Views from the road between Lospalos and Baucau.
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From the category archives:
Timor Leste
Experiencing a bit of writer’s block at the moment. I think my mind is being pulled in a lot of directions. It feels like when I try to write, one of this big buffalos is sitting on my wrists, stopping what is in my brain from flowing through to my fingertips. I’ll try to write some more about Timor as soon as the darn buffalo moves out of the way.
Photo taken on the road from Lospalos to Bacau.
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I went on a afternoon trip to Maubara this weekend. Maubara is about a 1.5 hour drive west of Dili. To get there, you take a winding road that hugs the coast, bumping along through potholes, squeezing around piles of rock left by landslides, avoiding buffalo, goats and chickens that are all taking their sweet time to cross the road, tempting fate.
You pass sites that are haunted by the ghosts of the country’s past. A town where some 300 were massacred during the Indonesian invasion. A lake filled with bad spirits where bodies were dumped, the crime long hidden under the water’s shiny veneer. A towering pulpit on the outskirts of Dili where Pope John Paul II spoke when he visited the country is now a spot where young guys loiter on the stairs catching shade and the infrequent breeze.
You pass chirpy Liquicia, with its mix of freshly painted bright green buildings and crumbling colonial relics. You pass broken bridges and kicked up dust. Potholes big enough to lose a Camry in and a new church painted the colours of a candy cane. You pass fish for sale on the back of a motorbike, accidentally slow roasting in the hot afternoon sun. Salty bushes and mangroves and half-built boats. Shaggy-haired huts the same colour as the sand. Afternoon naps and lazy palms.
Finally, when you reach Maubara, the cheery market (the main reason we had come) stands bold against the blue sea. The women sell baskets, woven floor mats, purses, tais and bags died bright pink, purple, blue, yellow and red. So many wonderful things, carefully made by hand.
Across the road from the market stands an old Portuguese fort. From the outside, a canon is barely visible and the imposing wall just looks like a history lesson. But inside, there’s a lovely shady garden and a cafe where they make their banana smoothies with buttery palm sugar and fresh coconut milk.
And then you buy one last pretty little thing from the market and then its time to go back to the city once more.
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The only things I have really managed to take snaps of so far here in Timor have been the beaches. They are so impossibly blue on a bright day, with clear water. Dili stretches along the coast, taking in lush vistas of the ocean framed by grooved mountain ranges, which are sometimes dusted with wet season mists hinting at impending downpours.
There are many restaurants, pubs and cafes along the waters edge, as well as some small stands grilling seafood. Down at Areia Branca you can sit and eat or drink right on the sand, taking a swim while you wait for scrambled eggs or a burger.
Timor is a challenging place to live in many regards, most definitely, but I’m living closer to the beach than I ever have in Australia — I even have to drive along the coast in a bright yellow taxi every morning to get to work, half sleepy on the sea breeze while my ears are assaulted with the questionable music choices of the taxi drivers and long-exhausted air fresheners swing about my head.
It’s easy to see burnt out buildings, crappy infrastructure, potholes, poverty and problems… but thankfully it’s also easy to look out into that deep blue expanse for a quick dose of micro-meditation.
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This is the view from the balcony of the flat I am sharing in Dili. Not too shabby right? The balcony points away from the main part of the city and the beach, towards the mountains that frame Dili.
The apartment has some problems, especially the water pump being turned off a lot, meaning you can strip to have a shower and then find there’s no water. That is a bit annoying! Also, out lounge room is connected to the lounge room of the flat downstairs by a locked staircase… so we can hear everything they say and smell everything they cook (and vice versa for them).
The staircase up to the apartment is also interesting… the steps are different sizes!
But I never really expected to find perfection here, and the balcony makes up for the quirks.
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I was pretty lucky on my first weekend in Timor Leste to get to take a minibreak to Atauro Island. The island is 25 km off Dili. You can get there on the ferry (which runs on Saturdays) or via the significantly more expensive yet much faster water taxi.
The island is quite a vision, with crystal clear water and snorkelling and mountain ranges rising high above the sea. It was a bit rainy on the weekend we visited, but it was still beautiful and so very relaxing.
We stayed at Barry’s eco resort, which was just a short walk from the ferry port… the water taxi drops off and picks up right on the beach in front of Barry’s.
Most of the time on the island, I just chilled. Reading, relaxing, relaxing, swimming, floating in the ocean looking back at the beautiful view, eating, relaxing. It was pretty great. We also rode down to the town at Vila to shop for locally weaved bags and gifts as well as jewelry made with local seeds and nuts (that I think I will have a hard time ever getting back into Australia). How did we get to the village? On a wagon attached to a motorbike, obviously. Because a single small motorcycle is the perfect vehicle to pull a steel cart that could seat four westerners (six Timorese) down an extremely potholed road, natch!
This is the cabin we stayed in at Barry’s ecoresort on the island.
The cabins were pretty amazing. Beautiful rustic wood, thatched rooves, an upstairs sleeping nook, an outdoor verandah, mozzie nets over all the beds, a hammock and an outdoor table… and all lights and small fans run on solar power. The bathrooms were shared between the cabins, the paths there lit by solar lamps at night… there was a spring water mandi and a composting toilet – all very clean and well maintained.
Our accommodation tariff included breakfast, lunch and dinner down at the family’s home, where there was a great spread for each meal with so many veggies and fish or chicken. It was delicious! The owner’s gorgeous twin toddler boys were there to keep everyone amused… they certainly weren’t shy around the guests and were very funny and cute.
All in all, it’s a nice place to get away and relax. There’s hiking and diving for people that are that way inclined, but for the others, there’s plenty of chilling and beach times to wash all your cares away!
I’m sure I’ll be back there a few times for some hammock sessions during my 18 months in Dili.
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On my first morning in Timor Leste, I got up early, full of enthusiasm for my first Tetum language classes. However, when I got out of my shipping container room and down to the shower block at the hotel where we are staying, I discovered the water wasn’t working. We had a few blackouts the night before because of a big storm (it is the wet season), so unperturbed, I decided to see if there was another shower block elsewhere with running water.
I climbed up a staircase beside the pool, but having no luck on the bathroom search, I turned back… only to be tripped by a wobbly board on the staircase sending me plunging face-and-boob-first down the stairs.
It was OK… I only got a few bruises, scratches all over my foot and one of my calves, a bleeding knee, two gashes in my ankle, and a dose of humiliation in front of one of the cleaning ladies. I didn’t expect to have to pull out the medical kit in the first 12 hours here… but that’s why you should always be prepared!
But since the fall, everything has been pretty good! Maybe I needed to literally come crashing to the ground to humble me right from the start of my experience here. I’m just taking language classes at the moment and doing errands/administrative things and meeting some people around town before starting my position, but things seem to be coming together. I can see that while living here will be a challenge, there is also a significant amount of stuff to occupy me socially, recreationally and professionally.
There is also a surprising number of fusion restaurants! More on that in another post down the track I’m sure….
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Yeesh, it’s been a while blog, sorry.
But I’ve been busy! I finished my Masters! Yay! I went to Adelaide to train ahead of my move to Timor Leste. And I did some other boring stuff like the groceries etc etc.
Something I did today was to go back and read some of the posts I wrote on this blog when I had just moved to Jakarta. They are pretty funny. They also reminded me how gobsmacked I was in those early days, how neurotic I was at 23 (umm, yeah cos I’m way less neurotic now), how much I am always pushing myself and how many stomach bugs and colds I had in the first six months there!
It’s a good reminder as I get ready to move to Dili. Reading them, I remembered how amazing, baffling, exciting and confusing Indonesia was for the first six months or so. I’m kinda hoping Dili is the same (minus the stomach bugs) — I hope I haven’t been jaded by already spending 21 months in Indonesia. At the moment, I’m feeling excited, but a bit daunted about packing and getting organised. I think it will be very different to my Jakarta existence, that’s for sure. For a starters, Dili is tiny compared to Jakarta. It doesn’t have all those blinging shopping malls or swanky hotels. There’s so many other differences too. Plus there are new languages to learn, a new culture to understand and new adventures to go on.
I really hope I can get decent internet access though, so I can update my blog with photos and writing.
I love you blog.
Anyway, if you have any pointers for my pre-departure Timor research, please share them in the comments. Links to Timor English bloggers would be great too, I will create a new blogroll on the side!
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I’m around 90 percent sure that I’m moving to Timor Leste/ East Timor next year to work with an international NGO (I should have that final 10 percent of confirmation soon).
It’s rather exciting… I’m spending a lot of time doing research. The world’s second newest country is small, but packs a whole lot of history in there, and multiple languages for me to learn as well!
The Lonely Planet guide is very thin though…
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