June 24 – Last Day in Timor-Leste

Well, we are finishing up our last day in Timor-Leste; this really has been a ‘rapid assessment program.’  Tomorrow, we will have been in country for 19 days, and by the time we get home, will have traveled for 23.  We still have more than 40 hours of travel to look forward to tomorrow, more than half of it in the plane, which means I have almost a solid day of my knees rammed into the seat in front of me or my tray table.  Air North and Qantas both were good about giving me an exit row, but United Airlines decided that it wanted to charge more than $150 for an exit row for the Sidney to Los Angeles flight, and another $50 from LA to Denver – money that I don’t have.  Honestly, shouldn’t there be some rule about making the flights somewhat comfortable for people?  Or at least about putting the people who actually need it in the exit row?  Joann is awesome and tries her best to give the exit row to tall people when she is flying, hopefully she will rub off on others.             

Unfortunately, our last couple of days here have pretty much been spent locked in our hotel rooms, compiling and analyzing data, and writing reports.  Yesterday we went to a fundraiser by Ba Futuru, the NGO that John Bano works for.  It means “For the Future” in Tetum, and is dedicated to children’s issues.  We all made a small donation, and watched as the had bands play and had their drama group act out issues important in Dili, including child labor, domestic violence, and martial arts groups (basically fronts for training combatants).  I was glad to be there to support John, but now I have a better idea of what the people I brought to similar stuff at the schools I taught at felt like.  These shows are a lot more interesting when you know the kids and have a vested interest in them.  Young people’s acting is bad enough, and made worse when you don’t understand a word that they are saying.  We stayed for more than 2 hours, but I was fairly glad when we left.             

Tomorrow we will leave our hotel around 8:30 am, go by Ba Futuru again to talk to their co-founder, and then off to the airport for our flight that leaves at 11:15.  Unlike on the way here, we won’t be leaving the airport on the way home, and we land in Denver at 3 pm on Tuesday.  I’m anxious for the flight in.  From what I hear, much of the state is burning and clearly visible from the plane, I hope that relief comes soon for the areas affected.  I had planned on camping in Poudre Canyon and seeing Devotchka at the Mishawaka Amphitheater when I get back, things that I probably won’t be able to do now.             

These few weeks in the developing world have definitely given me an idea of the things that I will miss when I’m in the Peace Corps.  I’m planning on spending the next couple of months gorging myself on pizza, cheeseburgers, craft beer, Netflix on high-speed Internet, and real showers.  Plus of course seeing the people I care about as much as I can – my family, friends, girlfriend, and dog.  Plus KK just booked her tickets to come out to Colorado for 6 days in August, which I can’t wait for!  Now I’m trying to figure out when my trip to NYC will be.  For my friends out there:  I am planning a week or so either end of July/beginning of August or end of August/beginning of September, I expect to see all of you and get into trouble!             

Alright, I’ve got some more Game of Thrones to read.  I’ve gotten through the first two books so far, and want to finish the third before I get home and actually start studying French again.  I’m looking forward to some camping, hiking, breweries, and barbeques when I get back.  I’ll see most of you next week!

Outside of one of the water systems we visited: most were gravity fed, meaning coming from the top of a hill to a lower elevation.  Those are mostly rice fields behind me

One of the performances at Ba Futuru's fundraiser

One of the many campaign billboards we saw around the country. 

Too much trash in your gutter?  Burn it!

When we interviewed people, it usually turned into a community affair

June 22 – Snorkeling and Tais Market

 Bear Cub and I got our first day off since June 3rd today and took advantage of it.  Through a company called Free Flow Dive, he went diving, and since I’m not certified, I went snorkeling.  Either way, it was my first time snorkeling in a place that you could actually see something, i.e. not a pool, so I really enjoyed it.  We went to two places about an hour outside of Dili and I was able to snorkel for about an hour each time.  The first is called 41K; a clever name that it got because it’s 41 km outside of Dili.  I don’t think I had put on flippers or a snorkel mask since I was in middle school, so I had a bit of a learning curve, but after twenty minutes or so I got the hang of it.  41K was beautiful, and there was a lot to see.  I’ve seen coral reefs and such on Blue Planet: Seas of Life and other documentaries, but that doesn’t really compare with seeing it in person.             

Unfortunately, because of my gigantic feet the flippers were a little small.  I think this is the first time I’ve gotten blisters on the top of my toes.  After we finished at 41K, we ate fish on a stick that was caught and grilled within the last couple of hours.  Grant and I each had a couple fillets, plus a stick with squid and a stick with octopus, and a couple little bamboo wrapped rice things.  The fish all were grilled with Chile Timor to spice it up, something that I had a bad experience with at one of my first meals here.  This fish was a bit spicy, but it was perfect for both of us.  It was amazing, definitely the best meal I’ve had here.  Not only that, but for all of that we spent a grand total of $10, and I was completely stuffed.             

We went with the instructor who was from the UK and a middle-aged fireman from Australia who was absolutely hilarious.  The British guy, Phil, comes to that beach a lot and the Australian, Pete, bought a 10-dive package, so he has too.  There are of course stray dogs everywhere, and Pete and Phil had a favorite there they named Bruiser.  He was the smallest dog, but somehow the alpha-male – he just never backed down.  I think he got all of the food we threw to the 5 or 6 dogs there.  As we were leaving Pete yelled back “see you later you vicious bastard!”             

After that we went to a reef called Secret Garden; secret because the turnoff is hard to find and garden because the entire reef is laid out right in front of the beach and easy to see.  I’m really glad we went there second, because it was way better than 41K, a lot bigger with more interesting things to see.  It was really cool seeing the corals I used to have in my saltwater fish tank in their natural habitat.  Everything there (and at 41K) was just so colorful and… alive, I don’t know how else to put it.  There were schools of multi-colored fish everywhere, with so many different kinds of cool corals.  Now I really want to get into diving, I wonder if Cameroon has any?             

Though I was smart enough to put on sunscreen in the morning, I didn’t bring any to reapply, so I have another sunburn on my back.  Not that bad this time, I hope, as long as it doesn’t start hurting any worse than it does now.  There certainly is a stark difference between my back and where my swim trunks start.             

After relaxing and showering, Bear Cub and I went to the Tais Market, a local place that sells all of the scarf-type things and a bunch of other local stuff too.  I’m not going to say what I got, because I don’t want to ruin surprises for people, but I did spend a bit too much money.  The haggling was fun, and the shops were clearly in working together.  I paid with this really dirty and old $7 in one place (all of the money here is dirty and old, it is all American money and it’s not like they have a mint here), and then bought something at the shop next door for $3 in the shop next door, paying with a Hamilton.  Of course, I got the exact same $7 back.  A lot of the shopkeepers were hard to understand because of their mouths full of betel nut.  Out of the $184 I spent of my own money so far in Timor-Leste (if my math is right), $94 was spent on souvenirs for others and myself.  Time to go to dinner! 

Fish, squid, and octopus on a stick with little rice bundles = delicious! 

 So much to choose from! 

There are an unfortunate number of monkeys chained up around Timor-Leste

Electricity is... iffy in Timor-Leste

Shopping for food, apparently we are going to have cassava tomorrow!

June 21 – Update on the Eastern Districts

Well we are back in Dili from our trip to the eastern districts Manatuto and Baucau.  I wasn’t able to get on the computer the whole time because I left my charger at the Hotel Vila Verde in Dili.  After calling about a dozen times they finally ‘found’ the charger, something I was really excited about.  Happens it was right where I told them I was in room 7.             

The car ride to the eastern districts was a lot less exciting, but also a lot less scary.  We got a new driver and a new company that cost quite a bit more (glad I’m not paying) who is also Jaoa.  He is a really nice older man that has I think six kids between the ages of 8 and 28.  We may not have gotten there as fast as with AJ, but I didn’t feel like I was going to die once.  Plus about ¾ of the road was coastal and absolutely gorgeous.  However, I was still amazed at how bad the road was.  Baucau city is the second largest after Dili, and the main road between their two largest cities wasn’t even two lanes and was full of potholes.  A trip that far in The States would have only taken about an hour or 1.5 hours, here it took 3.5.             

I definitely liked the west more, but the east was nice as well.  We had great views from the place we stayed in Baucau, and the hotel in Manatuto was just as nice as Vila Verde, so it was a fairly comfortable few days.  The main problem in Baucau was that there were literally at least seven roosters staked in the yard below the communal balcony, so sleeping past dawn was not really an option.  We’ve also been getting a crazy amount of work done.  Our boss in Colorado gave us a minimum of five field sites to go to, we have been to 11, one in Dili, two in Ermera, three in Aileu, two in Baucau, and three in Manatuto.  Today instead of going to the last site, Fatisi, Grant and I stayed and got all of the computer work done that we could, catching up on finding the projects we went to in spreadsheets and going through census information.  Don’t worry, we had already driven past Fatisi before, so we didn’t really miss out on much.  We also met with at least 16 different organizations in an official capacity and another 5 at least in an unofficial one – at this point, I don’t think we could have been more successful here.             

Our time is really winding down too.  It’s already Thursday evening, and we fly out Monday morning; it’s been such a great experience.  I’m really glad that I was able to go to a developing country before I leave for the Peace Corps to live in one.  I know it won’t be the same, but there will definitely be some parallels, especially the people staring at you all the time and watching everything you do.  I swear, every time I’ve put on my sunscreen/bug spray, the Timorese people have laughed at me.             

It’s also just been eye opening seeing how little people have.  One town we went to in Baucau, called Hau-Robu, was described to us by the head of the Australian Red Cross here as ‘a lunar landscape,’ and I couldn’t have said it better myself.  There are volcanic rocks everywhere, and really no place to farm.  Plus it is incredibly dry, even with the Red Cross project the people said that they only have water for about half of the week.  Entire households make only a couple hundred dollars a year, and a household is usually around 10 people.  They said that they had never actually seen anyone from the government in the village before – really anyone from any organization before the Red Cross got there.  Everyone chews the beatle nut, a mild stimulant, so their mouths are always red, and most people have rotten teeth.            

 On our way back we stopped at a place called Ilimano and went on a hike through the jungle to see how the water system works.  It was absolutely beautiful, and my first time eating papaya straight from the tree.  Back in the village we watched a boat being made and a bunch of kids play soccer while we interviewed some households.             

Tomorrow PVA is actually going to give us a day off, the first we’ve had since June 3rd.  Grant is going to go diving; I’m going with him, but since I’m not certified I’ll just be going snorkeling.  I think we are going to the Tice Market after, try to pick up a few small things for a couple of people.  I’m looking forward to it, but a part of me just wants to stay here and sleep, we’ve been working hard fairly non-stop and I’m exhausted.  I’ll really be looking forward to when we get reimbursed for our money we’ve spent here – between my vaccinations and other money I should be getting more than a thousand dollars, plus our honorarium.  Hopefully enough to see me through the next couple of months and a trip to NYC if I can swing it.             

I can’t decide if this trip is making me more or less nervous from the Peace Corps.  I’ve gotten some great advice from Bear Cub, and I think I’ve got a lot better idea what it will be like, but definitely a more realistic idea too.  I know I’ve got to start getting my butt moving on learning this French as soon as I get home.  Alexis, the EU Election Observer we met in Aileu, said that Cameroon is actually starting to speak a lot more English, but I really want to walk out being fluent in French, so I’ll make sure I tell the placement specialist that I want to be in a French-speaking area.             

Well it’s only about 8 pm here, but I am pretty much ready for bed.  I want to make sure I can take advantage of my one day off here, because we will be working all day Friday and Saturday. 

A ceremonial house and tree in Tohumeta with some kids underneath. 

One of the more terrifying bridges we went across.  That's right, there are holes out of each side and we barely had enough room for the car to get across.  I don't think it's making it through another storm.

The Joaos, our Timorese counterpart Joao Bano Suni and driver Joao.  We definitely wouldn't have gotten a quarter of the work done that we did without Bano. 

A 'bridge' we had to cross to get to the top of the water system

Firewood for sale

Making a boat

The cost of independence.  By the way, that's not an arrowhead but a general outline of the country.  Each of the skulls has the name of a different martyr from the area.

Bear Cub and I got cozy on this trip.  We now know each other a little too well.

Fresh papaya?

June 13 – Aileu and the EU Election Observers

June 13 – Aileu and the EU Election Observers

            Yesterday we had as busy of a day as I expected.  It started by going to World Vision, which had a very impressive organization.  The little building it was housed in was full of computers, a copier, and more than a dozen people bustling around working, all Timorese.  We were able to talk to a man who had worked in water and sanitation for more than 12 years, and he told us a lot about the projects that they are doing.  Bear Cub and I were talking; for both of us, World Vision seemed like almost a great organization to work for.  It may not have a lot of offices in the countries it works in, but each one is well funded, and the literature that they produce was some of the best that we read at DU. The only problem is that in order to join World Vision, you have to take the Apostle’s Creed, not something that I could really do as an atheist, or even someone who is agnostic or not very religious could do.

              The next place we went was the Red Cross office in the area.  It was amazing how bare bones it was compared to World Vision.  Red Cross, as an organization in general, is usually more bare bones than others.  They prefer to operate out of many areas, with just a few paid members and many volunteers.  Still, it was quite a shock after being in World Vision, with all of its technology and paid Timorese workers, to walk into Red Cross that looked like all it had was a table, chairs, and a white board.

              We had to spend the next hour or so looking for gas.  It was our first time filling up since we’ve been here, but Aileu was apparently dry.  We asked UNOPL, several people around town, tried the gas station and a couple of places that looked like lemonade stands only with gas, but all they had was diesel.  Finally we got word of another place further down the road that had some, and were able to get 50 ltrs for $71.50. 

             We happened to pass the SAS office on the way, and stopped by there after getting gas.  SAS is the local government water and sanitation management organization.  We walked in – the door was unlocked – but the whole building was empty.  We tried to look through some of their books and things, but didn’t get a lot of information.  I tried using their bathroom, but both the men’s and women’s were so disgusting that I decided to wait.  We thought it was pretty ironic that the government organization in charge of sanitation had such gross bathrooms.

              Afterwards we went to the Plan International office, where a very cute Timorese woman who was fluent in English and the office coordinator gave us some of the best information we have had.  She not only was able to tell us about Plan’s programs, but the SAS programs in the area as well.  We have these maps that Grant and I created in our GIS class that show the only area in Aileu district with water piped to houses was just northwest of the city, where she lives.  However, we found that the pipes are dry half of the year, and when something breaks, SAS takes at least three weeks to get out there and fix it.  Her family has bought huge water tanks from Dili to collect rainwater, which they survive off of the rest of the year.

              It’s amazing how many people we have met, Timorese and Mallai, that have been incredibly friendly and incredibly helpful.  After meeting with Emelita at the Plan office, we went to the Sisters of Maryknoll house, where we met Sister Susan.  She was so nice, though the information we had about her was wrong, she hadn’t worked in water here.  She’s originally from Chicago, but has spent more than 40 years in Southeast Asia, first in Hong Kong, then 16 years in Indonesia, and 20 years in Timor-Leste.  Every five years she gets to go home and visit her family, with more frequent trips for ‘renewal’ and a visit with other visits with Southeast Asian Maryknoll people in Thailand.  She was here through the Indonesian occupation, where everything they had was burned, then through UN governance, and now Timorese independence.  The whole time she has been helping the people with a clinic, agricultural programs, a workshop where disabled people can make things, and more.  Not only was her dedication incredible, but she has done it all with a bit smile on her face, joking with us and telling us her story.

              Afterwards we went back to the Blue House, where apparently two EU Election Observers, Alexis from France and Carola from Germany, are also now staying.  I couldn’t have asked for a better evening.  We went and ate dinner with them, and then came back and sat on the porch.  I spent most of the time talking to Alexis, who had amazing stories about all of the elections he has observed over the years.  Just to name a few, he observed in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Afghanistan, Iraq, Ukraine, Nigeria, Côte d’Ivoire, etc.  In Afghanistan he was in charge of the northern area that borders Pakistan, China, and Tajikistan (I think), where most of the time they had to bring election materials via helicopter.  At one point there, he had more than 6,000 people that he was in charge of.

              The things he has seen and the places he has been have been both terrible and incredible.  At one point, a bomb went off 10 meters from him, and 7 people were killed.  He has been to more than 80 countries, not counting all of the ones he stayed a night in on the way to other places.  Definitely work that I would consider doing in the future, but probably not for as long as him.  He is now 44, though looks no older than 35.  Carola was more rough around the edges, but also very nice.  I was there when they were interviewing people for a translator position.  She told one guy “you friend was not good, and neither are you, but you are a bit better.”  She then made him translate this paper from Tetum to English before telling him that he was very nice, but wouldn’t do.

              Alexis and Carola were both enamored with John.  They first tried to convince us to let them hire him immediately, and the rest of the time asking him if after he finished with us he would come work with them.  Everyday makes me realize how luck we are to have him.  Other than his immaculate work translating and finding us places to eat and sleep, I found out that the observers waited 1.5 hours for the food at a restaurant we went to for lunch as well.  We got there after them, waited no more than 25 minutes, and left before they even got their food, all because of John.

              This morning (the 14th), our car wouldn’t start.  We are now waiting for the rental company to send another, and are going to hike out to a place close by, about an hour’s walk, that is supposed to have a system we can look at.  Unfortunately, because of the delay we won’t be able to see all of the places in Aileu that we wanted to, but it will be nice to walk somewhere instead of drive

June 12 – From Ermera to Aileu and the Gift of a Scarf

Today we had our first real setbacks in our research, and even they were minor ones.  Grant and I were supposed to interview three people that spoke English and look up some data on the computer.  Unfortunately, two of those people were coming in from Dili today.  Eddie was supposed to be in at 10 AM and Domingos was supposed to be back by 2 PM.  We left around 3PM, AJ didn’t know the road to Alieu so we wanted to make sure we left while there was still plenty of light.  Unfortunately, neither came back before then.  The third person, Betty, was a woman who worked in the health clinic in Era Ulu and spoke pretty good English.  Ironically enough, she had actually been to Colorado a couple of years before, to Boulder.  I’m not really sure why, but she immediately wanted to talk to us and agreed to an interview. 

We went down to the clinic and were able to speak to her for about ten minutes, just our basic questions, before someone came with a hurt leg.  She told us to come back around 2, but wasn’t there when we went back.  Essentially, our planned interviews were a bust.  We got the computer information we were supposed to, but it wasn’t as complete as we would have hoped. 

Any disappointment I had with that was quickly dissipated though.  While in Era Ulu, the staff at the center we were at staying prepared all of our meals, and it was all very good food.  Our last meal was lunch, and after we had wrapped up we went to make sure that we had our final things packed.  John Bano, the translator asked if we could come back, because there was a little surprise. 

We walked in and there were five chairs, one for each of us – PVA, Bear Cub, AJ, Bano, and myself.  There are probably 6 or 7 staff members there, and we all sat in a line with them on the other side.  The woman told us (with Bano translating) that we had come unexpectedly so they were not really prepared for us being there.  They hoped that we enjoyed it there, and she even apologized for the food because they didn’t know we were coming, even though it was delicious.  We all thanked them profusely and told them the food was delicious, that we couldn’t have asked for a better place to stay.  The place was beautiful and they were all so nice. 

After that they had us all stand up and they gave each of us these embroidered scarf-type things, with beautiful colors and Timor Leste in the middle.  They came to each of us in turn and put them around our necks and shook all of our hands.  It was really an incredible experience, unexpected and heart-warming.  I had a huge grin for the rest of the day.  I can’t wait to get home and hang it on my wall. 

After that we departed for Aileu, taking a shortcut that we had been told about through what could best be described as a country-mountain road.  Parts of it had been recently repaired, but it was rough going, with parts that had steep drop-offs on either side.  At times we went over short bridges made from 3-inch logs that no part of me thought was going to hold us.  A couple of times there just wasn’t a bridge, and we had to drive through a couple of streams/rivers.  The drive itself was beautiful, and AJ is a champion (though still a maniac).  I took pictures the whole time, joking at one point that I was just trying to record our last moments for when they found the bodies. 

We made it to Aileu city in Aileu District and got to drive on a road that was actually paved!  It was like driving on air – they really need to change the shocks in our SUV.  Bano knows a guy here who told us about a house that rents rooms to people.  It’s pretty nice and a good deal - $100 for five people for five nights.  The bathroom is kind of funny though; there is just a huge tub with water in it and a little bucket, otherwise it has no water.  The toilet has no back to it, so after you do your business you dump some water in.  There is a drain in the middle for showering, and a sink (also with no water) to wash your hands in.  Bear Cub just used the ‘shower’ and warned me that it is breathtaking.  Literally; when you dump water on your head it is so cold that it takes your breath away.  I figure I’ll ‘shower’ in the morning to wake me up. 

It’s crazy to think that we’ve already been here for almost a week.  In some ways it feels like longer though.  We have fairly long days, usually working around 12 hours, and when the boss (PVA) is always around, it’s kind of hard to ever feel completely restful.  Today was the closest we have come.  Grant and I stayed around the center to wait for the people we were supposed to interview and work on the computer while PVA, AJ, and John went to interview villagers.  Since those people didn’t show up, we were able to get some reading in for a few hours, which was nice. 

I’m having a lot of fun in the districts, but Grant and I have had to share a room, and we have a knack for waking each other up every time we roll over.  Plus last night we stayed up for hours talking and giggling like schoolgirls, which probably doesn’t help.  It will be nice when we get back to Dili, we are staying at least one night in the Hotel Vila Verde on the 15th before we head to Baucau and Manatutu, so we’ll get our own rooms again for at least a night. 

Busy day tomorrow, more computer research on Aileu and we’ll have to figure out where we are going to look at water systems here.  We have some ideas of general areas, but no specific suco or village, so we need to figure that out. 

June 11 – Era Ulu and Hotalia

I realized that the last time I posted about Ermera, I mentioned it was the coffee district, but not much else about the coffee itself.  The coffee plants are everywhere, all over every hillside beneath what we only know as the canopy trees.  They need to have these trees to grow; otherwise they don’t get enough shade and die.  They are fairly tall plants with dark green, waxy leaves.  Depending on the species they may look a little different, but are all fairly similar.  The berries on them start as a dark green and then ripen into a dark red, which means they are ready to pick.  The coffee bean itself is the seed within the berry, and if I understand correctly, there is another layer to remove besides the berry.    
 

This all used to be done by hand, but it seems like most people or communities have a device which you basically stick the berries in, turn a wheel, and the outer part is removed.  The seed itself is then laid out on a tarp to dry all day.  While they are drying there is a very sweet, pungent odor that is easily recognizable.  Most households will make between $500 and $1500 a year with this coffee, though some of the wealthier ones can make as much as $3000.             

The maps that we’ve seen of Timor-Leste really give you the wrong idea of what the country looks like.  I keep using the word Succo and comparing it to a county, but most are fairly small – maybe 10 miles across with 8 small Alia or towns in them.  Each Succo only has about 2000 people.  Last night and tonight, perhaps tomorrow night as well, we have been staying in a Succo called Era Ulu.  Today we traveled to another called Hatolia to see a water and sanitation project done by the Red Cross.  On the map, it is only about 15 or 20 km away, max, but it took 2 hours to get there and 1.5 hours to get back.  The reason is that you never travel in a straight line.  Not only are the roads terrible, but you are constantly twisting and turning traveling up the side of the mountain.             

We heard from Christoph at the Austrian Red Cross that the road to Hatolia is a little hairy, and to definitely not go there if it was raining.  He was right.  One bridge had a huge hole in the corner, and at a couple of parts at least half of the road had fallen away.  We also crossed at least a couple of bridges that looked like they were no more than old plywood.  It blows my mind that DU will let us travel these roads, but not rent a motorcycle each, which would probably make it a lot safer.             

Every road winds up the mountains, and if you are not at the top, there is probably someone looking down on you harvesting coffee, along with people looking up at you as well.  These Timorese are insane, walking up these small footpaths made from dirt and mud that make me nervous walking on them when I have both hands, and I do my fair share of hiking.  They are carrying huge sacks of coffee.  Unlike most rural areas in America, every 30 seconds you see people walking along these Timorese mountain roads, mostly because they are harvesting coffee.  Every single person waves at you, and depending on the time of day says ‘bon dia’, ‘bon tarde’, or ‘bon note’ – good morning, evening, or night.  A lot of times it is just tarde or something along those lines, but always accompanied by a smile and a wave.  You can’t just enjoy the view while you drive, you have to say hello to everyone.             

Of course, a lot of people also add another word on to Grrm (my new name for Bear Cub or Grant, he looks exactly like George R. R. Martin on the back cover of the Game of Thrones books), PVA, and myself – Mallai.  Mallai basically means foreigner.  It’s not a rude term, just what we are, so it’s always ‘tarde mallai!’ always with a smile.  A lot of the places we have gone the kids have run after the car too when they see us, shouting and laughing.  Even when they have been working all day, climbing up and down these mountains harvesting coffee, both hands full with the full sack of coffee they are carrying and the machete, they still smile and wave.              

Plus every area we go to we can talk to the Chief de Succo with no problems, for usually a couple of hours each.  They are more than willing to share information on the community in general, their water and sanitation, mortality and morbidity rates, what health and education are like, and if they have had any programs from outside agencies like the government, UNICEF, or NGOs.  Not only that, but the data we gathered in Dili is actually matching up with what we are getting here!             

 But I haven’t even mentioned the best part.  This is coffee country.  Everyone we talk to, including the Chief de Succo (we’ve met two so far, basically the mayors of their 2000 people areas), give us coffee.  This isn’t just any coffee, this is as fresh as you can get, grown, harvested, husked, dried, and roasted by their own hands.  Without fail, if we talk to someone for any extended period of time and they have the ability, they give us this fresh, amazing coffee.  We’ve had a few different types too; I’m not sure what they all are, but I know one was Arabic.  It’s almost 5PM right now.  I’m sitting in a comfortable chair on the porch of the Santa Bakhita center, watching the fog roll in over the mountains while the sun slowly sets.  The center is on a hill in a bit of a valley, so I can see a fairly large portion of the surrounding area.  I can see pigs, cows, and horses walking on the communal field below.  I can hear a chicken crowing in the distance and the sounds of kids yelling while they play soccer.  There’s the smell of cook fires mixed with the pungent aroma of drying coffee that people are just now putting into sacks to go on tomorrows CCT trucks out of town.  Plus, it’s a mountainous jungle, so I can see all sorts of different plants and trees.  It’s even starting to get a bit of a chill.  Plus I’m drinking fresh coffee and eating a deep fried pastry.  Now this is field research. 

June 10 – The Road to Ermera

After driving on Timorese roads, I am no longer afraid of any mountain roads in Colorado, guardrails or not.  Our driver, a-Jay, is a 19-year-old maniac.  On roads I wouldn’t dare to drive more than 20 mph on, he was going 45.  The roads all have people going each way, even though they would be considered one-way roads by American standards, at best.  At one point, there were four vehicles on this narrow strip of road; one going towards Dili while another truck, a motorcycle, and ours went the other way.  The roads are considered paved, but in most places the paving is maybe 3 feet across with huge potholes.  Our SUV had no shocks, and we would bottom out every 30 seconds.  At some points even a-Jay would only drive 2 mph because the road was so bad, with potholes a full foot deep.  Meanwhile, on either side is mountainous jungle, with steep drop-offs on one side the whole way.  The mountains may not be the height of the rockies, but that doesn’t make them any less deadly. 

There was more than one time I thought that either we would die or we would kill someone else – maybe by going off the road, maybe by a head-on collision.  While driving, we didn’t just have to worry about the other cars in the road, but people walking on either side the whole way.  Our translator, John, threw up at least four times. 

Finally, after a few hours we made it to Gleno, the largest city in Ermea.  We continued on to Santa Bakhita after that, a small mountain town.  This place is absolutely incredible.  As I said before, Ermera is the coffee growing district.  Every tiny house had coffee beans drying out front.  We were able to make it to a place where we met an Australian named Jim who was able to hook us up with rooms for the next couple of nights.  He is here for about a month once a year helping with solar panels and things for the rather impressive clinic/English-learning center that they have.  Everyone in the community is so friendly.  After only two hours here we had spent an hour and a half talking to Jim and eating lunch, learning about his work here and the water system they have in place, 25 minutes putting our stuff down, and the other five minutes was spent finding the Suco (county) Chief.  Five was enough, he was more than willing to help and spoke to us for almost 2 hours. 

I won’t go into a lot of detail about the water systems, but I do want to say that everyone in the community has been working to improve them, usually through volunteering.  They have been working on a gravity system to bring water from a spring 20 km away, digging ditches to put pipes in the dirt, with only a couple of paid people and more than 100 volunteers.  Meanwhile, they are trying to harvest, husk, dry, and roast their coffee crops.  Through the work of USAID, the CCT, which means Timorese Coffee Cooperative, comes and buys their beans and what they think is a fairly reasonable price - $1.50 per kilo.  Seems like a low amount to me for how labor intensive the work is, but still better than before. 

I don’t have time to write more now, but I’ll try to tonight.  I have just been so exhausted after our work everyday that trying to write sounds terrible. Plus I don’t want to push my luck with our little wireless Internet thing.

June 9 – UNMIT, Elections, Preparations for the Districts

Tomorrow we head off to the districts, which are basically like states or provinces.  We will be going to two in the west, Ermera and Alieu, and two in the east, Baucau and Manatuto.  We go west first, with Ermera our first planned stop, probably to the Suco Hatolia before a couple of others.  We’ve been told that there is a good example of a gravity-piping project out there done by the Austrian Red Cross, so we are looking forward to seeing that.             

What I’m most excited about though is the district itself.  For about a decade (since independence), Timor-Leste, with the help of USAID, has had a partnership with Starbucks.  This is prime coffee growing country, and it’s harvest season, so we should be seeing Ermera at the most exciting time.  I’ve never been to coffee plantations or anything like that, or seen it harvested, so I’m hoping we can take some time to really see what it’s like.  A man we met today from the UNMIT – the United Nations Integrated Mission in Timor-Leste, warned us that Ermera is a bit of a political hotspot.  As he put it, “if you see a political rally and people start picking up rocks, you should probably move away quickly.”  I thought that was good advice.             

His name was Fahim Eqbali, a really nice guy from Afghanistan that does GIS mapping for the UN mission.  He looked my age, but was probably 8-10 years older than me, a bit of a surprise.  Since UNMIT basically deals with security and governance, I’m not quite sure why we met with him, but it was really interesting to hear a bit about the UN mission there and its history.  He has been in country for almost five years and said he has been to Bali 19 times in those five years.  I guess it isn’t too expensive to go to and is a great way to relax.  Timor-Leste might be beautiful, but it also ranks 147 out of 187 countries on the Human Development Index.  I’m sure sometimes you just want to get away from the poverty, it can be overwhelming.  Apparently in 2002 when the country first got its independence, they had a giant sort of floating hotel/recreation area where all of the people in the UN mission lived.  They had to because of the security.  The fact that now people get to choose wherever they want to live in Dili tells you a lot about how much the country has changed in that decade. 

 Our second destination is to Alieu, which is actually kind of on the way back to Dili from Ermera.  There are three general kinds of water systems near as we can tell, and we would like to see at least one example of each.  They are water piped to a house (very rare), water piped to a public place (the most common), and other than water piped to a public place.  What we are assuming that means is people who have to walk to get water from wells, tributary streams, river, and the like.  However, we could be way off base, we’ll see when we get there. 

I probably won’t be able to post another blog during this trip, we get back to Dili on the 15th, but we did just buy a 3G wireless Internet thing.  It’s only 256kbs though, which I think is 1993 dial-up modem style, and it costs $2 an hour, so we’ll see.  I would hazard a guess that there definitely won’t be any pictures until I get back. 

Right now in Timor-Leste is really a time of uncertainty.  The parliamentary elections are coming up quickly, July 7, and people are really nervous.  They don’t know whether or not there will be violence – there was during the last elections five years ago.  The elections were actually supposed to be held right now, but were pushed back for some reason.  In a way that is good for us, our work would have been a lot harder to do during the elections, but it is also kind of disappointing, I would have liked to see them. 

Don’t worry, there is still a lot of excitement.  Everywhere you go there are billboards and posters for certain candidates, everything from the communist party to several democratic parties.  Today was a big rally day.  The traffic was insane; since there are no real lanes, one main road (including the sidewalks and shoulders), had four lanes going one way and one going the other.  Of course our taxi driver just pulled right across all four, blocking a huge truck, until we could go the way we wanted to.   I got some great video of it.  For hours afterwards there were huge trucks with dozens of people in each one waving flags and shouting for certain parties.  At times they started yelling at each other and using threating gestures, which was a tad concerning.  Either way, definitely an interesting time to be here, I hope the elections happen without violence.  Ruth was talking about this yesterday.  She thinks that there won’t be because the 10-year independence anniversary went off without a hitch – I hope she’s right. 

PS - Even as I am writing this I can hear the shouting and honking of the people cheering for their candidate. 

Fahim Eqbali from UNIMIT, told you he looks young.

Timorese electioneering

Some of the cabs are quite decorative and fragrant.  I think this one had about 9 air fresheners.  The smell made me nauseous

Typical Timorese housing

A statue, apparently of the old president Jose Ramos-Horta (who looks nothing like this) breaking the chains of oppression.  I can only hope that one day there is a statue of me like this.