World’s second newest nation

Flying to Dili

I had set the alarm for just before 0600 and I managed to down a muesli and coffee before the shuttle picked me up for the airport. I got there before check-in had opened and I waited for a while. The check-in process was slow as some people had lots of luggage. Time went quickly though as I talked to others in the queue.

The flight on an a Brazilian-made Embraer with 2-by-2 seating was short (over an hour) and comfortable. The seats were so much wider than on a 737 or even some 777s!  Many Darwinians commented that this is shorter than any domestic flight out of their city!

First chats with locals

I found a taxi at the normal but inflated price of USD10 into town. I chatted with the driver on the ride in about various things including observations along the way:

It is OK for me to speak Malay/Indonesian to locals; they don’t hold a grudge against using the language. While it isn’t the native tongue in Dili, it is a lingua franca amongst the various peoples in the country. I had to confirm this quite a few people later before I felt comfortable using Malay/Indonesian.

There is an increasing number of mainland Chinese shops (as opposed to those owned by Timorese Chinese people many of whom fled). Some locals don’t like the mainland Chinese and some Chinese (or people looking like Chinese) have been beaten up while walking at night. He didn’t expect it to be a problem for me as I speak Malay.

I had booked a single room at the East Timor Backpackers in town. It was my first private room in over a week as Australia was expensive. The hostel had a shady courtyard and the English boss’ East Timorese wife-to-be was very nice and helpful.

My first sight of my room was a shock as it was buzzing with mosquitoes.  I’ve seen a lot of mosquitoes in my lifetime having grown up in the tropics, but at the end of my several days stay in Dili, I can consider myself to have reached new heights!

The love that crosses boundaries

I found lunch at Mama’s cafe nearby. It was an Indonesian style joint, like a Nasi Padang shop but I later realised it was Manado food (even though they had rendang). There was a separate cabinet which had dog (cooked in green chilli) and pork so that Christian majority can order it, and Muslims won’t feel that the rest of the display has been contaminated by the dog and pork.

Back at the hostel I brought up the subject of eating dogs (speaking in Malay). They really opened up and talked freely as they kinda saw me as semi-local:

• In 1999 when they had some bloody fights with the Indonesians, they dogs got stuck into the corpses but we still ate the dogs.
• People have tried to buy their pet dogs, even putting in orders for when it might die in the future.
  I said that I didn’t have any ideological issue with dog-eating, but the main concern was that the dog was disease-free. They said that people would eat dogs that had died regardless without too much inquiry into the cause.
• I think this love for dogs may have crossed the boundary in most people’s views. But it confirm my long-standing suspicion that dog-eating is very prevalent amongst Christians through the Archipelago.

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I saw Jesus

I had walked along the seafront to arrange tomorrow’s dive. I saw that Cristo Rei (the statue of Jesus) was further than expected. I came back and told Sarah (the Belgian girl) “I saw Jesus; he is too far away for us to walk to … let’s grab a taxi”.

We taxied to the park below Cristo Rei and walked up. The statue was a gift from the Indonesian government during their occupation. It faces Jakarta, heheheheh!

The role of the Portuguese language in Timor Leste

When Timor Leste came into being, it chose Tetum and Portuguese as the two national languages. Tetum is only understood in some areas and only the older generation spoke Portuguese.

Indonesian and English were recognised as working languages. Indonesian had become widely spoken as a lingua franca and English is now an international language.

The decision to have Portuguese as a national language raised some eyebrows. Speaking to some foreigners who have been in the country for a while, the snippets they provided include:

• The rebel leaders were Portuguese-speaking.
• The rebel leaders weren’t in touch with the people at the grassroots; in fact they had a different skin colour to the everyday people of Timor Leste.
• People are now learning Portuguese.
• The Tetum language is being formalised; it isn’t very commonly used in a written form until recently. In fact some Tetum speakers would write in Indonesian rather than in Tetum.
• Few younger people spoke Portuguese. There are some MPs that sit in Parliament sleeping because they don’t understand the proceedings in Portuguese.
• Some Portuguese visitors and aid workers quite rudely expect locals to understand Portuguese. They forget that it has been a long time since Timor Leste was their colony.

Most of the above had been my suspicion even before coming to this country. It appears I may not be completely wrong.