Just a typical Sunday night

On the weekend my housemate and I experienced Timorese hospitality, right in our own home. A few of the local kids came in to say hello and somehow ended up staying for a couple of hours and cooking dinner for everyone. This routine (as it seems to be one now) was repeated the following night as well.

Could this be the secret purpose of the midget bench?

I have never seen such an industrious group of kids –within a few minutes they had cleaned up our dirty dishes from lunch, put some corn on the stove to pop and started cleaning the rice for cooking.

Their inventiveness with our food was truly impressive (especially from my perspective, as I’ve been living on ramen noodles the last few days because my digestive system finally gave up its stoic fight against Dili’s bacteria). It was a whirlwind of activity which ended in an interesting, if carbohydrate-rich, dinner, followed by milo mixed with sweetened condensed milk (even in my poorly state I couldn’t quite resist it – maybe the Lindt café should add it to their menu).

Something tells me this could be a new weekly routine – provided our cupboards continue to be well stocked. There was even a not-so-subtle suggestion that we should look into purchasing some apples and icecream for next time. For a cooked meal, friendly company and some free practise at Tetun, I guess it’s not a bad deal.

Ingredients for a night in at Casa Del Random:

7 kids

2 malae (foreigners)

1 open door

3 cups corn

1 packet of frozen potatoes

3 cups rice

3 eggs

1/3 block cheese

1 eggplant

1 lemon

2 limes

2 onions

1 cucumber

3 tomatoes

2 limes

4 icy poles

2 handfuls of shrimp chips

10 Milk Arrowroot biscuits

1 can sweetened condensed milk

2/3 tin Milo 

My portrait, as drawn by our youngest guest