So seat belts really aren't the done thing

Yesterday for Easter Sunday, I decided not to go up the mountain for the stations of the cross, the weather was still looking pretty shitty and I had had basically no sleep the night before, though Mat went with one of our newly made friends. They ended up going up on a motorbike, to the statue of the pope. (on one side of Dili there is a statue of Jesus and one of the pope on the other.) this is one of the highest points in Dili so mat had some great photos of the outlook. All the way up the hill they stopped for the stations of the cross before finally making it up to the statue of John Paul II.

I spent most of the day around where we are staying. Went for a walk around, sat on the beach and read my book. Really nice lazy day!

Last night was probably the hottest night we have had followed today by the hottest day, it feels like it is 35 degrees and 100% humidity, I'm not feeling all that well as a result. Because it had rained so much over the weekend there was a lot of water around and therefor a lot of mozzies, well a lot more than usual. I woke up today with about 15 new bites, they must breed them tough here, we have 3 citronella diffusers around the bed as well as a lamp which burns citronella oil, and they still attack us.

Mat headed in early to the clinic today, while I stayed home and did some washing (like the good little housewife I am..) there is no such thing as a washing machine here, so iv been hand washing in the kitchen sink! Because it is so humid, everything takes like 2 days to dry too!

Around lunch time I went into Dili to meet Mat. We are about 2 kms from the main road, usually while walking from our place up to the road, a taxi will come past for you to jump in but today I made it the whole way to the road before I got a cab. When you stand near the road or walk down any road in dili, every cab honks at you, but none of them just have normal horns, all are random novelty sounds and quite a few also have flashing lights and are all covered in random bright stickers, anything to try to get your attention.

The cab I got in today, im not sure was actually a cab, I think this guy was just taking his daughter to school and thought he would pick me up on the way. Though he was really lovely and took me where I wanted to go. You can kinda tell when the cars are personal cars or taxis by the state of disrepair, this car was really well kept and actually had seat belts, a rare find in a cab. Those that actually have belts don't ever get used, when we jump in a cab and buckle up (when there is a belt) we get the strangest looks, one guy actually said about it then laughed at us.. In Timor no one can really afford insurance so everyone just drives quite slow, averaging 30-40kms, you wouldn't really want them to go much faster anyway, especially when there doesn't seem to be any road rules, though the single traffic light in Dili everyone seems to obey.

There is a lot of one way streets in Dili, they are lined to make it a 2 lane road but no one pays much attention to that, sometimes it can change to 4 or 5 lanes, with motorbikes weaving in and out of the other traffic. Only about half of the people actually wear helmets but most of the time they aren't done up. One of our local friends offered me a lift on his bike today, I politely refused..

Once I met up with Mat today, we had lunch at a little indonesian place we found. for the amount of death and destruction the Indonesians caused this place I'm surprised by the amount of indonesian stuff you see around. There is tones of statues and memorials of Indonesians and quite a lot of buildings (which have since been half burnt down) which were built by the indonesians still around. A lot of timorese also speak bahasa (Indonesian) because while the indonesians were occupying it was compulsorily taught in schools.

Anyway I had nasi goreng for lunch, it was pretty awesome, though I have a feeling it was full of msg. Mat decided to order something random off the menu as he always does, today it backfired big time. What he ordered turned out to be a dessert, which consisted of what look like milk, Milo, chocolate topping, those weird jelly pearls you get in bubble cup, some bread that had pink food colouring on it and then massive chunks of ice. Basically it looked like someone ate dessert then threw up in a bowl.

To his credit he ate quite a bit of it, but thought if he ate any more he would be 'pissing out both ends' charming Mathew.

Iv been feeling pretty shitty all day, iv been quite dizzy and light headed, thought it was just because it was hot and I was dehydrated but it doesn't seem to help when I have a heap of water, I felt a bit better once i had eaten some lunch but im feeling a bit sketchy again a few hours later. This might be what sends me home.

After lunch we decided to head to the supermarket, to the market and then home. Like always at the market, once we had selected our veges etc, we got quoted $6 then 5 seconds later it became $7.50, the longer you hang around the more it seems to cost! We did buy a pineapple that looks freaking amazing though, can't wait to get into that.

Back at home now, just sitting on the daybed out on the front porch, watching the waves roll in. Mat is having a nap, it's amazing how tired you get here, I think it's just the weather and the humidity but it really takes it out of you.

I'm going to try to make some sort of awesome stirfry for dinner tonight, should have bought some hokkien noodles or something though, getting a little over rice.