there was a serious artificial insemination program for farm animals given the price for a kilo…

Adeus Rob

Home Sweet Home

8 -14 September 2013

Several milestones have been achieved this week:

• Move into my house
• Got my motorbike
• Been able to make a cup of tea.

Out of the above, who would have thought that making a simple cup of tea would represent the culmination of what feels like a very long journey thus far?  Unfortunately I cannot share a cuppa with the missus but that is only a matter of time before we will able to (sigh!).  I have now had many cuppas and it feels just great!  Although one of the other volunteers, Derry, has warned me about the long term performance of kettles sold in TL – they only reach double digits before blowing up, shorting the house or making me jump.  I will need to get some 100% rubber thongs to protect myself from possible electric shocks in the future (electrical safety TL style).

I have moved into a one bedroom apartment which is across the road from the former United Nations compound near the Obrigada Barracks.  The road and open drain in front is being upgraded so hopefully there is less dust in the long term.  It is interesting to compare how civil works are done in Timor-Leste and Australia.  In Australia there is all this hoopla about building a new road, planting a tree etc, anything that involves cutting a ribbon by an esteemed person or that a repair to any road is done within a day after it is reported (well most of the time).  

In TL, the roads are left to deteriorate to such a state that the asphalt (if laid) has disappeared before something is done.  The poor roads make a great speed management system, everyone has to drive slowly unless they want to trash their car’s suspension or wheel bearing (or both).  This even happens on the country roads, the road to Baucau is considered one of the best in the country, you can be zooming along 90-100 km/h and then slam the brakes on as the seal is completely gone with two foot deep potholes or that repairs have started but each step of the repair takes at least two days so the road fails even further.  If only they did… (patience my friend, patience…).  I will make a video of a typical motorbike ride in the future.

Ahhh the motorbike, what a relief to have the means to go anywhere at any time.  Since getting back from Baucau on Tuesday, I have been ripping up and down the streets of Dili on the Azúl Azmátiku (blue asthmatic), which is an appropriate name for a bike that is difficult to start first thing in the morning.  I was shown later where the choke is located in an awkward spot in the engine block, not on the handlebars, I can now start it first time.

The apartment is basic by Australian standards but after seeing the varying quality vs price options here, this is a veritable palácio.  To celebrate my moving in, I stumbled across dragon fruit for $1/kilo and apples grown in NZ in one of the supermarkets.  There must have been several containers arrive earlier this week for this bounty to appear.  It may be several months before these items appear again on the shelves.  

One of the more interesting things is there are no addresses to assist in locating where someone lives.  So my address here is: head past the Obrigada Barracks around the bend and turn right into a driveway across the road to some cannons about 500m away.  I might have to check the cannons out as they might be Portuguese relics.  

We are all (relatively) familiar with the recent history of TL but did you know that according some historians, Kaupang and Dili were used as re-supply ports for the Portuguese explorations in late 1400’s and early 1500’s of the Asian and Australian coastlines?  One historian (whose name I escapes me at the moment) hypothesises the west and east coasts of Australia were mapped about 1505-15 AD, unfortunately this cannot be definitively verified in the Portuguese records as they were notoriously secretive with this information and were burnt long ago.  So who did the Spanish, French (Vallard Map), Dutch and English get their information from?  Interestingly, fisherman from Eden, NSW have trawled Portuguese wine urns somewhere near Gabo Island dated to this period.  It is an interesting question to ponder.

For most of the week I have been getting my head around about what I can do at BESIK in the relatively short time I am here.  It been interesting to learn the differences between what is a successful project here relative to home.  Simple things such as spare parts can render a whole water supply unusable for many weeks/months.  I will keep you posted on any updates in this area.

I had a quiet weekend where I cruised around on the Azúl Azmátiku, mainly getting stuff for the house, namely food for the week.  So in some ways it is no different to what I would be doing in Australia on the weekend….

Gotta get out of Dili!

31 August-7 September 2013

By Friday the newbies, including me, are starting feeling a little more at home in Dili.  The usual saying is thank heavens it’s Friday, this is extra special as it is a public holiday here Timor-Leste.  We were invited to Kate’s birthday at Jesus’ Back Beach through one of Hamish’s friend that we bumped into at the Australian Embassy to vote for forthcoming federal election.  

It is an interesting walk to the beach - we went past the Stations of the Cross and turn off the path somewhere near the top and head down a goat track.  It was really to get away from the noise and hubbub of Dili and to just hang out with and talk stuff.

It was an absolute surprise to find what I considered to be one of the best Thai meals I have ever had for Saturday's lunch.  We needed to refuel after more house hunting and finalising Bhavani’s leasing arrangements with her landlords, who happen to live below her apartment.  Had some time out before heading to sample the Dili nightlife – woohoo!  We kept going onto wee hours of Sunday morning which is pretty hard for this soul who is normally in bed by 10:30!

Hamish and I joined Liz and Bree for a brisk walk taking the long way to Jesus’ back beach over the Hera Road hill.  It was good to get some exercise in as I am seriously missing my mountain bike….  Speaking of which the Tour de Timor started on Monday, which had about 150 competitors for the five day event.  I am planning on being one of the riders in next year’s TDT, my training will start once I get the hang of the road rules here.

I was in early for starting at BESIK on Monday where I was shaken out of my bed – a magnitude 6.5 earthquake whose epicentre was located 312 kms north east of Dili.  I have never been so well shaken (except by Timor-Leste’s roads).  The only times I have felt an earthquake, well heard an earthquake, was when I was last in Vanuatu diving.  There were two instances where I heard a boom underwater.  I was thinking, “where’s the boat? Can’t they see the divers’ flag on the surface?”  It wasn’t until later on that I found out that it was earthquake.  Back to Dili, all of the locals started banging anything they could get their hands on to warn everyone and to check whether everything is OK.  To the best of my knowledge there was no damage.

It was my first day at BESIK (Bee, Saneamentu no Ijiene iha Komunidade, or Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Program) on Monday.  It was good to finally start working in my volunteer role – I have only just realised that I have not being chained to a desk for four weeks, mind you, I could get used to that.  So for the rest of the week I have been getting myself familiar with how BESIK works and going into the field to understand the lay of the land and survey the pipeline route for the water supply in Licore.  The following picture is of the trusty survey team made up of the local villagers and Gerarsieu from BESIK. 

I was in the Baucau and Lospalos regions from Thursday into the weekend.  This was my temporary base for further field trips into the more eastern parts of Timor-Leste such as a village in the Lospalos region.  Gerarsieu and I again worked with the villagers to determine the problem that plagues part of the supply system.  This is still a work in progress to solve the problem.  The main storage tank for the system is located next to a primary school where we attracted the attention of most of the students of the school.  Primary schools are very basic and small in Timor-Leste, the students are taught in shifts (morning, mid-morning to mid-afternoon and afternoon) and sometimes even by gender as the schools are not large enough to cater for high numbers of school aged children.  The children are no different to Australia children, where some are shy, loud, quiet…

Friday night in Baucau was Karaoke time; it was good fun where some of us sang well while others were a little suspect (was it either - none of us should give up our day jobs or was it the bad room acoustics?).  The group included volunteers from Germany and doctors from Cuba, so half of the songs were in Spanish but no German, even I plucked up the courage to sing in Spanish towards the end!

On Sunday, swam several laps but I do not think I will receiving a call from TL sports commission to represent TL in the next Olympics.  I ended up talking to a young Timorese girl – she wanted to practice her English with me….  I feel as though I will get the hang of the local language soon enough.

Back to work tomorrow :(  seriously it should be good.

After one week in Dili

23 August-30 August 2013

An early start of 03:45 on the 23 August saw me onto a plane from Darwin Airport to Dili and was an uneventful flight although the plane’s ascent and descent seemed to be one of the steepest I have experienced. I witnessed a traffic accident on the way from the hotel where a car tried running over woman on a motorbike.  My taxi driver took it upon himself to assist the lady and the traffic started again.  Lesson 1: It is the driver from behind's responsibility to not run up the rear of another car/motorbike, but still get out of the way ASAP as they sometimes do not follow their own rules for whatever reason.

We are staying at a hotel as long term accommodation has not been sorted, which is made harder as there are no real estate agents in town.  There is a possible business opportunity here but can we get real estate agents to donate their time to setting one up here?

The In-Country Orientation (ICO) has been intense where on the first day we were inducted by one of the many western consultancies that have set up shop here to support the development of the oil and gas wealth in the Timor Sea.  It was interesting to note that there were not encouraging their staff to interact with the locals while Engineers Without Borders is the opposite – the locals will need to run/build what EWB has facilitated in the long term…  Lesson 2: past development approaches do not effectively work, it would seem that the volunteer that needs to challenge their underlying assumptions not the locals.

One feature of my placement is the provision of a motorbike by my partner organisation, BESIK, for me to get around.  So on Monday we went to the licencing office to sort this bit of paperwork.  We had allocated the whole day to complete this, however the planets aligned themselves and we completed this task in record time of 1 hour 20 mins.  I had to chuckle when I paid for some photocopying, my change was in the local coins and some lollies!  Lesson 3: Sometimes hard currency is of less value than a gift.

We went to beach in front of one of the embassies for fish on stick.  All week we have been driving past fish sellers thinking to myself, should I or shouldn't I eat food that has not been in the fridge.  It was a liberating experience to go "when in Dili, do what the locals do".  The only advice I would impart is to take some tissues so you can wipe your hands afterwards.  It was also good to not just be with just the EWB group, the expat community is relatively small but really friendly.

On the Thursday, we went to the resistance museum and that was a sobering affair.  This was after seeing a documentary of the resistance to the Indonesian occupation on Wednesday night.  The East Timorese have had it tough over the past 500 years or so, firstly with the Portuguese occupation (with little investment in the colony throughout that time), the first vote for autonomy in 1974, Indonesian occupation from 1975 to 1999.  The East Timorese seem to be getting on with their lives although you can see the evidence of the occupation through Dili.  The stop the boats stuff in Australia is just pointless once you have seen how people struggle in another part of the world.

It has been a steep learning curve and so the show must go on....