Road Trip Dili - Baucau - Viqueque - Uatolari

This photo shows me with Ina, who served as a guerrilla fighter during ET's independence struggles. Ina was also a close friend of Alfredo Reinado (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfredo_Reinado or http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfredo_Reinado) who was one of the leaders of the rebel forces (F-FDTL). "Reinhado" was killed during attacks on Prime Minister Xanana and President Ramos-Horta on Feb 11, 2008.

Ina is now doing research on Peacebuilding and Trauma and she gives lectures at Universities in Timor-Leste and Australia. She invited me to join her trip to Viqueque where she was supposed to attend one of those Community Dialogues (see also the Blog entry "Embracing Dialogue"). The dialogue was taking place in Uatolari which is far in the East of Timor-Leste. We left Dili Friday evening (at around 8 pm) and arrived in Baucau at 11 pm (3 hours for 100 km), where we stayed over night and we then left Baucau early in the morning.

Some impressions from our way between Baucau and Viqueque:
Finally we could see the south coast of Timor-Leste! In the local language the sea here is called "Tasi Mane" ("men's ocean") whereas the sea in the north is called "Tasi Feto" ("girl's ocean") as it's apparently calmer in the north!
Huge rice plantations in the south:
After 5-hours driving from Baucau, we finally arrived in the village (Uatolari) where the dialogue was already in progress. While the dialogue was running, I preferred spending my time in the village walking around and watching the children playing football. The community dialogue is a very emotional issue and not for or foreigners or even "tourists". I didn't want to bother the process with my presence.
Spiderman house:
Betel nuts and a small choice of other local products at the village's market:
We decided to spend our night in Viqueque and go back to Dili on Sunday morning after breakfast at the guesthouse:
Some impressions from our way back...
For lunch we had a traditional "catupa" (rice balls in tiny baskets made out of palm leaves cooked in coconut milk)
Baucau market... there are so many varieties of bananas I've never seen before! If possible go for the red ones, they are delicious!
Deserted landscape between Baucau and Dili:
Even though it was a lot of driving (we spent about 14 hours in the car) I had a great weekend with Ina and the others. I got so many impressions and learned a lot about this country and it's people that I will (hopefully!) never forget! Thank you, Ina!