away from timor, i realise that i am constantly hopping onto cabs to make appointments on time because I forget that it now takes more than ten minutes to get anywhere in town.....so i am kinda retuning my clock back to a bigger city and a faster pace in life generally.
away from timor, life is simpler and complicated in different ways. christmas lights adorn the trees and the streets are brightly lit in all colours, throughout the night. there is no more need to prepare candles and matches in case of 'ahi mate' and life seems unimaginable without airconditioning here... it's too ***** cold here in the tropics! all weird! the air conditioning in church was so cold I thought i was in canada or something. People wear jackets for mass here while in timor, we try to wear the loosest and airiest tops which can catch the slightest breeze to take the pearls of sweat away.
away from timor, i finally gargle my mouth with tap water for the first time in months...i still have to remind myself that i CAN drink from the tap. and of course, here, where every drop of bottled water is imported, the prices of EVIAN and AQUA isn't heaven and earth, just a dollar in difference ;-)
away from timor, i find that i now need a good Sudoku book to keep me occupied while waiting for the trains and buses to bring me home. Everyone has a mobile phone attached to the ear or their thumbs. Everything is so noisy, bright and busy.
away from timor, i find that i now need more clothes each day i venture out and see such nice stuff enticing me in the shop windows - ON SALE! 20% discount! half price! post christmas specials! ....or how about that new 3G phone (which will be useless back in Timor) that is now so much more affordable if you buy it with a 2-year plan? or that Motorola (red) phone that will give $17 back to a worthy cause?
Oh so many choices now, it gives me a headache.
just a few days home and already i feel tired out. everywhere looks different - new buildings, new malls, new everything. I had to hunt for the pharmacy i usually frequent because it's been moved. I had to ask a cab driver what those bright lights over yonder were (a new golf course) and i had to find out that a friend discovered she had cancer and is now undergoing chemotherapy, two elderly friends died from cancer, and a former schoolmate is now divorced. of course, there were also the nice surprises - like new babies added to the brood in my social circles and how suddenly all conversations have become 'how old is he/she?' 'how heavy was he/she when first born?' 'ooo can he/she walk now?' 'what's the first word?' goo goo gaaaa gaaa...
i guess, i am just feeling a little out of touch. it comes with the choice i made when i decided to venture overseas for my adventures and now for work. i do lose touch with my friends and each time i come back, i desperately try to claw back into the fold, but each time i slip a little further. Hmm... relationships.... you really do need time to build them. I can't be a good godma if i only see my godson once every year.....
maka ne'e deit....
Valente SmellyBottom
Thursday, December 28, 2006
Wednesday, December 20, 2006
tribute to Caicoli
'Been passing by this setup for the last few days while on the way to work. It's right outside the old UN house in Caicoli. Ironic huh, a scene of love, sacrifice and goodness that the Holy Family embodied, yet set in the most contrasting environment - a home that used to be but now burned, pillaged, destroyed and down to its skeletal remains, with graffiti decorating it. You can see it both ways - the Holy Family healing the wounds or someone with a real bad sense of humour. 
I have a special thing for this area because I used to eat at the warung right across the old UN house every single day. The ibu used to sell the yummiest (and most unhealthy) fried chicken and for $1 only, you can get kangkong & banana flowers (for warding off malaria), 1 piece of fried chicken, rice, and sometimes even bean soup! A West Timorese, she would also go to English Mass every Sunday at Igreja Aimutin where we would see her and chat with her too. But since the crisis, her shop is now closed, and we hardly see her anymore in church. Last I heard, she's now living with her husband and son in Balide. I miss her $1 meals.... This area is also particularly heartwrenching for me because I have seen it in much better days. There is a small loja here selling snacks, soft drinks and where people would sit and gossip after lunch. Now, it's always shut.
There was also an English school in a small shack that some of my colleagues would go to after work. It doesn't exist anymore. This was how it looked in better days... One of my colleagues lived a few doors away and his house too was completely destroyed, and everything was stolen, down to the last piece of zinc on his roof. It's kinda sad that i only knew where he lived after his house was looted, when other colleagues pointed it out to me each time we drove past. It must be so painful, to see your house, yet be unable to return. He told me that when the crisis erupted, he didn't want to leave at all, but when the houses nearby started burning, he had to run away with his family.
He brought nothing at all, safe for the clothes on their back and a statue of the Blessed Virgin. Of course, everyone kinda knows that those whose homes were not destroyed belonged to the right group. Amidst the empty shells of homes in Caicoli, you still see the families whose homes were left untouched, so it's kinda awkward when you pass through, and you know who is aligned to whom.
Dang, i'm getting super nostalgic here........... I guess, it's like death you know... they always say you see a bright light at the end of the tunnel and your memories of your life start flashing before you. I guess, that's me now. Although i know i will be back, but i can't help feeling the nostalgia...for the good ole days when i could walk home without feeling anxious, take a microlet and go shopping in Comoro Market (where are my market shots???), sit on the beach eating ayam bakar....
Anyways, i haven't done this for a long time - going around with my tiny camera. I took these shots yesterday after my 'Timorese dad' told me he had bought some Akar from Atabae. What's Akar? Apparently it's sago from palm trees, which is processed into solid cakes. 
You have to soak them in water, dry them and then use them for making dosi or cake.I'm more accustomed to seeing Sago made into round balls and used in desserts in thailand, singapore, malaysia etc. Not in cakeform.... intriguing. Incidentally, the akar was one of the most essential food used during the resistance. The women in the OPMT (Popular Organisation of Women in TL)
used to harvest and prepare sago in sacks and distribute them to the Falintil fighters so that they could survive for long periods in the bush without exposing their cover and stay alive. Cost for each block of akar - $1 ONLY!!!! You can ask the Timor Travel guys who ply the Kupang - Dili route to help you buy some since they pass Atabae on the way.
Monday, December 18, 2006
Sit until it disappears syndrome
Ok, i couldn't help but blog about this after Living Timorously mentioned Jam Karet and the Amananha attitudes that have been inherited by the Timorese and practised to perfection. I love my Timorese friends and many of them extremely bright, but in my 1.5 years here, i have noticed that some are afflicted with the "sit until it disappears" syndrome. What are the symptoms?
1) The person nods 'yes' to all your requests - there is little clarification
2) The person busies him/herself with other smaller, easier tasks and your request gets buried into the back of the mind
3) The person then tries not to remind you of your requests - this is the 'sitting on it hoping it will disappear' part
4) The job never gets done for weeks
5) When you rememeber your request and hunts down the responsible person, he/she says 'oh, i wasn't quite clear what you meant then' or 'i'll do it this afternoon' then the cycle goes back to (2). To stop the endless cycle of procrastination, i've found that i literally have to be in their face several times a day, until they finally beat the inertia to get off the starting block.
This extreme procrastination happens even for those who are highly educated and are definitely capable of performing the tasks. It seems to be a mental block or fear of inability or simply knowledge that it's an unpleasant task that stops them, and they have picked up the idea that if they sit on it long enough, the task will peter away into nothingness. I've had serious confrontations with close Timorese friends about this bad bad habit because it really paralyses them into inaction. It's getting them to realise that the worst monsters melt away when you face up to them, and they do grow larger and larger when you run away.
I guess, maybe it's not just the Timorese who are afflicted with this syndrome. Plenty of people around the globe try to run away from their fears without realising it breeds their monsters. I've had serious procrastination issues before when i was freelancing but i grew so tired of the mental stress of undone work bearing on me (no matter how i tried to sit on it it wouldn't disappear!) that i finally decided to hack, slash and slaughter the 5-headed monster with my sabre. So far, it's worked quite well. Just hope that those of my friends afflicted with the syndrome will eventually pick up the courage to battle their fears too.
Perhaps then, this country will move faster along in decision-making, and the homeless and displaced and the poor don't have to wait much longer for the powers above to make their critical and sometimes hard decisions.
1) The person nods 'yes' to all your requests - there is little clarification
2) The person busies him/herself with other smaller, easier tasks and your request gets buried into the back of the mind
3) The person then tries not to remind you of your requests - this is the 'sitting on it hoping it will disappear' part
4) The job never gets done for weeks
5) When you rememeber your request and hunts down the responsible person, he/she says 'oh, i wasn't quite clear what you meant then' or 'i'll do it this afternoon' then the cycle goes back to (2). To stop the endless cycle of procrastination, i've found that i literally have to be in their face several times a day, until they finally beat the inertia to get off the starting block.
This extreme procrastination happens even for those who are highly educated and are definitely capable of performing the tasks. It seems to be a mental block or fear of inability or simply knowledge that it's an unpleasant task that stops them, and they have picked up the idea that if they sit on it long enough, the task will peter away into nothingness. I've had serious confrontations with close Timorese friends about this bad bad habit because it really paralyses them into inaction. It's getting them to realise that the worst monsters melt away when you face up to them, and they do grow larger and larger when you run away.
I guess, maybe it's not just the Timorese who are afflicted with this syndrome. Plenty of people around the globe try to run away from their fears without realising it breeds their monsters. I've had serious procrastination issues before when i was freelancing but i grew so tired of the mental stress of undone work bearing on me (no matter how i tried to sit on it it wouldn't disappear!) that i finally decided to hack, slash and slaughter the 5-headed monster with my sabre. So far, it's worked quite well. Just hope that those of my friends afflicted with the syndrome will eventually pick up the courage to battle their fears too.
Perhaps then, this country will move faster along in decision-making, and the homeless and displaced and the poor don't have to wait much longer for the powers above to make their critical and sometimes hard decisions.
Thursday, December 14, 2006
more tumbling tots..............
Finally, the wind has stopped blowing this tumbleweed madly upside down and everywhere..
I'm five days before my contract here breaths its last....my last major 'deliverable' is done, and I am now catching my breath to pack up and see what else needs to be done. But i will return to Timor again next year, even if i don't get a job....this land is rather addictive ain't it?
A few issues popped into my mind, after glancing at the large number of ETAN mails in my mailbox and i am attempted to respond to them... or at least get them off my chest.
email "Whitlam asked to 'tell truth'" reminded me that the Balibo 5 were murdered on the day i was born... a great way to remember significant historical facts huh? It also reminded me of how ignorant I was of the happenings in ET all my life until 2 years ago even though my country is a close neighbour, yet,geopolitics caused my country's weak media to report little on ET's independence struggle... Other birthdays i know: Tia M was born on 28 November, and she celebrated her 16th birthday in 1975, while A was born on 7 December, and he was 4 when the Indonesians invaded Timor.Everytime I look at them, i see the miracle that they are still alive and breathing, knowing how thousands of Timorese were brutally slaughtered.
email "It makes you wonder, doesn't it?" had a really cynical comment from an anonymous reader about the fence at City Cafe. I would like to counterpose it. Recently, I met an Aussie woman who has been living in Timor for 7 years, and had met all kinds of awful people who did awful things to her, and so she had become really skeptical of all NGOs and UN staff. So when I first met, her fangs and claws were sharpened and ready to shred me apart. There was much bitterness in her. I had to gently remind her that i used to be a volunteer too, and eventually, through our interactions, she realised that I am indeed not evil or a bloodsucker, or what the anonymous reader described as " expats using the recipient country as a stepping stone for career advancement, paying off mortgages, financing expensive holidays, satisfying personal expenses and as a safe heaven sexual fraternisations..."
What i want to say, is, for every baddie out there, there are also many GOODIES! I've met so many great malaes who have truly embraced their Timorese brothers and sisters as their own, and are doing many good things here in Timor. perhaps Mr Anonymous Reader needs to stop hanging out at City Cafe and meet the other nice malaes i know, who are dedicated, passionated and sincere. And when i say malaes, let's try to think out of the box. Black-haired, brown-eyed Asians and Africans are also malaes. I think that while some people choose to volunteer (like i did) and find great satisfaction in that, there are others who prefer to have a career from international development - and they should not be burnt at the stake for that choice.
Remember, it is a CHOICE. I despise how some volunteers get all high-falutin about their 'sacrifices' and scoff at those who receive a salary. To each their own, i say. YOU chose to be a volunteer, nobody forced you to. (You can still fight for social justice if you receive a salary.) To be honest, i don't think there is such a thing as 'true altruism' in this world. When we volunteer, we DO get something back in return - a nice warm feeling in our hearts, and some people also get awards, recognition, and more warm feelings from others. So it's NOT for nothing, so stop getting all romantic about volunteerism. I dare say this, cos I have been volunteering since 1998, and I have never told anyone that it's ALTRUISTIC cos it's not. I do feel good about it, and that's the reward.
That said, i must admit that there are many baddies that exploit the system to linger on and get posted from one country to another. BUT there are also volunteers who are like that! So it's not about whether you have been PAID or not, but what YOU, your character is like, and what harm you do in the country. In a cowboy town like Timor where the laws are not loophole-free yet, there will always be opportunitists earning a fast buck at the expense of others. But that feeling of being in a frontier town (and lawlessness!)does make it all the more exciting to be here.
Okay, that felt good. I'm normally not this vitriolic.
Last one on my list: the doctor with a stethoscope round his neck.
one day, my father came to visit and he was climbing up to the Jesus statue. As he was going up the last flight of steps, he saw a man, and asked in amazement, "Is he really a doctor?" because this man was climbing up the hill with a stethoscope slung around his neck. We all know who this man is. Apparently, he's a bit of a legend in ET's neighbour to the east and many doctors volunteer at his clinic. He's also very popular with the Timorese people. I'm writing about him because recently there was a story by Jill Joliffe in The Age about women being trafficked into Syria.
There was a mention of the women being AIDS-tested before they were recruited. After this article was circulated around, someone sent me the FULL copy of what Jill Joliffe had written before her article was slashed down to exclude these few paragraphs:
Whoaaa....I don't have to say what's wrong here, do i? Will I get in trouble for posting this here? Maybe The Age was afraid of being sued that's why these paragraphs were deleted? Or maybe it's because the doctor mentioned is so popular in that country to our east? Or they just didn't trust Jill Joliffe's professional skills and her ethics? Hmmm.. makes me wonder if the media in the 'free, and developed world' is any freer than those in developing countries?
Anyways, just some rambling tots... before i pack up and wave tata. I should be in Laos in January volunteering there for a month before seeing what else i can do back here in Timor. So until then..................adios!
I'm five days before my contract here breaths its last....my last major 'deliverable' is done, and I am now catching my breath to pack up and see what else needs to be done. But i will return to Timor again next year, even if i don't get a job....this land is rather addictive ain't it?
A few issues popped into my mind, after glancing at the large number of ETAN mails in my mailbox and i am attempted to respond to them... or at least get them off my chest.
email "Whitlam asked to 'tell truth'" reminded me that the Balibo 5 were murdered on the day i was born... a great way to remember significant historical facts huh? It also reminded me of how ignorant I was of the happenings in ET all my life until 2 years ago even though my country is a close neighbour, yet,geopolitics caused my country's weak media to report little on ET's independence struggle... Other birthdays i know: Tia M was born on 28 November, and she celebrated her 16th birthday in 1975, while A was born on 7 December, and he was 4 when the Indonesians invaded Timor.Everytime I look at them, i see the miracle that they are still alive and breathing, knowing how thousands of Timorese were brutally slaughtered.
email "It makes you wonder, doesn't it?" had a really cynical comment from an anonymous reader about the fence at City Cafe. I would like to counterpose it. Recently, I met an Aussie woman who has been living in Timor for 7 years, and had met all kinds of awful people who did awful things to her, and so she had become really skeptical of all NGOs and UN staff. So when I first met, her fangs and claws were sharpened and ready to shred me apart. There was much bitterness in her. I had to gently remind her that i used to be a volunteer too, and eventually, through our interactions, she realised that I am indeed not evil or a bloodsucker, or what the anonymous reader described as " expats using the recipient country as a stepping stone for career advancement, paying off mortgages, financing expensive holidays, satisfying personal expenses and as a safe heaven sexual fraternisations..."
What i want to say, is, for every baddie out there, there are also many GOODIES! I've met so many great malaes who have truly embraced their Timorese brothers and sisters as their own, and are doing many good things here in Timor. perhaps Mr Anonymous Reader needs to stop hanging out at City Cafe and meet the other nice malaes i know, who are dedicated, passionated and sincere. And when i say malaes, let's try to think out of the box. Black-haired, brown-eyed Asians and Africans are also malaes. I think that while some people choose to volunteer (like i did) and find great satisfaction in that, there are others who prefer to have a career from international development - and they should not be burnt at the stake for that choice.
Remember, it is a CHOICE. I despise how some volunteers get all high-falutin about their 'sacrifices' and scoff at those who receive a salary. To each their own, i say. YOU chose to be a volunteer, nobody forced you to. (You can still fight for social justice if you receive a salary.) To be honest, i don't think there is such a thing as 'true altruism' in this world. When we volunteer, we DO get something back in return - a nice warm feeling in our hearts, and some people also get awards, recognition, and more warm feelings from others. So it's NOT for nothing, so stop getting all romantic about volunteerism. I dare say this, cos I have been volunteering since 1998, and I have never told anyone that it's ALTRUISTIC cos it's not. I do feel good about it, and that's the reward.
That said, i must admit that there are many baddies that exploit the system to linger on and get posted from one country to another. BUT there are also volunteers who are like that! So it's not about whether you have been PAID or not, but what YOU, your character is like, and what harm you do in the country. In a cowboy town like Timor where the laws are not loophole-free yet, there will always be opportunitists earning a fast buck at the expense of others. But that feeling of being in a frontier town (and lawlessness!)does make it all the more exciting to be here.
Okay, that felt good. I'm normally not this vitriolic.
Last one on my list: the doctor with a stethoscope round his neck.
one day, my father came to visit and he was climbing up to the Jesus statue. As he was going up the last flight of steps, he saw a man, and asked in amazement, "Is he really a doctor?" because this man was climbing up the hill with a stethoscope slung around his neck. We all know who this man is. Apparently, he's a bit of a legend in ET's neighbour to the east and many doctors volunteer at his clinic. He's also very popular with the Timorese people. I'm writing about him because recently there was a story by Jill Joliffe in The Age about women being trafficked into Syria.
There was a mention of the women being AIDS-tested before they were recruited. After this article was circulated around, someone sent me the FULL copy of what Jill Joliffe had written before her article was slashed down to exclude these few paragraphs:
27 girls were tested in Bui Kiak’s group, all signing forms filled in by others. She did not know she was being AIDS-tested, or might have suspected the job was not babysitting. Syrian visas do not require AIDS clearances, unlike some Middle Eastern countries.
Known as a champion of the poor, Dr M (deletion of full name, mine) said he ‘had no idea’ of the identity of the people who approached his clinic.
He said medical tests are usually free for Timorese but ‘because this was so unusual we tried to negotiate a contract, of 5USD per patient. It was not paid by the patient, but by those requesting the tests’.
He admitted women should not have been tested without informed consent. ‘They should have had VCT, voluntary counselling and testing’ he said, ‘we should have been more careful’.
Whoaaa....I don't have to say what's wrong here, do i? Will I get in trouble for posting this here? Maybe The Age was afraid of being sued that's why these paragraphs were deleted? Or maybe it's because the doctor mentioned is so popular in that country to our east? Or they just didn't trust Jill Joliffe's professional skills and her ethics? Hmmm.. makes me wonder if the media in the 'free, and developed world' is any freer than those in developing countries?
Anyways, just some rambling tots... before i pack up and wave tata. I should be in Laos in January volunteering there for a month before seeing what else i can do back here in Timor. So until then..................adios!
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