Atauro, Arte Morris and more

Have just arrived back from Atauro Island. A beautiful piece of paradise 30 km north of Dili.  We caught a water taxi over and back, but the ferry also runs weekly on a Saturday.  We stayed in a wonderful, beautiful, relaxing place called Barry's Eco-Lodge - right on the beach where the taxi berths (well doesn't berth - where it stops and you unload into knee deep water).  The lodge is run by an Australian (Barry - hence the name) and his Timorese family.  We stayed in thatched cabins right on the beach.  Food was magnificant and relaxation was all you could do - unbelievable snorkling, reading, eating.  This is one place I would love to come back to and spend much longer.  All for $30 per night. 









This is the view from our Tent.  The tent was in a raised thatched cottage and at high tide was two metres from the water (thats my feet - I was lying down)

Sunrise Atauro Island

Easter was really busy at Dive Timor Lorosae (where I stay in Dili) as lots of people flew in just to scuba dive over the Easter holiday period.  I was talking to a  couple of guys from Darwin who said the scuba diving off Atauro Island was magnificent, so clear and the coral and fish was just like the movie "Finding Nemo".  So, I guess, if you are into scuba diving - this is the place to visit.  The cheapest way of flying here is to fly to Denpasar and catch a connecting flight to Dili.  

Before going to Atauro Island, have spent time around Dili.  Visited Arte Moris which is an Art Gallery and Artist Colony set up in the remains of an Indonesian-era museum.  Art students live there while they train and study.  One of the resident artists showed me around the gallery and also to their studios.  There are plenty of pieces I would like to buy, but there was a beautiful painting of a Timorese women on Tais - it was magnificent and from a recent exhibition they had.  Would have loved it - but of course the problem of getting it home............  Also had some fun sculptures outside.  Enjoyed this immensely.

 

Teapot - made from wire frame and thongs

Yesterday we visited Chega! - (Chega - Portugese for NO MORE, STOP, ENOUGH!) An exhibition which is housed in a former Portugese Fretilin and Indonesian prison where countless human rights violations occurred and hundreds of resistance fighters were interned by the Indonesians.  It was a very powerful and moving exhibition and the prison cells (especially the Dark Cells) still have the grafitti from the prisoners that were interned there.  There was horrible cruelty with one of the cells used as a execution chamber where they filled it with water to about waist level and then put in electricity to electrocute them all. The number of prisoners that where held there is still unknown, with family members visiting and adding names regularly.

Also visited the Santa Cruz Cemetry. This was the site where on 12th November 1991 over 100 people  were killed by Indonesian forces and what precipitated the turning point in Timor Leste's independence struggle and international involvement. The Indonesian forces shot a 20 year old New Zealander (Kamal Ramadhaj) and beat up an American journalist (Allan Nairn on assignment with the New Yorker).  The attack was filmed by British journalist Max Stahl.