Merpati Madness – East Timor 12th December 2008

We have 3 airlines that fly into East Timor: Air North from Darwin who gives you a ridiculously small luggage allowance for a ridiculously high airfare. Austasia who have recently started a route from Singapore which opens up that market, but also some Europeans who are banned from flying on any Indonesian airlines because of their bad safety record. And finally Merpati to Bali, who are Indonesia’s domestic carrier but charge an international price.

This is soon to change as East Timor is setting up their own airline to fly to Darwin and Bali, which should stop the monopoly. But at the moment you have one airline depending on your destination.

The Merpati experience is one to be endured rather than enjoyed. Every 3 months the price seems to increase, but you don’t have a choice if you want to get to Bali. The flight is functional, you certainly don’t expect any frills, and if there is anything edible in the stone cold lunchbox they give you, it’s a surprise. It’s even more of a surprise if they manage to give you customs card on the plane, unfortunately they were the wrong ones and we had to repeat the form filling process again when arriving in Dili.

Because my working week is more weekend intensive I tend to fly weekdays, so have never encountered the mass exodus on a long weekend. Last weekend was a public holiday so the Merpati flight was full, or should I say overbooked by 10 people. Rather than addressing this at check-in, they waited until everyone was in the departure lounge which is not a pleasant place, with ineffectual air conditioning which had broken completely that day, gross toilets and no water available to buy (plenty of gin and whisky though). After 2 hours Merpati basically told their customers that they were overbooked and had to ‘cull’ themselves! You can imagine how this went down!

Eventually 10 people did give up their seats and the remaining passengers were herded towards the plane only to find their luggage had been unloaded, apparently the plane was too heavy. So one hundred people protested on the runway. This is supposed to be an International Airport!

I’m not sure how it all got resolved but the plane landed in Bali 4 hours late minus some poor sods luggage, and most of the passengers who had connecting flights of course had missed them. So the Customer Service award East Timor style has to go to Merpati this year.

Last week the Dive Centre gained PADI 5 Star status which we were all really pleased about and celebrated with a few bottles of fizzy plonk. To get 5 star status you need to satisfy certain criteria in continuing education, reef conservation and also have a generally nice dive centre with changing facilities, retail shop etc. In the lead up to our application the place had a distinct feel of building site at times, a new storeroom was built, the old storeroom was turned into a toilet and shower and just when we thought the rubble, cement and noise had finished, my boss decided we needed a huge wall sized water feature with our logo on it. It does look fab now it’s finished though.

This water feature is becoming a bit of a mystery though. First the pump worked intermittently which meant we had stagnant water which is breeding ground for mosquitoes. A couple of scientists who were doing research on dengue fever confirmed that we had the dengue larva in the water. An easy remedy is to put fish in the water that eat the larva, so Megan came round with some fish for us. The very next day the fish had disappeared.

We worked out the problem with the pump, due to a slow leak, the water level dropped and the pump works on water pressure, so by topping up the water, the pump works and gone is our dengue problem as the water is always moving. Two days ago one of my UNPOL customers presented me with a present of a terrapin that he had found in a puddle in the middle of the main road. So we stuck the strangely named terrapin, Felicity, into the pond at the bottom of the water feature and an upturned shell so she could sunbathe and hide under it. The next day the terrapin had disappeared!

This morning, John showed me a bucket of fish he had bought to put into the pond, these were more of the dengue larva eating type. This afternoon I returned after lunch and the fish were gone! Now I know we have a lot of stray cats round here but this is getting ridiculous.

We also had another visitor a few days ago, I turned around to see Rita shooing a huge crab through the house with a dustpan and brush, it made me giggle as it kept changing direction causing Rita to run around in circles.

Another mystery occurred on Tuesday when I walked into the office and found one of the security cameras facing the wall. We installed CCTV after the traditional method of the Lulic Man didn’t identify the thief and we decided a more modern approach may be needed. As the camera facing the wall was very suspicious, the whole nights footage was played, nothing at all went on until 8 a.m. when on screen came Zelia with her feather duster and knocked the camera round. Mystery solved.

We have already got into the Christmas spirit here; on the 2nd of December I gave Zelia a long list of shopping, paint, vinegar, pens, toilet roll and a Christmas tree. I was worth it just to see her face light up, she was so excited. I returned back in the afternoon to be presented with a garish, over decorated, multicoloured plastic tree, but the staff like it and that’s all that counts. So we are suitably decorated for our Xmas party and 5 Star celebration on the 16th. Although attendance may be a bit low as everyone is dropping like flies here due to a horrible stomach bug that’s going around. It lingers on and on and the weight loss in people has been dramatic.

There has been a big clean up around town getting rid of the market stalls. The stalls were illegal and in some cases like the Pertamina market, a bit of a safety issue as people would park on a bend to use the market. Apparently the only stalls that are allowed outside official market places are those that are on wheels as they are considered vehicles. So now the vendors have to go back to the official market places if they want to trade. The place looks completely different.

East Timor had a big quake last week 6.3 and the bed moved for me again. I’m getting used to it now.

We have had a load of tourists in recently, real genuine ones that have come here solely to dive, not visa runs or visiting relatives. We had a couple from Holland who were both instructors and had been diving for 27 years and only had enough time to dive for one day here. In all the years of diving, neither had seen a dugong in the water. On their second dive my friendly dugong playmate from a couple of months ago came back to the same spot and repeated his playtime for 10 minutes. It must like visiting instructors.

We have also had loads of squid spawning and a few humpback whales. Although the rain has come early this year and the visibility is dropping. Time to teach search and recovery and navigation courses again.

Splash for Trash – East Timor 8th October 2008

On the 20th of September it was International Beach Clean Up day. All over the world volunteers were picking up rubbish from their beaches. So to join in the spirit of things I decided that our dive centre was going to take part and if possible get as many kids involved as I could.

The event was a great success. We held it at the Ocean View Hotel as we needed shade and toilet facilities. 50 people took part including some regular divers, snorkelers and kids from both international schools here in Dili. We managed to get some Timorese teenagers involved as well. They were at the hotel for an English lesson and when they had finished I invited them to join us. They thought it was a great idea and donned their rubber gloves and joined in with the rest of us.

What I didn’t know was the Portuguese television company that was filming the event was going to show the footage worldwide. So I’m now an international film star, even the USA! We managed to collect 48 big bags of rubbish in two hours which were disposed of by Anteater (thank you!) Prizes were given to the kids that collected the most unusual pieces of trash which were a car bumper, a radio and a welding helmet.

I had my first encounter with a Lulik man (witch doctor) recently. We had a robbery at the office and to eliminate any suspicion the traditional Timorese way of doing things is to visit the Lulik man and he will tell you who did it. A load of codswallop you may say but the Timorese are very superstitious and really believe in this stuff.

So I went to see the Lulik man who told me who the culprit was. He did this by wadding his mouth with betel nut and lime, and then every time we asked a question he would remove this muck from his mouth, inspect it and give us the answer. The thing is about betel nut is it a mild drug, so the guy was getting stoned and looking into his drugs for the answer!

I then had to go and buy a candle and all the staff had to hold the candle and swear that they did not steal anything and they didn’t know who did. The weird thing was when I took the candle back it sent shivers down my spine and I had goose bumps for a good 5 minutes. Once the ceremony was over I had to return the candle to the lulik man and tell him what kind of curse I wanted. Anything from death to disability! I opted for a head cold. Needless to say his description did not fit any one person and no-one has got sick. This is not something I want to repeat, ever!

We have had a whole band of tourists in from Australia, 10 of them! Wow we had a busy week, just the logistics alone. But I did some incredible diving over on Atauro, the walls there are amazing. The Timorese polices have been having a clamp down on car registrations, If you don’t have the original documents on you then the car gets impounded. The tourists were driving around in a minibus we hired and of course got stopped at a road block, bye-bye minibus!

Now this is typical of Dili. The major car hire company had two partners who fell out so they split and are now both trading in separate premises but under the same name. I phoned the company to get the papers for the minibus only to be told that the previous company illegally kept all the papers for the cars and they are now in the middle of a court battle to get the papers back. This doesn’t really help when your hire car has been impounded by the police! We managed to get the minibus back though.

I did a deep dive course this weekend with 3 of my regular customers. The course is 3 dives and each one of them was fabulous. The first at Dili Rock we got 26 nudibranches in an orgy plus a winged pipefish (well spotted Annabella!) The third at Marble Rock we had a Bumphead Parrotfish and 2 leaf scorpionfish. But the second dive at K41 was one of my best dives there yet. At 40metres we had 2 white tip reef shark just laying on the sand, when they moved off an huge Napoleon Wrasse swam past. Then a huge barracuda, 21 squid doing a fabulous line dance, a flying gurnard, 2 lionfish, a scorpionfish, a swiftly moving nudibranch and a flatworm. To top it all we had a manicure courtesy of the cleaner shrimp.

We have some guys over here that are trying to raise a shipwreck in the harbour. They are a great bunch and we have been trying to help them out with their unexpected problems. So they invited us on their boat for dinner. It was bliss sitting on the top deck in the cool night breeze looking over Dili. Really chilled out especially as I am in the middle of a very stressful course with 6 Filipino cops who cannot seem to make it on time, ever! I did get a word of warning though, when using the toilet, check the area first. They had a banded sea snake in there, eek!

Stop, Sink, Act – East Timor August 18th 2008

Accents are funny things, after living in East Timor for 2 ½ years, I sometimes get mistaken for an Australian. However I love to tease my German colleague about his English pronunciation. I was sitting in the office listening to a dive briefing when the instructor asked ‘What do you do when you have a problem underwater on a night dive? One of his German students replied ‘You Stop, Sink and then Act’, which had me laugh wery wery much!

I took a group of guys out diving from the Mercy ship recently. The Mercy is a huge naval hospital ship that visits East Timor every year. They tour around South East Asia, but East Timor is the only country they visit on an annual basis. The ship is huge and is fully fitted out with operating theatres, opticians, dentists and specialists, unfortunately though, no recompression chamber. The work they do is amazing; one of the guys was telling me about kids horribly disfigured with cleft palates getting their smiles back with a relatively simple operation. Another kid was burned in a fire seven years before and his skin on his legs was fused so for seven years he could not walk. After an operation he was bicycling around the decks of the ship!
After the first dive, the lads produced their own lunch in the form of a ration pack complete with its own cooker! It’s a plastic bag containing magnesium, just add water and you have your very own boil in the bag cooker, really impressed me and Edu (One of my local staff). Can you imagine the concept of creating heat without a flame or electricity?

This weekend has been fabulous; we had a white tip reef shark at Dili Rock which was totally oblivious to our presence. It was being cleaned by a fish and getting annoyed with it so every couple of minutes it would circle around then settle back on the sand again, not aware of us, what a display.

My next dive was with an Advanced Open Water student doing her navigation dive. Half way through the timed task my watch stopped. Then trying to navigate a reciprocal heading she was going completely the wrong way, I then realised she had her compass upside down. Finally navigating a square I realised geometry was not her strong point (even though we had practiced on land) as the compass headings she had plotted were 60 degrees not 90, we both have never laughed so much underwater.

And Sunday; Sunday was the second best dive I’ve ever done in my life. We had a fab first dive at behau village, baby cuttlefish, nudibranches, crayfish and blue spotted stingray. But the second dive at Secret Garden was absolutely incredible.



We had already seen white tip reef shark, blue spotted sting ray, maori wrasse and bumphead parrotfish and were just coming up to our safety stop. I was freezing! It was the 2nd dive of the day and I was teaching photography and diving with an instructor tourist and his rescue girlfriend so the dive was very slow and 26 degrees in the water.

I heard a noise and the instructor was pointing above me, I looked up to see a huge dugong swimming over me about a metre above my head! He then swam round all 4 of us and checked us out, so close that you were tempted to put your hand out and touch it (of course we didn’t though)

Then he took off to a sandy patch and rubbed and rolled himself in the sand wiping out the vis completely so we lost sight of him. Not to worry, he was in a playful mood, he came around and checked us all out again, then off again to rub his tummy. This routine went on for 15 minutes until my buddy and I decided that we were numb, we had been in the water for 67mins by then. So we left the other buddy pair to enjoy a few more minutes of the playful frolicking.

Luckily 2 of the divers had cameras so got some fantastic shots really close, but my buddy was so cold she could actually show the other divers her photos as her hands were shaking so much! It was so worth it though.

Photos by Vincent -Thank you

My only dive to beat this was the same scenario but with a 5m baby whale shark in Egypt!

Our new Divemaster says she wants to come diving with me as I seem to be on a lucky streak at the moment. For the 3rd day running I’ve seen something great, yesterday it was an Eagle Ray at Christoe Rae. Let’s see what today’s diving holds.....

Electrical, Mechanical and Physical – East Timor 20th July 2008

Since I started my new job on the 1st of July, I’ve been plagued with breakdowns. So much so in the first few weeks I thought someone might have put a Lulik curse on me! First it was the cars. Prior to East Timor I’d only ever had one flat tyre, then one in the two plus years I’ve been in East Timor. In the first two weeks I got two flat tyres, one on each car! Then it was the batteries on both cars. Of course I was immediately asked if I had left the headlights on, I may be blonde but I’m not that dizzy! So now I’ve learnt all about batteries, alternators and glow rods (well enough to know when they break they are expensive and inconvenient!) Then I got a phone call from my colleague asking if I could send out the other car with a long tow rope as he had sunk the Land Cruiser!

I also went through a spate of accidents that kept me out of the water for a while. I think in five years of teaching I’ve had three days where I couldn’t teach due to illness. That was until a few weeks ago when I was doing a rescue course and whilst exiting the water carrying my own gear plus two others, my foot went down a hole and when a wave came, I went one way and my foot stayed in the same position, ouch! Luckily it was a bad sprain rather than a break. However, me being me, I don’t do ill, so the next weekend I thought I’d be ok to dive if I put my gear on in the water. So when a large wave came and I was dragged back out as I was holding on to my equipment. The sea literally spat me out straight into a rock and I bashed up my elbow.

Normally cuts and bruises wouldn’t be a problem providing you douse them heavily with Betadine, as in the tropics cuts can so easy get infected. However, if you are constantly in salt water it has a cleansing effect, constantly opening and cleaning the wound. So my predive preparations included strapping my elbow up with cling film and sticky tape as you can’t get proper waterproof dressings here!

I was on the mend when Mark, Pedro and Tania had their birthday party. Fuelled by Sangria; silliness ensued including jumping over the bonfire on the beach. Following several successful jumpers I managed to roll on my bad foot and went down heavily on my leg. I nursed a lovely bruise the next day as wet sand is pretty hard.

Finally, to add insult to injury (to coin a phrase), I was doing Open Water skills on the sandy bottom at Dili Rock. I felt a sharp pain in the same foot but couldn’t see what had bitten or stung me. By the time I got out of the water my foot was swelling up and turning a lovely red colour. Driving back to the Dive Centre I was finding it hard to breathe, swallowing was difficult which really started to worry me. For the first time since I started my scuba career I actually used my insurance to call DAN (Divers Alert Network) and spoke to a great doctor. Hence for the next hour I had to sit with my foot in a bucket of extremely hot water, much to the amusement of the staff.

Just when I thought the curse had lifted, the compressor buggered itself! Luckily we have two! So I spent the last few days in Bali getting a simple ‘O’ Ring changed on a filter. I had to go to Bali anyway as my quarterly Marks and Spencer’s shopping run was due. But trying to explain this weird looking mechanical device in your hand luggage to customs officers was slightly trying.

Still for all the lumps, bumps and bruises you get in this profession, it’s still worth it when you get a diver squealing with delight through his regulator after his first dive and telling you that ‘I’ll never forget my first dive, and I’ll never forget you’. Especially when he is from a land locked country such as Nepal.

On a final note, the diving here is great, but the place is quirky. We were kitting up to dive at Tasi Tolu when a Blackhawk started to take off behind us. Of course all dive preparations stopped as we watched the show, those things are impressive.

Medical Mayhem – East Timor 18th June 2008

At the age of 12 I joined St John’s Ambulance, it was a compromise with my stepmother, if I did something useful, then I could go to the youth club afterwards. So after an hour of dressing fake wounds and creating perfect roller bandages, I would share a coca-cola with my wanna-be skinhead mates at the local Holy Family church youth club.

In my teenage years, however, St John’s proved very useful; you could get to see bands free. Ok, you had to wear a very embarrassing uniform and you were always at the back, but you got guaranteed entrance.

As a diving instructor I teach EFR (Emergency First Response) which is not much different from the St John’s of years ago, simulated situations, plastic dummies and fake pain. Until last Saturday I’d never actually had to use my training in a real emergency, and I hope with all my heart, I never have to again.

In East Timor, crash helmets are supposed to be mandatory, but it’s a complete farce. You often see thin plastic crash helmets rolling down the street where they have come off because the rider has not done the strap up. In a climate such as East Timor, crash helmets are pretty hot but young lads also want to be ‘seen’ on a motorbike because they are still luxury items, most people can’t afford one. That’s why you often see a family of five on one motorbike, and if you are lucky the main rider only has a crash helmet perched on his head. The local Dili motorbike riders also have a habit of removing the mirrors on the motorbike, because it looks ‘cool’ which creates a traffic culture of merge and swerve. As a car driver, the slower the better as you never know what’s going to pull out on you.

On Saturday I was in the Hotel Timor pool teaching a rescue course when we suddenly heard a sickening screech then crunch. It took a couple of seconds to register but then I was out of the pool and in the street as fast as my legs would carry me. One of our Divemaster Trainees was already ahead of me. We emerged to find two young lads only about 16 or 17 lying in the street both with serious head injuries. One apparently was wearing one of these cheap plastic crash helmets that came off immediately upon impact, the other wasn’t wearing one at all.

It does not matter how much training you have had, nothing prepares you for reality. There was absolutely nothing I could do except keep the head still and check for breathing, they were so badly injured that you just were willing the ambulance to arrive, I felt so helpless. There was an Australian army guy there that was amazing, he packed and dressed one of the guys head. It was the second major traffic incident involving a motorbike that he had dealt with in a month. But what really got me was the onlookers, I know it happens in every country, but fellow Timorese taking photographs of a guy that’s lost 2 pints of blood on the street really sickened me.

The first ambulance arrived after 20 minutes but it seemed like hours. They had no neck brace but at least they had a back board, the second ambulance didn’t even have that. Seeing the two young lads off in the ambulance you knew there was nothing you could do for them and their chances of survival were slim to zero. On Monday evening I found out there as a shrine laid out on the road, one the boys had died, just after his sixteenth birthday.

What an absolute crazy waste of life! That lad were someone’s son, brother or nephew. It costs $30 to buy a full face padded helmet here, ok, it may not be up to Australian or UK standards but at least it gives some chance of survival. The attitude here seems to be that crash helmets are worn to avoid a fine, but the education doesn’t extend to the fact that mandatory crash helmet wearing is there to save lives. One of the guys I used to work with cut a star shape in the top of his helmet for ventilation because it was ‘too hot’. If he had come off of his motorbike the sharp plastic edged would have impaled in his skull but that was a risk he was willing to take even though he actually owned a full face padded helmet.

$30 however, out here is a lot of money. On the average wage of $2 per day, that’s half a month’s salary but the loss of a loved one is a hell of a price to pay.

Later in the week I had my own experience of Timorese medical care. While teaching the same rescue course, I got my foot stuck in a hole between rocks. At the time I was carrying a lot of equipment, so when the wave came, my foot stayed where it was and the rest of my body went sideways, spraining the foot badly. After two days of hobbling around I went to see the Portuguese doctor who wanted me to get an x-ray to ensure there wasn’t a fracture.

There are only two places in Dili where non military/UN folk can get an x-ray. One is clinic that’s open from 12 until 2 and the other is Dili National Hospital with its one tired x-ray machine and its single only operator. The hospital itself is under construction, so there are planks over walkways which were hard to navigate with a painful strapped up foot, let alone a wheelchair!

After locating the X-Ray department whose walls are adorned with ‘DANGER RADIATION’ posters, I gave in my doctor’s letter and was told I had to pay, which I expected. What I didn’t expect is payment has to be made in the Laboratory which is two buildings away. So off I hobbled only to find the entrance I had been told to go to was closed for construction, so I hobbled back the way I came and tried a different way. Once I got to the lab a friend of mine who worked there took pity on me and led me through the maze of corridors to the payment section, I’d never had found it on my own.

Back at the x-ray department there were around 60 people in the waiting room. Here you see the poverty of the country, young mums with faded, ill fitting clothes, mosquito scarred legs, carrying their stick thin sick children in sarongs tied around their neck. The whole hospital looks tired, antiquated equipment, grubby walls and posters stuck up with yellowing sticky tape. The renovated blocks look good though and according to the doctor it is so much better than a few weeks ago when the IDP’s were still living there. Then you had tents between every building, with cooking fires and livestock tethered at the entrance of the operating room and Intensive Care Ward, not a hygienic environment for a hospital. I’m glad I don’t get sick very often.

Luckily my foot wasn’t broken, only sprained, so I’m going to be careful where I put my feet in the future, I’d rather not repeat this experience.

Mr Timor – East Timor 27th May 2008

Forget American Pop Idol, forget the Eurovision Song Contest, the biggest extravaganza of the year was Mr Timor! Seven (very brave) luscious men, strutting their stuff in front of 300 screaming women (and men!) at the Atlantic Grill on Saturday night. Apart from a few Dili hitches such as power cuts, the night flowed as easily as the Bintang did. Even the wimpy men that didn’t have the guts to enter got Dutch courage after a couple of beverages and did an impromptu strip and strut. The winner of the evening was a gorgeous Timorese boxer, with an amazing physique much to Lisa’s luck as she was the winner of the raffle, first prize, a date with Mr. Timor. All the money raised goes to promoting HIV prevention and awareness in East Timor, so a great cause as well as a fantastic night.

I love menus in Asia, they are a constant source of amusement for the spelling mistake and Dili is no exception. In the Dili Club you can get unchooies on your pizza, at the Saigon you can order Sweetcorn and Crap meat soup, but still nothing could top the old Filipino restaurant that used to offer Chicken Crispy Skin and Ass (no spelling mistake there!)

I’ve just finished teaching the kids at one of the International Schools about Project AWARE and Reef Conservation. The ages ranged from 8 to 12 and boy do they have imaginations, they ask intelligent questions too like ‘How do they dynamite fish? Because if you lit the fuse and threw it in the water, the fuse would go out’. We played great games like pin the fins on the fish and measuring a blue whale and over 5 weeks we built a mural of the reef in East Timor, I’ve never seen quite as many whales and dolphins in one place, but their artistic talents are amazing.

Talking of artistic talents I actually picked up a pencil and completed a drawing last week for the first time since I left school. I sat in on an art class at Arte Morris, the kids there put me to shame, and they are so talented, picking up shading and perspective so easily (credit to the teacher of course). It’s a great organisation and some of the art they produce is stunning. They have a new exhibition in Hotel Timor for Independence Day, so I’m going to have a look this afternoon.

Unfortunately, I was working on Independence Day, so missed the parade which was reported as fantastic, I also missed the fireworks because they were moved from 8.30 at Jesus to 7.30 at the Palace. Still by the sounds of the vibe it was much more of a celebration than the last two years, may be now as things are settling down here there is more reason to celebrate.

Return of Ramos – East Timor 1st May 2008

I’ve been playing international jet setter; well, Indonesia and Singapore! I took a well needed holiday in Bali and really pampered myself. I’d received a wonderful birthday present of a massage in Bali at one of the top reputed spas which was wonderful. Then through a friend I met a lady called Jenny who runs a spa school in Bali and she asked Camilla and me if we would like to be guinea pigs for her graduates. Of course Camilla and I jumped at the chance and had an aromatherapy massage one day and a full body scrub another day which was a bit strange because they scrub you with a turmeric mixture then plaster you with yoghurt. I felt like an Indian takeaway.

Meanwhile, back in East Timor, Ramos Horta returned home from his hospital stint in Darwin to a reception of thousands of teary eyed supporters on the streets. The road to his house (outside which he was shot) was completely repaired and resurfaced in a matter of days prior to his arrival. This is a pretty amazing feat in East Timor given the state of most of the roads in the city, and the road was renamed April the 17th Avenue, marking the day of his return.

The coverage from Australia Network showed Ramos Horta visiting the medical facility that acted so quickly evacuating him when he was shot. Ramos Horta thanked some of the Australian troops that were on duty that day, they shook his hand and said ‘That’s ok Sir’, whereas when Ramos thanked the Timorese staff, there were hugs all round and not a dry eye in the house.

A few days after his return the curfew was lifted except in one area where Salsinha was still in hiding. He has since given himself up, exactly two years since the crisis started in April 2006.

Meanwhile, I flew to Singapore to attend the Asia Dive Expo. The East Timorese Government had a stand there and I was representing one of the dive companies. The show wasn’t huge but the number of people that attended kept you busy all day. It’s been a long time since I’ve done an exhibition and forgotten how much your back and feet kill you, that and the fact you feel like a parrot saying the same thing a thousand times over. Still, if it boosts the tourism industry in East Timor it will be great.

I haven’t been to Singapore for years, even the airport is impressive. The hall for immigration alone is bigger than Dili International airport. Within half an hour we had got through customs, changed money, bought a SIM card, booked a hotel and got our luggage. In contrast to Dili International which in fairness, has seen the return of the little café, so at least you can now buy water. Upon entry to the airport terminal you are faced with a sign that reads ‘All weapons are to be inspected and cleared with the magazine removed prior to entering this terminal’, there is even a diagram with a picture of a machine gun and the correct way to unload the magazine! At check in the luggage is moved by hand, the waiting room is hot and sticky with ineffectual air conditioning units and you walk to the plane in the blazing sun. But with two flights a day, you hardly need the Singaporean efficiency.

The other thing I got used to was having the loo flushed for me. As soon as your derriere leaves the seat in Singapore, the automatic flush kicks in, I got back to Bali and was waiting for the toilet to flush itself. Similarly with the taps, I stood with my hand under the tap in Bali and realized I had to turn the tap on myself! How soon we get used to things.

Taxis were another source of fascination to me, smart, leather upholstered cars with Sat Nav, credit card swipe facilities and the automatic printing of receipts. A far cry from Dili taxis. However, I have seen some smart new yellow taxis on the streets of Dili and after the recent removal of the blackened windows from taxis, the absence of just a two inch strip for vision is more reassuring. A few adventurous taxis have replaced their windscreen slogans with slightly smaller ones that don’t obscure half the windscreen, so my driving amusement is starting to come back again. However a couple of new ones make me wonder if they ever want any business, there is ‘Broken’ and La Diak (which means ‘No Good’ in Tetum). Would you get in a taxi that’s advertising itself in this way? And last but not least there is a microlet sporting the banner ‘Lottery’!

Pink Wellies – East Timor 2nd April 2008

Last year I was in England for Easter and the year before troubles were afoot so this year I was quite taken aback with the level of celebration Easter causes in East Timor. My first real encounter of a Dili traffic jam was Palm Sunday, thinking we were being clever we chose to go East via the Bekora route and found ourselves in what I can only compare to the Notting Hill Festival; people everywhere dressed in their finest, holding intricately woven palm leaves. One little girl caught my eye in a bright pink nylon fairy dress with matching pink wellington boots. Please, nobody light a cigarette near her! It never ceases to amaze me, the extent of synthetic fibres worn on a Sunday. In this heat, I sweat in cotton clothes, but I’m a Malai, I guess if you were born here you would be acclimatised. I get the Wellington Boots though, we have had so much rain here recently and as I live in flip-flops I’ve got a permanently soggy bum and dirty calves as the flip-flop flicks mud up your legs.

Easter Sunday we got stuck at Hera behind a procession carrying 13 crosses. The UNPol at the checkpoint cleverly diverted the traffic through a back road, unfortunately, they didn’t put anyone directing further down, so all the cars turned too soon and got stuck in a side road just before the church entrance. Not close enough to see the procession unfortunately.

The curfew has been extended again but now it’s 11pm until 5am. To me this curfew makes very little difference as I’m rarely out after 10 in the evenings, but you have to respect it. One Sunday night when the curfew was still 10pm I encountered a young woman who was completely plastered around 8pm. I stayed until 9 and advised her to get a lift home and not to drive. After I had left, she got several offers of lifts home but refused saying she was ok to drive. Of course, when the time came she couldn’t seem to get the car started (probably as she was using her house key to try and start the car), meanwhile curfew time came and went, so the UNPol turned up and asked if they could assist her by giving her a lift home. Being intoxicated as many of us know can affect you sense of reasoning, she decided to call her own security officer (her boss), slurring down the phone, way after curfew. Needless to say she had left the country by the Tuesday. What a way to get yourself sacked from an Aid Agency, call your boss and tell them you are in trouble, pissed and after curfew, doh!

When I first got to East Timor Manuel spoke very little, of any language. The strong silent type! So my communication with him resulted to a lot of pointing and gesturing. Two years later, I guess Manuel has resigned himself that my Tetum will probably never extend beyond ‘Good Morning, how are you?’ so he has been coming out with a few words in English, which not only astounds me but also his East Timorese co-workers. According to Jose and Nelson, Manuel can now count in English and he says goodbye to his colleagues with ‘See you tomorrow’, in English, which amuses them no end.

Manuel is the only one of the guys that is not a diver, he can’t swim. But he is not afraid of wading in the water to help divers out or retrieve equipment during my Rescue courses. During one of these courses I was swimming out with Jose who was playing the rescue victim. Jose said ‘Look at Mr Manuel’. Manuel was standing in the shallows with a wetsuit and mask on peering in the water. So next time I was out diving at K41 in the surface interval I put a wetsuit, fins, mask and an inflated BCD on Manuel and took him snorkelling. He swallowed a bit of water and I think he was relieved when he could put his feet down again, but he told the other guys he enjoyed it.

Continuing the lighter theme from Christmas, we have been inundated with cheap Chinese musical lighters that play the most god awful tunes that stay in your head for the rest of the day. At Landmark Supermarket today they are advertising Musical Lighters 35c, lighters with no music 50c. People would rather pay a higher price for ordinary lighters than be subjected to the tinny tunes every time they light up!

Lastly, I returned home today and my landlord told me he had fixed my water problem. Yippee! Since I moved in, water has been sporadic at best. This is mainly due to lack of town water in this area. During the day they fill the water tank so that we have water at night when the town water is at its weakest. The only problem is that I don’t have regular transport, so John used wait until he saw my car arrive and then open the water. Of course when I didn’t have a car, I wouldn’t have water either. This week has fluctuated between no water at all, a tiny cold trickle or such bad water pressure that you get scolded. So hopefully my water problems are fixed, but it makes me cringe to think of those villages I went through a few weeks ago relying on one small hand pump and a well for all their water needs. My water problems pale into insignificance.

Special People – East Timor 5th March 2008

Yesterday I had the opportunity and absolute privilege to accompany an Australian woman and a Timorese guy to Same, to deliver aid to Fundation Fuan Nabilan an organisation that works with the blind and vision impaired of East Timor. There are many NGO’s in East Timor covering wide communities of people but sometimes a group will fall between the cracks, the blind are in that position. Originally this group of 15 students attended a special school in Tibesi, Dili, but in the crisis of 2006 their school was burnt down and they fled with their teacher Joanna to Same.

Unfortunately people with disabilities in East Timor are treated as outcasts, even in Same these young people get stones thrown at them. Same was an Alfredo stronghold so in the recent weeks there has been a strong military presence with low flying helicopters and APV’s (Armoured Patrol Vehicles). I know for the un-ordained hearing a black hawk overhead can set your heart racing and APV’s when they trundle past are deafening. Can you imagine how frightening these noises would be if you can’t see?

In addition to the military presence, the foundation was burgled and they lost beds, furniture and most importantly their computer which was used to produce Braille. Four girls share a thin single foam mattress on the floor; the boys have to sleep on the ground. The government is supposed to help these people but they are getting no financing and Joanna and her husband haven’t been paid for nearly two years. The aid that was given was simply to buy food.

After a 4½ journey through amazing scenery we arrived at the Foundation and were welcomed with open arms. A group of six blind young people sang us songs and played guitars then read us a speech from Braille. Since their computer was stolen the teachers have produce lessons using cards and pins, a laborious, painstaking task. It was an incredible experience, I can’t play an instrument and my vision is 20/20, yet I was listening to wonderful music produced by two young men that couldn’t imagine what a guitar looks like.

The other thing that is frustrating is that some of these young people simply have cataracts which with medical care can be removed and in some cases restore sight, but with healthy women dying in childbirth in the capital city’s hospital, eye care is a long way down on any medical agenda.

I have limited experience of humanitarian work when I volunteered at a street hospital in Calcutta, India, but my time there made me realise that some communities need help because they really can’t help themselves. Yesterday really broadened my understanding of why people are so passionate about working in this sector. Many of my customers are dedicated to the organisations that employ them because they are making a difference. What riles me is the bureaucrats and the consultants that charge thousands of dollars just to replace the word ‘Cambodia’ or ‘The Solomons’ with ‘East Timor’ on their proposals.

Soapbox speech nearly over, I don’t normally do this but the aid the Foundation received was just to buy food, not replace the Braille computer or pay for an eye operation, it was simply a stop gap. Joanna even apologised for not being able to offer us any food! These guys need long term help so if you know of any organisation that may be able to help fund this Foundation please reply to me and I’ll pass the details on to someone who can make it happen.

The journey back took about 5 hours as it was raining heavily and a passenger we were taking back to Dili was horribly car sick so we had to keep stopping. The rain was so bad that in the town of Aileu the water was knee deep in the main street. I took a photo of a water pump in the middle of a village that was the only source of water for the whole village; it makes me cringe to think I was moaning about the lack of water pressure in my flat. All I have to do is turn on a tap! Living in the city you take so many things for granted.

Tired and grubby we arrived back 12 hours from set off, but what an amazing day, one I will never forget.

Road Block Reprimand – East Timor 26th February 2008

The state of siege has been extended for another month. One good thing about it is the decent night’s sleep I’ve been getting as there is no one wandering about for the dogs to bark at and no passing cars, I even overslept one morning, the first time ever in East Timor in nearly two years. Peaceful sleep unfortunately alluded me last night when I had a couple of rogue mozzies in my usually mosquito free apartment, that ravaged my elbows of all places!

The curfew up until Saturday night was eight p.m. and the problem is for the restaurant owners themselves because if you are like me, you leave the restaurant at five or ten to eight with just enough time to get home by the curfew. The restaurant owners are still clearing up and shutting up shop at curfew time because their patrons have only just left. I know of one owner who was apprehended giving a lift to his staff to ensure they got home safely, so breaking the curfew himself.

In addition to the curfew, everyone has to carry I.D. because of the ‘State of Siege’. There are also road blocks and speed checks (a very good thing!). I had to go through a road block on my way to a dive at Dili Rock today and the whole thing was farcical. Firstly you are waved at, is that waving me over or waving me through? I wasn’t sure, so I pulled over. Then 3 or 4 people pointed at me, were they asking me to move the car, or carry on? I had no idea. Eventually a Chinese UNPol sauntered over and asked me to get out of the car, which I did. I was then scanned with a metal detector by a young Timorese lad with no uniform on. At this point my student who happened to also be UNPol piped up that ‘Language Assistants are not allowed to do the scan, it must be a police officer and they should be female’ the scanner was immediately given to a young female officer who duly scanned me and my staff member but not my student. None of us had been asked for I.D.

Next the policewoman searched my bag, but no other bags or the gear bags on the back of the truck. So if there were no weapons found in one bag, that obviously meant there were no weapons anywhere else on the truck. Wrong! I realised later I was inadvertently carrying a weapon in the form of my dive knife that was packed with my gear in the back of the truck, whoops! Then I was told that the blackening film on the windows was not allowed (the reason I was driving with all the windows fully down) and proceeded to try and pick it off with her fingernails. I started to envisage a long and hot few hours at that road block until my student informed the Chinese UNPol that it wasn’t mandated to remove the blackening only recommended and we would do it later.

If my student knew all this by reading the memos and documentation that is sent round to all the UN Police Officers, then why did the Chinese UNPol allow this situation to happen? Lack of keeping himself informed, lack of understanding or lack of authority amongst his colleagues?

On the subject of keeping informed, the ex-pat community all received text messages from our various embassies on Saturday saying the curfew had been extended from 8 p.m. until 10 p.m. but will apply for another month. Unfortunately this information did not ripple down to the PNTL who apprehended a couple of girls on a motorbike returning home from work at 8.30 p.m. Scared, they phoned their boss who is a friend of mine, who went down to try and sort the situation out, taking along another friend who speaks Behasa. The PNTL boys weren’t having any of it and tried to resolve the situation with their fists. So representatives of East Timor’s National Police Force were trying to enforce an outdated restriction through ignorance, then assaulted an Australian and Indonesian National. And these guys are allowed to carry guns!

Ramos Horta is out of his coma and talking to his family which is great news.

I’ve managed a couple of dives over the past week but the temperature has dropped to what feels a freezing 26 degrees (down from the usual 28-30 degrees) and the visibility was awful. However, I took a guy out that had learnt to dive near San Francisco so he found the 10-12 metre visibility normal and the temperature was 14 degrees higher than he had been used to. He thought the dive was great, so did I because I saw my first ever blue ringed octopus.

I’ve also seen the Pope this week! Not the current one obviously. A huge statue of the previous Pope has been erected outside the new church on the hill at Tasi Tolu overlooking Dili. So we now have the Pope overlooking Dili from the West and Jesus overlooking Dili from the East. The strange thing about the Pope though is he has a huge body and a very small head.

Time gentleman please – East Timor 15th February 2008

The state of emergency and subsequent curfew has been extended until the 20th of February. I popped into Fat Boys after work yesterday, the place was packed and everyone was eating. I joked with Fat Boy himself that he was getting the whole nights business in two hours and by 8 o’clock he can sit back and relax. Closer to home at the Dili Club at five to eight, it was like drinking up time in a bar in the UK, except the landlord didn’t need to call time, the government did. The only time I’ve seen a pub clear so quick is when ‘Time’ is called Christmas Day lunchtime. The journey home was eerie, not a car or person on the street.

The curfew is having a bad financial effect for many businesses such as restaurants and nightclubs that only open in the evening. The other business is Tiger Fuels, the country’s only 24 hour garage and convenience store, which is now 14 hours. Much of their business is done at night when people pop in for pizzas and petrol, or emergency supplies such toothpaste, nappies, toilet roll, water or dog food. If you get caught short now, you need to make sure it’s before 8 p.m.

Other businesses however are making a financial killing again. What with the attempted assassinations on Monday, the funeral of Alfredo yesterday and the arrival of the Australian PM Kevin Rudd today, the journalists have flocked back into Dili filling the hotels and renting all the available cars.

Whenever you ask an East Timorese ‘Where are you from?’ the answer is never Dili, this always puzzled me. I had it explained by one taxi driver recently. When the Portuguese came to East Timor, Dili was a small village, the Portuguese developed it into a port and city and the East Timorese came to Dili for work. But generations later, their loyalty is with their village or town that their family came from. For births, deaths and religious ceremonies the Dili residents return to their home towns.

Here when someone dies, their body is laid out in the family home for family and friends to pay their respects and grieve. From friends’ accounts, the women wail in grief and the whole process is very vocal, quite different from the sedate affair we are used to in the UK. Alfredo’s body was laid out in his stepfather’s house just down the road from work. I can’t imaging he would have been a pretty sight given the wounds he received. Hundreds of East Timorese were at the house to pay their respects along with a very visual display of military and police. He was buried in the garden rather than being transported back to his home town of Maubisse breaking with tradition, because it was too much of a risk to move the body with all the road blocks and security.

The city seems relatively calm but wary. The daily rain is putting a dampener on things (excuse the pun!) and the nightly curfew means that any activities on the street are highly visible. Ramos Horta in the mean time is reported to be stable which is a relief.

One thing I did notice this morning is the taxis; gone are the sun strips that cover half the windscreen, gone are the blackened out windows and the taxi drivers are driving around with their windows open. I don’t think this has anything to do with the overcast weather more to do with being visible at road blocks.

Playing Battleships Again – East Timor 12th February 2008

In my new flat I have a TV, a receiver and a digi box. I have all this equipment with cables everywhere and I can only get one channel, the BBC World News! Watching my one and only channel yesterday morning I was updated about the news of Dili, but I had already been informed by the more reliable Dili grapevine. The president Jose Ramos Horta had been shot and was in a critical condition being treated in Darwin, the assassins also tried to shoot the Prime Minister Xanana Gusmao, but he was unharmed and the leader of the rebels Alfredo was shot and killed.

Needless to say we were advised to restrict movements around town and there is a curfew for the next couple of days between 8 p.m. and 6 a.m. The new PM of Australia, Kevin Rudd sent over a load more troops after a request from Xanana and declaring a state of emergency. So at the moment we have HMAS Perth strutting its stuff just off the waters of Dili, the waters of which at the moment are terrible with all the rain we have been having. It’s a feeling of Déjà Vu, we were having the same weather when the first battleship appeared in May 2006.

Obviously with such shocking news, people are worried about the repercussions, but it seems that Ramos Horta is pulling through and the International Security Force is trying to round up the remaining rebels. Without their leader, let’s hope that that faction will lose momentum. Apart from that, the city seems calm.

In other news, the rations given to the IDP’s has been halved, trying to persuade them to their homes. It was feared that there could have been a backlash but I’ve heard no reports of any troubles at the camps.

But the best snippet of this week is a European delegation that were invited to attend a meeting in East Timor’s capital, Dili. They were a little concerned when no-one was waiting for them at the airport, the telephone numbers they had been given didn’t work and no-one at the airport seemed to know anything about their arrival. It’s probably because they were waiting at Delhi airport, India!

No Drunking Bar!– East Timor 25th January 2008

There are more and more Malais around town with the UN and NGOs’s, which creates a higher demand for cars, accommodation and unfortunately, prostitutes. There also seems to be more IDP’s especially around the harbour area, so much so that they are camped out on the slipway causing problems for anyone trying to get their boat in and out of the water. The Harbour View cafe should be renamed the IDP View cafe because that’s all you can see.

So why are there increases in the IDP’s? There are a few reasons; one, some people cannot move home because other people have moved into their homes. Two, the government is offering payouts for the IDP’s to move, but you have to be an IDP in the first place to get the money. Three, which is the most concerning, is if you move out to an IDP camp, you get free water, free rice and in some cases electricity and satellite TV and you can rent your house out to a Malai for $1000 per month. Given that the average wage is $2 per day, even if you have 3 members of the family working you would still make a 455% profit, a bit of a no brainer!

In a recent clampdown around 100 prostitutes and pimps were arrested and are now sitting in jail awaiting deportation. It’s mainly Chinese girls that come in on tourist visas. Several bars have been closed down including one that proudly announces it is a ‘No Drunking Bar’. You can’t get a drink but you can buy a girl.

In East Timor if you are looking prosperous (i.e. a bit porky) it’s a good thing, it means you can afford to eat. Whereas if you are looking dark, it’s a bad thing as fair is beautiful. I was talking to a New Zealand cop and on the same day we had both been insulted. I was looking for a bicycle as mine had been nicked on Xmas Eve. $200 was out of my price range so I asked to see bikes around the $70-$100 price range. I was shown one without gears, but I was advised by the shop assistant not to buy it because, quote ‘In two weeks it will break because your body is so big!’ Similarly the NZ cop was told after returning from holiday, by one of the waitresses at the Espalanda ‘Manna (sister) your skin is so black! Beauty is definitely in the eye of the beholder.

Crash helmets are supposed to be compulsory, but unfortunately you get a family of five on a moped but only the driver is wearing a helmet and usually they are the thin plastic helmets that don’t come anywhere near to the safety helmets required for skateboarding in the US. I saw the classic today; a motorcyclist had a helmet which had split, so he had fixed it with bright yellow cable ties. Unfortunately, he had not trimmed the cable ties so his helmet looked like he had a bright yellow Mohican.

I’ve found a semi reliable taxi driver to take me to work. Most taxi drivers in Dili must develop back problems as they black out their windscreen so far down that they have to stoop to see out of it. Manuel is no exception, he’s not only got blacked out windows, but he’s got about 8 inches of unadulterated windscreen to peer out of. The difference with Manuel is he doesn’t have a huge woofer in the back of his cab, so you are not tortured with over loud Indo music and only hearing the base. Manuel plays West Life and has Air Conditioning. One of his first comments to me was ‘My Taxi is my God’, given that most Timorese taxis don’t sound like they are going to make it to your destination, I’ve decided to give Manuel a go.

We have had so much rain recently that most people are coming down with either stomach problems or mosquito related diseases. Touch wood, I’ve managed to avoid both. The weather though doesn’t do much for business; however it’s a great time to do rescue courses. The worse the conditions, the better the course. Some days, after heavy downpours of rain, it’s like diving in England, but without the cold. There is one advantage of poor visibility though; you can get much closer to the fish. Dili Rock on Thursday I had an amazing dive.