Jesus Statue

Blog post: July 16, 2009

After work yesterday Bess and I rode bikes out to the beach and went for a run towards the tip of the island where there is a giant statue of Jesus (although he’s in scaffolding right now). This was the first of a few things for me. It was the first time that I navigated the roads on a bicycle (this was a little nerve racking but I managed to remember to stay on the left hand side of the road and Bess and I stayed close together). We were going to bike all the way to the Jesus statue but then Bess’ tire was flat so we decided to park our bike and run. This was the first time I had been that far down the beach and it was the most beautiful run I have ever been on. We were running as the sun was setting and I was lucky that I didn’t fall flat on my face because I was looking out on the ocean with the sun setting on the horizon the entire time. Breath taking. There were actually many people (both “malae”, who are internationals, and local people) running along the road. In two weekends there is a big 10km race that I’m going to try to sign up for.

I have also joined a women’s soccer team here. We practice every Tuesday and Thrusdaya nd this Saturday I have my first game. Our coach is from Sweden and is a UN police officer. Last night the two girls I’m currently sharing an apartment with and I hosted a girls’ night. There was about 6 of us in total and most were from the soccer team. I’ve never been great at ball sports but I’m excited about playing a game on Saturday with a bunch of girls that I now know. Anyway, at the girls night, we made a bean dip and we all just sat around talking and devouring delicious food.

Today I went out to lunch with a bunch of people from the UN. One of the UN guys that we were eating with is from Vancouver. Within 5 days I’ve already met 3 people from Vancouver. Usually when I meet Canadians (and that has been relatively rare in the last couple of years) they’re from Toronto. But this nice Vancouver fellow who gave me information on how to contact a NGO that has a recycling project in Dili. Apparently because there isn’t a paper recycling in Dili this organization is collecting paper from offices and is going to make them in to paper bricks that you can burn. The paper is going to be burned anyway, but at least this would decrease the number of trees that are going to cut down and it would provide jobs for Timorese who work at the paper brick making factory. I noticed that LOL separates its paper and glass bottles and my boss said we are hoping to start recycling, perhaps we could contribute to the paper brick factory!

Next week I start an intensive Tetum language course that is every morning all week. My tetum is getting a lot better (I can piece together sentences with my co-workers. They are so patient it’s unbelievable). But I was thinking about how cool it will be to actually understand what they are saying to each other. It will take a bit of time to get to that point but I have time.
Much love,
mariesa