Are we preparing for some sort of warfare?

As I sit in Dili Beach Hotel, eating their laksa and accessing their WiFi, the high tide sparkles with the light paths that lead to two ships perpetually docked somewhere off Dili.  Music is playing.  People are eating and drinking.  On the road outside cars, 4WDs and scooters go past in an uncharacteristically orderly fashion. 

I haven't looked tonight but there are probably three or four UN vehicles parked below the balcony - there usually are.  There is a table of Australian Police.  They're out of uniform tonight, but I've seen then in here before.  Last night there were a couple of Kiwi soldiers.  Is the peaceful persona that I experience on a daily basis simply a facade?  Perhaps.  Or perhaps Dili is a symptom of the West's over-excitement at the thought of getting something, anything.

Sounds cynical?  Hmmmm, walk along the foreshore and spot the embassy.  They're pretty easy to identify. If you see a huge building or two mostly hidden behind a concrete wall, usually adorned with spikes and sometimes even barbed wire, bet your house you've spotted an embassy.  Most of them are there.  Brazil, the US, China, Korea, Japan, Mexico and probably a few I haven't bothered to remember.  The Australian embassy hasn't claimed water frontage for it's embassy - that's on Comero Road, one of the main roads.  But it has claimed space for the Australian Compound.

I have visited this space on two occasions.  The address is described as "between Dili Beach Hotel and Foreign Affairs".  That's about as specific as it gets in Dili.  The thing about the embassies is that they announce themselves with shiny plaques and huge flags that flutter from stalwart flagpoles.  The Australian compound is, by contrast, non-descript.  It has the requisite concrete wall and spikes that apparently even the bougainvillea won't dare traverse - or perhaps it's thwarted in its expansion attempts.  Got to expose the dangers to would-be invaders.

Behind this faceless facade is the Australian clinic.  To gain entrance, you have to have your name at the gate.  No just rocking up and getting the doc to squeeze you in.  I went on Tuesday for a couple of vaccinations and their EFTPOS/Visa machine was down (Surprise!  Surprise!  It is Dili after all.).  So I had to go back this morning to pay.  There was much consternation.  My name was not on the list.  Did I have an appointment?  No, I said.  I've just come to pay.  Dubious but mildly accommodating, the guards let me in, then called the clinic.  I spoke with the receptionist / nurse / money collector.  She spoke with the guards.  It was decided that I could indeed be escorted to the clinic - which also bears nothing to differentiate it from what I assume are residential houses.

The paranoia spreads to the Australian Embassy.  To gain entrance, you have to put your passport in the little draw.  Wait for the guard to scrutinise it.  If you pass muster, you're rewarded with the return of your passport and a visitor badge.  One by one citizens and other visitors may then gain entrance . . . into a an area where you are wanded for explosives and temporarily relieved of your water.  Inside they will charge you $33 to take a photocopy of your passport and sign to say it is real.  On the way out, you relinquish your badge and they return your water.  It's all very civilised . . . except it's not really.

It's an imposition.  The Timorese are amazingly friendly.  The overwhelming majority will say hello and some even dare to strike up a conversation with the linguistically-challenged malai (foreigners).  This is in stark contrast to the UN vehicles - hulking 4WD, white with a stark black UN on each side, belt up Beach Road, sometimes sirens blaring, rushing it seems to something urgent, urgent, urgent.  But the scene is otherwise so tranquil, I'm left to wonder whether the urgency is gastronomic rather than military.

Even visitors, ponder what it is that the UN is doing here.  Scuttlebutt is that they're leaving.  We are too, apparently.  No doubt the embassies will remain though.  East Timor, it seems, might just be ripe for the picking.  What are all these countries waiting for?  Resources?  Territory?  Only they can tell and the cynic in me says that if we were to ask we wouldn't get an honest answer.

Until then, let's all party up at the Brazillian embassy - I'm told they dispense with formalities and should you dare to grace their threshold, will swing the door open and welcome you with a cheery, "Bon Dia!"