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Trip Start Aug 2004 Previous
Entry Trip End Nov 2006

  Viqueque/Baccau, Timor-Leste
Wednesday, April 20, 2005

A few weeks ago a friend and I took a mini-vacation to the central part of the country. We spent a few days at the beach in Baccau and then travelled south through the mountains visiting a few PCV friends along the way. It was really nice to get out and see other parts of the country, especially the beach! Baccau has a beautiful private lagoon beach. We were the only ones on the beach and spent the day swimming in the crystal clear water and watching dolphins off in the distance. The city of Baccau is built up on the mountain and so it is a five minute car ride down the mountain to the beach, and since no one really lives down near the beach it is often difficult to find a car. The city is amazing, definitely one of the nicest cities I have seen in Timor so far. The market sells an amazing variety of vegetables, I was shocked by the selection, just as good as what you find in Dili. Plus there is a nice hotel with swimming pool that we could not afford to stay in but enjoyed walking around and dreaming. After Baccau we went further into the mountains to a little town called Ossu. It was so completely different from little mountain town. The mountains in the center of the island are more spread out and rolly than then mountains of Ermera. In Ossu you can see great distances and also there is such a diversity of trees and plant life. Ossu is what I think of when I think of tropical mountains, whereas Ermera is more like jagged mountains with dense coffee forests and tall shade trees. When you come to a clearing in Ermera all you can see is mountains in every direction, but in Ossu you see the valleys filled with rice fields and horses grazing. Another thing that struck me was the amount of water everywhere, it seemed every bend in the road had another spring or waterfall. After Ossu we went to Viqueque to district capitol. It was flat and hot. Just your typical mid-size city in Timor. It was interesting how the people changed with the geography. The people in the central region were much more Asian looking than the people in my region who have more Indonesian characteristics.

That was pretty much the extent of our little vacation. Not much is really going on in my site. I haven't found any projects yet. Most days I spend the morning in the clinic and the afternoon visiting with my family or neighbors. I don't actually do anything in the clinic besides talk on the radio with other clinics in Timor. I have faith that one day people will think of a use for me and until then I just plan to continue developing relationships with the members of my community. I now live by myself and that definitely makes it easier to make friends. Before people wouldn't just come by my families house to hang out with me because my family is so important. Another good thing about living by myself is that the people in my community see that I am not like the other foreigners in Timor. They see that I don't have fancy furniture or American food. I eat the same things they eat and if anything they have nicer things in their house than I do. Meaning often times they feel sorry for me and bring me food and things because they worry that I don't have enough, especially my family who thinks that I am just barely scraping by. So people don't look at me like an outsider or a cash-cow, just as some poor American come to learn about life in Timor. It is almost coffee season, June is when the coffee really starts coming. Right now the trees are starting to ripen and everyone promises me that once it comes time to pick beans Fatubessi will be a lot more fun. The teenagers and young adults come back from the capitol and the money starts rolling in and there are parties all the time. It is hard to imagine my village being more than the quiet sleepy town I have see thus far and I can't wait to see what fun looks like in Timor.

A few people have been asking about sending packages and letters and how they can help with any projects in my community. Since I have no projects going on I have no suggestions on things people back home can contribute. But if you want to send things anyway this is how...

***VIA DARWIN AUSTRALIA**** (it is important to write this really big and bold and if the post office asks where you want the package sent you can tell them Darwin and it will come here. If they don't see the Via Darwin packages and letters tend to get lost in Indonesia or sent back to the states)

Anne Castelvecchi
Corpo de Paz
Caixa Postal 310
Dili, East Timor

Okay so I will keep up the hard work and thanks to everyone who responds, I really enjoy the feedback and news from home.

-Anne

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