Thursday November 20, 2008

I slept in a bit this morning and feel I have now properly recuperated from my rest deprived sailing voyage. I’m still peeling from all the sun exposure though, damn my pasty white complexion! When I hit the café downstairs Lauran had several other peoples I-pods for me to load up and even had a list of requests for songs. Thankfully Azzamates Cheesy Hits have most of the songs covered. I’ll hopefully download the others when I hit the Net Café for research after breakfast. Does anyone know who it is that sings that ‘Too late to Apologise’ song? Never mind I’m sure I’ll find it if Azzamate has not had a chance to do so and email it to me already.

I feel I am a bit of the odd body amongst the patrons here. Mostly they are older, law enforcement, military and political types. Everyone keeps their heads low and somehow seems to be disaffected by their surroundings. I on the other hand am trying to spark conversations with the staff and passersby and spend as much time looking around with wide-eyed curiosity as I do with my attention on the computer screen or my meal. It has occurred to me that I have become a bit of a curiosity to the staff here; they want to know what my job in Timor is and my usual response of “No Job… Tourist” leaves them walking away with confused looks on their faces. I haven’t seen a single other tourist to be honest. I met an expat Aussie yesterday who runs a small fishing and research charter vessel out of the harbour and he doesn’t believe that the backpackers here even exists anymore.. though he did try to convince me to stay at ‘his friends’ hotel so maybe he can’t be taken for his word. Without some form of super cheap accommodation then it is no wonder the tourist market is non-existent. There are many closed cafes and restaurants in the blocks surrounding where I have set up so I believe that at least at one time things where much better for visitors. I will have to ask Sunday and Lauran tonight to see what is going on.

A large troop carrier just dropped off a load of Aussie and Kiwi soldiers for a quick refreshment here at the City Café and the staff changed the moment the young, heavily armed boys walked in the door. It is the quietest I have ever seen the ladies. They submissively and efficiently went about their business of serving the men and never once smiled or teased anyone like they do me. In fact I was flat out trying to catch one of them making direct eye contact with the soldiers. There is another thing I must bring up tonight. I think that years of colonisation have left the people here suspicious of any foreign power base which is understandable I guess.

I really want that razor! I hope Lauran does not forget to grab it for me. Maybe that will bring an end to the ‘woolly boy’ quips. A young girl I have not seen here before just caught sight of my peeling legs and I overheard her say something like ‘Leprosaria’ to the other girls who all immediately giggled while snatching glances my way. I don’t speak Portuguese, in fact I’m not even sure if the local dialect is pure Portuguese but I swear she just made a crack that I have leprosy. Cheeky bugger! I’m off now to check out the net and get some research done, I’m unprepared for my stop here in Timor and am very keen to find some things to see and do.

I had a huge walk through town today just trying to soak up the atmosphere and find a travel or tour agent to see what is in the area. I found one such place and even though the shop front was wide open there was nobody in sight. I think it’s a Timorese thing. They appear to be a very laid back people. I’ll pop back tomorrow sometime and see if I can catch someone. There is not a whole heap of info on the net about this place so I think I’ll be winging it a fair bit. I’m three days into my 14 day visa so I want to get moving again soon, though this rest has been very necessary, I’m itching on the souls of my feet already and raring to explore more (That’s figuratively speaking people… no I do not have tinea). I really wanted to take heaps of photo’s today but in the areas I visited there were only hard looking, though very little, blokes all around and I feared I was painting a big mug me sign on my chest every time I took it out of my bag. Besides I’d hate to appear to them the same way some tourist do back home so I’ll just try to describe some things for you.

It’s the same the whole way through Asia or at least it is in my experience, they seem to have a whole dictionary of horn beeps and there is a constant cacophony of beep beeps and toot toots going on around me. We just had a very rare occurrence on the street beside the shady spot I am writing this; a totally clear street bar one solitary, lonely motorbike and even he was still beeping away as he rolled along although I do not know what at. I have been trying to pay attention to this automobile dialect and believe I have discerned several different statements one can make with ones horn. (1) The ‘I’m passing you, please don’t radically or unexpectedly change course’ beep… which is a singular short stab on the button and can be wielded at both vehicles and pedestrians - Beep! (2) The ‘get out of my way please, I’m coming through and have temporarily forgotten how to apply brakes’ beep - Beep Beep Beep! (3) The ‘you really are pissing me off you moron’ beep - beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep! (The longer the beep the more annoyed you have made the driver) (4) The ‘do you want a taxi?’ beep - Beep Beep, long pause, Beep Beep, long pause and keep repeating until someone hails you down (of course you only see the taxi’s use this one and I have been tempted at times to hail them just to shut them up) (5) The ‘I’m coming out of my driveway or narrow laneway and I can’t see if there is any traffic, besides I am reluctant to stop even if I could’ beep - Beep Beep, short pause, Beep beep beep, short pause and repeat. (6) The ‘I am very important so don’t mess with me’ beep, most often used by police cars or UN vehicles - Beeeeeeeeeep Bebeeeeeeeeeeeep, Beeeeeeeeeep Bebeeeeeeeeeeeep. It’s one of life’s little mysteries that Australians find a simple beep to be such an insult. Back at home I have on a number of occasions accidently hit my horn when stopping my indicators on the bike and copped a middle finger salute and an ear full for my trouble. Are we as Australians overly sensitive to the use of a car horn? They wouldn’t include them on every vehicle if they were not intended to be used would they?

I’ve noticed something else here in Dili that has me a little bit confused. Even the poorest looking person that is asleep in the doorway of a derelict building, hugging a solitary plastic bag containing what I assume is their worldly possessions has a mobile phone. There are a fair few that also have some sort of cheap Korean MP3 player. I even spotted a young boy approximately 8 or 9 who although missing pants of any description was listening to a brand new I-pod. It kind of works against a street vendor, in my opinion, when mid speal about how you MUST buy a cheap, tacky East Timor Cap because they are sooooo hungry and indeed may faint at any second then pauses to take a call on his Nokia. If it were me, I would at least find the silent mode and employ it with vigour during my working hours.

There is the usual plethora of canines on the streets here in Dili too. Now you probably know I’m a big fan of dogs. I’ve been closer to some of my woofy charges than a lot of people I have known in my life, but the dogs here seem to me a tad on the aggressive side. Twice now I’ve had my heal nipped at and one dog even got a hold of the corner of my shorts nearly dacking me in front of a gaggle of school kids leaving class for the day. I loath to be aggressive with dogs, normally (with my voice) a short, sharp BAAAAAHHHH is enough to make them think twice about messing with me and I am in no way one of those wary, nervous people around our four legged friends but I actually had to give one mutt a quick kick in the ribs today to get him to back the heck off. The other thing I noticed is that there is a lactating mother on every second corner and yet I have not seen ONE puppy. Hmmmmmm… I thought my chicken salad tasted a little strange hahaha.

In this next paragraph I’m going to make some sweeping generalisations that certain, overly sensitive and politically correct people might find racist or derogatory. That is not my intention… I have been impressed by the people here in Timor even though I have had a fairly insular couple of days. I’m just trying to make up for a lack of photographs by painting pictures with words aight!!

Some random observations from the twisted mind of Monsta: The cups and drink servings here in Timor are small and yet the plates are massive. The young children have eyes that look older, far beyond their obvious years yet the elderly have a child-like spark that makes me believe they possess secrets I should be envious of. No one is ever in a rush… full stop… unless they are behind the wheel of a car where even a momentary delay will invoke beep number three from Monsta’s Timorese Horn Phrasebook. The roosters crow all day long, in fact they battle crow each other all day long so it could be chook bedtime and yet you still hear the die hard roosters cockle-doodle-dooooing right up until 10pm - we had chooks when I was a kid and I find this to be uniquely Timorese. The Urinals are never above my knee in height and therefore invoke memories of my kindergarten years. The beggars have a Timorese style of… lets call it half begging… I was going to say lazy begging but that’s not really right cause they defiantly put in their hours they just don’t get too fussed when you say no. I have found that I can deflect a beggar or street vendors advance from up to a hundred metres away just by looking at them, mouthing thank you and shaking my head to indicate no. Every one is quite small and the biggest local on the street still makes me feel like and oversized clumsy giant.

Maybe I’ll get back to those impressions of Timor later. For now I need to press on. I was hanging in my usual spot (I surprise myself sometimes with how much of a creature of habit I am) and waiting for Lauran or Sunday to come get me when I thick Aussie accent asked “Mate can you get wireless here?” from over my right shoulder. I turned to see the question was indeed directed at me and that before me stood a tall, bald, tanned bloke with his thinner, fairer, much prettier girlfriend at his side. I explained I was just bashing out some thoughts for my blog and we started chatting. His name is Tavis (no r.. Tavis not Travis) and her name is Meagan. Together with their van who is named Miles (haha cute) they have travelled overland from the UK and are in Dili to make the last hop across the water into Australia to complete their voyage. For those who have read Peter Moore’s ‘Wrong Way Home’ you will be familiar with the route they have taken. If you haven’t read that book, you should, it’s a bloody good read. Basically they have come from UK through Europe, Georgia, Iran, Pakistan, India, down through South-East Asia and into Timor. Tavis is a Goldie boy and Meagan hails from Canada where they had met several years ago when Tavis was on a previous adventure. Tavis has not been home for several years and has been living and working based in the UK. Two years ago they took over the lease on a small bar on a small Greek Island called Kavos in the Corfu area (I think I’m getting this right). The bar is called TKD’s, is only open seasonally for the local summer and now has an Aussie theme to go with its Oz as owner. They are a mad couple of people. Very friendly and easy to talk to. So easy in fact, that it must have been 9pm before I realised that Lauran had stood me up and I had better order some food before I passed out or got too drunk. Tavis and Meagan were keen for some tucker too so we ordered more beers and some meals and continued our exploration of each others travels.

I had the best night in their company and due to the fact they have just come through the very areas I will soon be travelling I asked so many questions Meagan commented she felt like she was a guest on Parkinson. I have about eight pages of notes from my time spent picking their brains and probably would have taken more but, as we chatted, we worked our way through more than enough beer to make me abandon my research and resign myself to the fact we were mid way through a good ol’ fashioned piss up. I found them a fascinating couple of characters but soon it was my turn to field some questions and I managed to get a few good reactions relating my recent time spent with Jeff and describing my home life. After a while we decided that since all three of us have been sticking with the comfortable familiarity of City Café for the last few days we should really move on and make this piss up a Timorese Pub Crawl. A quick flick through their copy of Lonely Planet revealed there is one more bar in our area called ‘One More Bar’. Ok, we understood that two pubs might not count officially as a pub-crawl but to hell with it all, we were doing our best. ‘One More Bar’ enjoys a second story vantage point overlooking a pretty park that appeared to me a near perfect clone of the park just down the road from the share house in Brisbane. Just swap the basketball court for a big statue of Mary, sprinkle some dogs around the place and you have it. We killed the rest of the night there talking about everything and nothing in that way that old mates do even though we had only just met. Eventually the staff wanted to shut up shop so they kicked us out and we forlornly made our way back to the street that held our accommodation. Promising to catch up tomorrow arvo and taking some photos in front of the well-travelled Miles we said our goodbyes and parted company.

This is the confusing part for me because although I know exactly where my hotel is from theirs, only a few hundred meters away, I somehow managed to get lost as I walked home at around 1.30am. What a Mang!! I’d been busy on the phone chatting to Tez and Yuin Huzami from the Coalition. I must have made a turn off my street while I wasn’t paying attention. You see I have a habit of walking while I’m on the phone. At home I would pace back and forward on the back deck but here in my drunken stupor I had wandered off route and couldn’t find my way back to my hotel. It was a confusing 40-minute walk to cover those few hundred meters hahaha. Safe and sound back at my room I laughed at myself while I showered before passing out, face down on my bed, on top of the covers, butt naked with my boxers in my left hand. That is exactly how I woke this morning with the added embarrassment of a large drool pile having wet my pillowslip. Oooooooooh… my head… where o where had I packed my painkillers again??

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