Suai Media Space

علي وجين التقيا من شهرين عندما لارا مانتيكنا قدمت كلينا عبر الفيس بوك. علي و لارا يدرسان تطوير المجتمعات سويا في جامعة فكتوريا وعندما لاحظة لارا ان علي لدية رغبات في عمل الانميشن والفيديوٍ. وهي تعلم ان جين بحاجة الى من لدية خبرات في هذا المجال لمساعدة جين في برنامجها سويا ميديا سبيس. بدوره علي قام بالاتصال ب جين  عن طريق الفيس بوك لكنة استخدم اسمه الكامل وهو محمد علي, اعتقدت جين انها مزحة ولم ترد على ذلك. بعدها ومن خلال حفلت ابنت جين لارا اخبرت جين بان علي او محمد علي ليس مزحة بل حقيقة وهو طالب يدرس معي في الجامعة.

جين راسلت علي ونحن الان نعمل سويا. قررنا اليوم ان نقدم اعمالنا, لذلك هذة الصورة لنا سويا قي الكومبيوتر خلال لقائنا الثاني. خلال لقائنا الاول اعطيت علي صوتا مصورا صورتة عندما كنت في تيمور في سنة 2000. تصتطيع الاستماع له وحاول معرفة ماهيتة.

هذة القصة بدأت خلال شهر السابع سنة 2000, عندما كانت الميليشيات تجوب شمال تيمور قادمة من حدودها ومستمرة بالدخول اليها.

وكنت قد وصلت الى كميناسا, بعد قضاء يوم كامل مررت خلال الهازردوس سهولها وجبالها من دالي الى سووي وهي ققط 200 كيلومتر من دالي والطريق اخذ منا ثمان الى تسع ساعات.

ذهبت الى النوم بعد عناء السفر عندما كان الاخرون في البيت عندما بدأ صوت غامض يدوي. كنت وقتها نائمة قي الناموسية خشية لذغات البعوض وكان السرير هو فراش على الارض في غرفة بجانب فتات استرالية وهي قامت بايصالنا الية ذلك اليوم. عندما سمعت الصوت وهوست (ماهذا الصوت)؟ ولا من جواب. صوت يشبه الاعصار الشديد قادما نحو البيت. نمت ولكن الصوت بدأ يقوى شيأ فشيأ. وكذلك اسمع صوت الحشرات خارجا بوحشيه ممتزجة مع ذلك الصوت. كنت خائفة ممدودة بجمود داخل الفراش, ابعد سنتميترات قلائل عن السمنت الارضي للغرفة, وذلك الزراق المنتفخ مع رفاقي المعسكريين معي. اتلفت كالاعمى الى ذلك الضلام ودقات قلبي تزداد.

بعد وقت قليل, عجزت عن النوم اطول من ذلك وقررت النهوض لارى روبرتو وهو تيموري وهو حارس موتهيأ لذلك الصوت.

مؤقتا, خرجت خارج بابي. الحجرة كانت ظلماء وهادئة بسرعة ارتديت لباسي, اخذت قدحي الاخضر الصغير وبدات بالخروج  باصابعي الى المكان ونضرت حولي.

الابواب الداخلية والخارجية مقفله. فتحتها بصوت خارجا منها ناضرت بخوفى الى الظلام. لااحد هناك. الصوت اقترب اكثر, يسرع بتناوب ولم افهم لماذا لايوقض

الاخرين. وهل ذلك يعني انة صوت غير مغيف او مؤذي؟

كل اعظاء جسمي تقول لي انه لم يكن صوت طبيعي في جنت الفردوس الريفية. واعلم ايضا تأريخ هذة الجنة الفردوسية الريفية.

هناك في الظلام, تحت ضوء القمر, في هدوء وعلامات قاطعة في اكف السعف المتمايل ورفرفت نبات بوكنفيليا الوردي. وخلال البيوت المهدمة ومقاطع سمنتية راقدة مصفوفة جامدة. بسلوكها هذا تكون شاهدا على حياة كانت قائمة. تجر اقدامها مدمدمة على وخلالهم ذكراهم.

رجعت الى غرفتي في ما كان الرجال نياما ووقفت خارج الباب مثقلة بهمومي, ماحيلتي وماذا اصنع. هذه اول مره اكون هناك ولست متاكدة من ان هناك انذار بالهجوم ام لا.

قررت ان اثق بغريزتي. فتحت الباب بهدوء, مؤقتا اسرعت دقات قلبي, ولاعلم لي بهولاء الناس, انا فقط وصلت توا. ولم اكن متأكدة من هو داخل تلك الغرفة, واتكلم شيئا يسيطا لغتهم وهي ال – تيتيون. صحت بصوت هل من احد يقضان؟ تسمعون ذلك الصوت ؟ روبيرتو؟ ولامن مجيب.
واليوم علي احضر معه اول جزء من الفلم المتحرك والذي شرع به وقمنا بأدخالة لكم لكي تنظروا له.

anemation

Read in Arabic

Ali is an artist and a refugee from Iran who wishes to help the youth of Suai.

Ali and I met two months ago. Lara Mantegna introduced us through Facebook. Ali and Lara are doing the Community Development Course together at Victoria University and Lara noticed that Ali was often making animations and videos. She also knew that I really needed somebody to help me with Suai Media Space.  Ali tried to contact me through Facebook but he used his full name and because his name is Mohammed Ali, I thought it was a joke and I ignored him. Later at my daughter’s party Lara told me that Mohammed was a real person and in fact her friend from university.

I texted Ali and Ali and I have begun working together.  We decided today that we will show our process, so this photo of us is at the computer at our second meeting. At our first meeting I gave Ali a soundtrack I recorded when I was staying at Timor Aid in Kamenassa, Covalima in 2000. You can listen to it here and see if you can guess what it is. There is a very loud noise in it that frightened me when I first heard it. It begins very quietly and becomes very loud. It is 7.43 mins in duration.

The story begins in about August, 2000 when militia incursions across the nearby West Timor border are still common.

I had just arrived in Kamenassa, having spent the day driving through the hazardous curling and mountainous roads from Dili to Suai. Although Suai is only 200 kilometres from Dili the drive takes up to eight or nine hours.

I had already gone to bed and so had everybody else in the house when the mystery sound began. Imagine yourself as I was, lying in my mozzie dome on the floor of a room next to a young Australian woman who drove us down there that day. We are staying in the ruin of a house has been partially re-habilitated by Timor Aid. It has doors with bolts and louvre windows, and a blue tarpauline stretched over the top for a roof.

When I heard the sound I whispered “What’s that!” There was no answer. I tried again: “Jane, Jane, what’s that?” Again, no answer. It sounded like a huge storm coming towards the house. I lay there a little longer but the sound was getting louder and louder. I could hear the sounds of insects outside awakening to this monstrous out of place sound. I was frightened. I lay rigid in my sheet bag, a few centimetres off the cement floor, on my blue inflated camping mat, staring blindly into the darkness, my  heart rate rising.

After a short time, unable to lie still any longer I decided to get up to see if Roberto, the Timorese security guard was alert to it.

Tentatively, I peeped out of my door. The hall was dark and quiet so I quickly threw my sarong around me, grabbed my little green mini mag lite and tip toed down the hall to look around.

Front and back doors were locked. I opened them noisily and peered nervously into the darkness. Nobody was there. The sounds were getting nearer, alternately fading and accelerating and I couldn’t understand why it wasn’t waking anyone else. Did it mean it was a harmless sound? Every fibre in my body told me this was not a normal sound of the night in this remote rural paradise. I also knew the history of this tropical paradise. Out there in the darkness, under the moonlight, in the idyllic scene punctuated by palm fronds swaying and fluttering pink bougainvillea, lay ruined homes - slabs of cement lying in rigid rows, bearing witness to the life that had once padded, scuffed and hummed upon and around them.

I crept back to the room where the men were sleeping and stood outside the door, head bowed, wondering what to do. This was the first time I had ever stayed here and I wasn’t sure if I should be alarmed or not. I  decided I should trust my instincts. I tapped on the door quietly, tentatively, my heart was racing, I didn’t know these people, I had just arrived.  I wasn’t even sure who was in that room, I spoke very little of the local language Tetun. I called out in English “is anyone awake”? “Can you hear that noise”? “Roberto”? There was no answer.

The first Step in Ali’s visualisation of the sound track from Kamenassa in animation form.

anemation

The little girl and little boy who recite their short histories of Timor Leste on the Ninth Anniversary of the Santa Cruz Massacre on November 12, 2000 in Portuguese and Tetun tell their own story.

Episodes 1 & 2

Tetun Language
‘Stories from the Youth of Suai’ were written by participants in a digital stories workshop held in the Suai Youth Centre in June 2008 in response to a request for stories that symbolise Suai for the Pt Phillip community and the international audience that visits suaimediaspace. The eleven participants had just completed a five day workshop, that for many represented their first encounter with computers, when they were thrown into discussions about symbolism, local and international audiences and asked to write some stories and take the photographs to accompany them for this website.

The students were all aged between about 18 and their early twenties and there was a restlessness towards the end of the second week due to the fact that the students expected a ‘media workshop’ would involve video cameras and editing software. The third week therefore was dedicated to a simple animation workshop in which the students photographed each other and themselves with mobile phones and digital cameras and animated them to music in iMovie. The result is the collection of Comic Videos.

Tetun Version: Krizi Hahan
Food crisis has considerably preoccupied the mind of the Timorese people as the price of the rice is skyrocketing beyond the purchasing power of majority of the Timorese. The price of one sack of rice is now US$32.00, more than twice higher than the price before the crisis. Many people cannot afford to buy even just one sack of rice. Consequently, many Timorese are forced to return to their indigenous diets, such as, corn, cassava, banana, papaya, and other locally grown foods.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tetun version: Suai Cidade Arte

During the time of the Indonesian occupation, Suai was really a town of arts. But since Timor became independent, Suai is no longer as it used to be because of the 1999 violence, during which everything was looted and destroyed. The destruction included many things that relate to works of art. Now there are many young people who are artistically talented. The idea of rebuilding Suai as it once was before the destruction will take a long time.
Read the rest of this entry »

I met Melli through Annie Sloman. Melli is the lead singer of Galaxy one of the most high profile bands in East Timor. Melli writers songs and stories as well as poetry. you can see an interview I did with him in 2006 when he was in Australia for the Darwin Festival and the Sydney Writers Festival. Now I’m thrilled to bring you links to his story titled ‘The Hand’ or ‘Tangan‘, published on the Asia and Pacific Writing website.

In the same website you will find another story by Indonesian writer Linda Christanty. I met Linda at Melbourne Writers week many years ago and later discovered her friendship with Naldo Rei author of ‘ Resistance’ . ‘Maria Pinto’s Flying Horse’ or ‘Kuda Terbank Maria Pinto‘ is the title short story from Kuda Terbang Maria Pinto by Linda Christanty (Khatulistiwa Awards, Indonesia, 2004).

English Version Traditional House Story

“Uma lulik Tradisional Fohorem”

Ida ne’e mak uma lulik tradisional ami Timor nian, liu-liu iha Covalima no uma lulik tradisional Timor sei la lakon tamba bei ala sira rai hela mai ami no sei lahalakon hosi jerasaun ba jerasaun.Uma lulik tradisional lulik tebes. Tamba sei wainhira ita tama ba uma lulik laran labele kanta,halimar,no labele uja sapeo,no tenqui respeito ema katuas ou halo tuir sira nia lia fuan,se karik lahalo tuir lia fuan nebe iha leten mak sei fo malisan mak hanesan: mate,oan la iha,bulak,moris la hakmatek nebe ami timor adora teb-tebes uma lulik.

Tur hamutuk iha uma Lulik

“Tuir Hamutuk”

Prosesu halo uma lulik tradisional persija tempo naruk teb-tebes no tenqi lao hamutuk ho serimonia adat.

Tenki tur hamutuk tamba,liu hosi tur hamutuk mak bele halibur famalia tomak maski balun kaben ho ema malae mutin maibe sei lahaluha iha uma lisan ida ne’e nia laran hodi tau hamutuk ideia hodi harin uma ida ne’e no oinsa preparasaun hanesan karau,fahi, fos, no seluk-seluk tan hanesan material dapur.

Serimonia oho Fahi

“Sermonia oho fahi”

Molok ta,a ai rin tenki oho fahi,hodi hisik fahi ran iha ai hun nebe mak atu ta’a.

‘Ta airin” “Halas uma”

Ai rin ne’e mak hanaran bei mane no Bei feto, Bei mane iha lor ,no nia hanesan fatin adora lulik, kaba, mak hanesan simbolu ida ou marka hatudu katak ema ne’e uma lisan ida ne’e nian Bei feto mak iha ahi matan rai matrial lulik ba hanesan tanasak lulik,sanan lulik no seluk tan.

“Halibur tali”

Tali halibur hamutuk ho halas

Halibur hamutuk

Tali tahan ou du,ut mak hanesan material nebe atu usa hodi sor uma lulik, prosesu halibur tali ou du,ut (lata hae/du ,ut), molok lata dut/hae uma halas hotu ona.

Resultadu hosi prosesu uma lulik

Resultado hosi prosesu halo uma lulik mak ne’e.Ami familia uma lisan ida ne,e sinte kontente teb- tebes maski iha prosesu halo uma lulik ne’e naruk no bele han tempo tinan ida.

English Version: Food Crisis
Krizi hahan ne’e prekupa bot ida tebes ba ema Timor tamba fos folin sae halo ema barak labele sosa fos. Ema nebe mak laiha osan labele sosa fos tamba fos folin caru liu hanesan saco 1 $32.00. Ho rasaun ida ne’e ema Timor barak fila fali ba hahan tradisional hanesan batar, Aifarina, Hudi, Aidila ho buat seluk nebe mak ema Timor bele han.”

Intervista Senhor Antonio Moniz Mall - World Food Program - Suai
Tambasa mak krizi mosu iha timor leste?
Tuir Sr. Antonio nia hanoin katak krizi hahan ne’e mosu hosi ema ida-ida nia a’an rasik tamba lakoi halo serviso hanesan ema agrikultur; lakohi halo to’os ou baruk ten. Maibe hau fiar katak ema Timor bele moris ho hahan tradisional.

“Oinsa impakto kona ba krizi ne’e?
Krizi ne’e impakto bo’otba povo Timor tamba sasan folin sae no ema barak osan menos no labele sosa fos, tamba fos karon ida $32, nomos sasan seluk tan. Tuir ema seluk nia hanoin, hare, nomos rona katak krizi hahan ne’e mosu tamba, kondisaun naturais mak hanesan udan bot, anin, bai loro naruk.

“Batar”
Foto hahan Tradisional
Batar mak hanesan hahan original Timor nian, maski ema Timor iha hahan oin-oin hanesan hudi, aifarina, aidila. aibe ema timor hare liu ba batar, Batar ne’e ema Timor mengola sai ba oin-oin atu hodi susutenta sira nia moris loro-loron.

“Hudi”
Foto Ai Han timor
Hudi mos hanesan aihan Timor, maibe hudi dala ruma ema Timor usa hanesan hahan mata bisu, Ema barak mak hudi hodi halo dosi, pisang goreng no buat seluk nebe sira bele halo tuir kapasidade ema ida-idak nian.

“Aidila”
Aidila mos hanesan ai han ida nebe mak ema Timor bele han, Nomos sira bele halo modo liu hosi nia tahan ho fuan. Aidila nia tahan mos bele halo aimoruk hodi halakon isin kole, laran beik no malaria.

SUMARIO
Istoria badak ida ne’e hosi ami gropu III kona Ba krizi hahan iha Timor Leste. Maibe ami fiar katak ami timor sei moris nafatin ho aihan tradisional.

 English version Suai Art City

Uluk tempo Indonesia, Suai rai ida nebe mak Cidade arte tebes.
Maibe agora Timor hetan independencia, Suai lahanesan uluk tamba funu iha tinan 1999, ema estraga sasan barak nebe mak iha relasaun ho arte nian. Agora jovem barak mak iha talento konaba arte, hanoin atu hari fila fali Suai hanesan tempo uluk maibe sei persija tempo nebe mak naruk.

Jovem ne’e naran Albino Gusmao agora nia nudar Professor hanorin iha Escola Primaria Ladi Suai. Nia mos iha talento konaba arte nian .Fila hosi eskola nia la haluha fahe tempo halo servisu hanesan pintador ou desenvolve ninia talento nebe mak iha ona.Almeida Gusmao,hela fatin Suai-Debos. Nia Estudante ida nebe mak iha talento konaba arte nian. Agora nia remata eskola iha Pre Secundaria de Ladi. Iha tinan 2005, Nia tuir kompetisaun lukis iha Jepang, representante Timor Leste. Nasaun nebe mak tuir kompetisaun ne’e hamutuk 25. Iha kompetisaun ne’e, nia hetan Segundo Lugar.