Things I miss about Timor Leste:
- going to the beach
- going to the beach in my big white SUV and parking it in any empty spot
- going to the beach and walking from my car, 20 metres to the pristine white sand and sitting down on a beach chair
- going to the beach and having a Mana come up to me to take my drinks or food order
- going to the beach and running into friends while digging my toes into the soft white sand (Areia Branca)
- watching the sunset at the beach
- the sunset from outside Lita store
- going to the gym
- swapping crazy stories about crocodiles and plotting my escape route while sitting at the beach
- jogging from Caz Bar to Cristo Rei, running up the stairs to the top, then back down and repeat. Preferably right at sunset.
- wearing cute sun dresses
- my yellow room with the chocolate accent wall that drove my landlord nuts
- the bathroom that was built just for me, with my very own septic tank and hot water tank
- speaking Portuguese
- hopping over the wall into the litter-strewn dried-out river and crossing over into downtown Dili
- listening to capoeira music and watching the MAC kids puttin' on the moves
- Little Pataya
- Caz Bar
- Aroma Café
- sharing an international living experience with friends FOB from Brasil
- Yoga class!
- GNR jokes
- Mana Māe's smile
- Donuts from Tiger Fuel, picked up mid-afternoon when I'm desperate for a snack
- The Sri Lanki hole-in-the-wall restaurant with awesome juice and coconut salad
- The bed I got special ordered from the coffin-maker, but that only enjoyed for two weeks before leaving
- Piling all the kids in my landlords' family into my big white SUV and teaching them all how to buckle seatbelts!
- The pigs outside my window (I debated which list to put this on, but I think I miss them)
- MY VERANDA FURNITURE. Two days after I moved into my house I drove half an hour to another town until I found a guy selling bamboo furniture. We bargained, he fit the full set into my vehicle, and that was that.
Things I don't miss about Timor Leste
- UNPOL
- UNPOL vehicles
- Driving the white SUV when everyone else was driving the motorbikes
- Getting violently sick on the drive to Baucau
- The inability to avoid people I know when I'm at the beach
- The ethical dilemma of daily living
- Not being able to trust people
- Working in a dark gray-coloured warehouse
- The inability to avoid people I know when jogging to Cristo Rei
- The [lack of] quality of the Internet connection!
- The failings of the Brasilian embassy
- Being lied to all the time
1 comment:
great post... i think will enjoy better the good things you listed while im here, thanks :)
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