Maubisse to Same

The village of Same – East Timor

There are no places in East Timor where you will not come across the remnants of the destruction that swept across the country in 1999. Same is no exception.

That really struck me while traveling around the country.

Sui in the south, Oecussi, Dili, Baucau, Los Palos,
Lautem, Maliana, anywhere the Indonesians had settled in.

The only places unaffected are so far off the beaten track that they were never developed.

The Indonesians did invest a lot of money in the infrastructure in East Timor when they had control.Schools, roads and medical facilities had been built in East Timor, but when the Timorese voted for independence the Indonesians chose not to leave anything behind.

Then the Timorese militia joined in and went berserk and a lot more carnage followed.

It is popular to blame everything on the Indonesians but it seems like it was more of a group effort including help from the west who did little to prevent the foretold disaster.

Same – East Timor