Late Night Live In Timor-Leste

Everyday, a different East Timor. As reported, there are places that feel like Mexican border towns with people preparing to gatecrash the mighty US. Or you walk into an area that has to be a set for one of Sergio Leone’s spaghetti westerns. Today we were in Timor’s ‘Machu Picchu’.

We climbed up the worst road I’ve ever experienced, high into the mountains, and there perched atop the most magnificent rock terraces – which would’ve required efforts similar to constructing the great pyramid – was a village of ‘mushrooms’. The most beautiful circular huts topped with dark thatch. And here, we met a wise old man, in his mid 70s, who introduced us to some of the ancient mysteries of traditional belief. Though notionally Catholic he dismissed Catholicism as a very recent religion. The same airy dismissal for Islam. His people had been here practising their faith long, long before the Portuguese and the Indonesians had arrived with their dogmas.

We sat in their holiest of holies, smoking cigarettes and licking lollipops whilst he told us - through a few layers of interpretation - about the ancestral figures that the building housed. When I asked him his age he said: “We don’t count years. For that you need a piece do of paper, a pencil and you have to count. It is a waste of effort”. He gave me permission to reduce my own age by 20 years and on his authority I have done so.

The rain is a little late this year and they were preparing a ceremony to encourage the clouds to come over the mountain tops which were Peruvian, Andean in scale. I hope it works out for them as they’re down to their last few drops.

His best line came in response to my observation that their little temple was more beautiful than St. Peter’s. I’d forgotten that, as good Catholics who entertained His Holiness the Pope in downtown Dili, he was not unfamiliar with Catholic history. “This is St. Peter’s, this our St Peter’s,” he said. And then we talked of the future and its problems; of what to do with the kids; of the need for help with infrastructure. It is always a mistake to think that simple people are simple.

Once again, we will devote a radio program to this marvellous day and these marvellous people. And there will be snaps and some video available here - if you know how to navigate these strange websites. Which I don’t. Talk to you tomorrow.

Phillip Adams

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This entry was posted on Thursday, October 4th, 2007 at 11:06 pm and is filed under All Posts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.