Set in Titanium

This year is our 20th year of being married. We got engaged a little too young, at 19 and 17 years old but we’ve stuck together with most of the credit going to Cynthia. Its been a tough 20 years I think and we both could do with a bit of a break. I hope that we can go another 20 years or 40 years – that would probably do though. As you can see from the photo, Cynthia is still as beautiful as ever.

For this auspicious occasion we ordered some special rings to replace some plain silver ones we’ve been wearing.

These were done by titaniumringsforever and they did an awesome job. Cynthia and I look mild but when it comes to possibly the only thing we’ll have stuck on our bodies for any length of time we get very fussy. The folks who made the rings were very patient. Cynthia’s has “filigree” which is fancy carving with a few stones: amethyst (engagement), ruby (grandma) and diamond (a girls best friend). Mine has a tree bark sort of look (?) with a feather engraved (??). Inside we had engraved “bind us together”. And if you place one inside the other, line the diamond up with the feather and hold them up to the fire light then some fancy writing shows up saying … just kidding.

20 years ago.

Kaiyil Leonardo Bacon

More sensible minds have prevailed to the relief of most friends and family. Still, we just had to have a difficult name. So our son is called Kaiyil Leonardo Bacon. What is it with this generation? Whatever happened to names like John and Mark and Thomas?

 

Kaiyil is doing very well and I am very thankful to God. He squirms and burps and exudes other less exemplary semi-solids. But things look normal on the whole. The name Kaiyil is a corrupted form of a less known Hebrew word in the Bible meaning something like “valiant”, or strong or wealthy. Someone of khah’-yil could be thought of as a person of force. Cue Yoda going, “The force in this one strong is!” I am currently working through the book of Ruth with a Timorese friend and this word of valor is used to describe Boaz. He is a noble and respected man in the village of Bethlehem who ends up marrying the beautiful young Ruth from another country in order to redeem a widow’s family. Boaz also describes Ruth as a woman of valor as she has left her country to stick by her widowed mother-in-law. Kaiyil was born near the ocean which is called Kai in some island language. So Kaiyil it is. Leonardo has always been a bit of a hero of mine in terms of creativity of mind.

Incidentally, Kaiyil is currently stateless. He is born in a country which does not recognise his citizenship because his parents are Australian. Yet he is also not an Australian because he was not born there. We must apply for naturalisation for him to be called an Australian citizen, then apply for a passport before he can leave Timor-Leste. Just another quirk of the bureaucratic world we live in. Why? What is the point of making international travel illegal? Why is this world some sort of global dictatorship? Of course, I am speaking not for Kaiyil but for the many babies his age born into other nations who may not successfully find a safe place to call home. I give my son to God and hope that Kaiyil will serve Him valiantly to make this world a more peaceful place.

It’s a boy!

This morning Cynthia gave birth to a handsome baby boy. She began with contractions around 2am which really got going by 3am. By 3.30 the kids decided to shift downstairs to the office as they didn’t want to hear mum in pain and Cynthia moved into our upstairs living area. We were grateful to have Lauren staying with us (as planned) who was our nurse. I don’t think many births are easy and this one certainly wasn’t but Cynthia did very well with no pain killers.  The bub eased out at 4.51am with no tearing or other dramas, thanks so much to God.  The placenta took some time to come but Lauren really helped with that and there was very little blood loss. The lad weighed in at 3.67kg which is somewhere around 8 pounds. 

The bub born today in mum’s arms – Cynthia glowing as usual

I think that’s covered most of the important bits for the women readers amongst us.  He’s sort of long, a bit squished with a reddish tinge and a bit of fluff on top for hair.  He doesn’t cry much yet and seems fairly happy with himself and the world around him – I hope he likes it.

just the most adorable baby ever … sort of

Serenity is not sure about all the fuss and why you’d want to have another pooey responsibility.  Israel has been very excited and very glad to have a baby brother.  Xakira is happy but still a little unsure what its all about.  Cynthia is very relieved and I am happy that the bub is out because Cynthia was struggling to waddle around.  He’s pretty sweet.

“Know that the Lord, He is God!  It is He who made us, and we are his; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.”

Ps 100:3

Quality father and son time - doing what guys do best

As usual we have no name yet but the pressure is on.  He needs to be named, then Timorese birth certificate, naturalised as Australian and then a passport before he can see family in Oz (hopefully in November).

Naming a person is a very awkward responsibility.  It seems like you make a random stab at something that takes your fancy which impacts a person for the rest of their lives.  I’ve got an inkling for “Krispin” which is a valid Timorese name – known to be a Christian martyr around 300AD.  More temperate minds will most likely prevail but I thought its ultimate destiny as “Krispy” would be really cool.

About to Burst

Cynthia is still in one piece but any day now she is about to burst.  We’ve got a couple of midwives down on the south coast ready to come over to help (although the journey between us and them is around 6 hours!).  Cynthia’s being doing a bit of nesting and has prepared a “How to give birth for dummies” instruction sheet for me.

Some other random things…

A nice visit from two folks from America, Jason and Ashley, who’ve come across the ocean to share God’s love with the Timorese.  They also painted our dining table and bedroom. 

And we bent up a cool little hook which is our Timorese version of a husking hook to take the husk off the corn in the field.  Its off to get tested in Los Palos.

Jason sports a new weapon against poverty.

Its made of 6mm steel and wraps around behind the forearm and is strapped on with rag.  The idea is that if it works then anyone can make it.

I snapped this one of Serenity the other day…

Serenity goes shopping at the local plaza – for her, like any 15yo, its all about the look.

And we got a surprise visit from Sipri, my Salvo brother in training to be an officer.  He’s been doing his practical placement in Kupang which is the capital city on the western half of the island in Indonesia.  He got a few days off and came over to see his family.

Dirty Water

Two of the great challenges for any city is to bring clean water to all its citizens and to take dirty water away.  It takes good leadership from the top and cooperation, ingenuity and determination from the bottom.

Here in Dili there are still many drains full of stagnate, dirty water.  I visited my friend in a middle class suburb the other day and noticed slimy water coming up through their front drive and running down into the drain by the road. 

The open drain outside my friend’s home in Dili.

As it was the dry season I asked where the water was coming from.  They responded that it was just like that especially if they use the bathroom – that is, it was actually raw sewage running down their driveway which they would walk through each day before entering the house.  These were clean people who looked after their family well but right beneath their noses was this urk.  So I whipped out my circular saw with concrete cutter, cut a trench in their slab and gave directions and cash on how to put in an absorption trench. 

Digging the absorption trench to receive water from the septic tank.

This one is about 5m long, 60cm wide, 80cm deep, filled with 20-40mm stone and running the length is a 100mm PVC pipe with holes cut in it to get the septic tank water absorbing into the ground.  The whole job was knocked off for about $80.

 

500 Years of the Catholic Church in Timor-Leste

This year is also the 500th anniversary of the Catholic Church coming to Timor-Leste.  There were many celebrations and even the head of state of the Vatican flew in for the occasion. There is a very strong link between the Timorese people and the Catholic Church and thousands turned out for the special ceremonies. 

The main 4 lane road packed with the faithful.

A main event was escorting the “Youth Cross” and its friend “Maria Peregrina”. 

 

The Youth Cross on the right.

With Maria Peregrina protected in a glass box.

The Youth Cross, originally inspired to draw young people to Jesus, has taken on a life of its own and with special Tais (local cloth) and a golden head piece it appears remarkably similar to a sacred pole dressed up as what could be understood to be a witch-doctor or local spiritual leader (similar to the gentleman in the above photo on the left).  Mary statues are generally pretty and peaceful and lovingly adored.  They make a suitable and comfortable couple to symbolise Timorese religion. 

So it seems, even the City of God has its challenges.  May God help us both at the top and the bottom to make changes. 

Death has a win

If you fight – I suppose you must be prepared to lose … sometimes.  Well, we lost this round.  I was soaring on visionary wings with these chickens, that is, until they all died.  All 10 chickens are dead.  We were taking it to the next level by bringing in a rooster and 4 laying hens.  Unknown to us, the rooster was carrying a lethal disease (possibly Newcastles Disease).  He died within 2 days and then slowly the rest of the flock died.  It was so sad to see and I will spare you the pictures of crippled chickens. The four laying hens turned out to be old battery chooks who, being vaccinated, are blissfully enjoying their new life without competition and not doing much egg laying at all.  So now we must begin again to rebuild a flock and try to breed up some nice laying chickens.  But its hard to get back up again after such a loss.  Its another component to a very long list that sheds light on why these people are poor.  In Australia, we’d probably have such lethal sicknesses under control. But here, poor folks with few assets lose all their precious chooks in one hit.  I am very sad.

As we wallow together in avian misery, I might as well recount another loss.  Mauk Moruk, the “rebel” leader has been killed.  He was leading a group that was demanding that the government stand down and had a fair number of armed (and unarmed) followers. The police and military were closing in on him and apparently he did not want to give in and was killed in the shoot out. His body is yet to be buried.  There is lots of talk about who will do what now.  Farmers in the east want freedom to go out and work their fields since being in lock down for the last few months or more.  I hope and pray that things will calm down so we can all get on with the fight for a better life.

Help Needed

In The Salvation Army, pointing to the sky is our way of saluting, saying hallelujah and giving glory to God.  So in the above picture you could take it as a two-handed salute or it could also be me pointing to the top of the building which has no slab on it.  Its probably both.  When I find myself in a jam I tend to say “Hallelujah!”  Its like saying, “Drat, I’ve stuffed it up again, now how is God going to get me out of this one?”  But let me cut to the chase, can you help?  I need about $10,000USD to get this slab on the top of this section.  That will take steel, plywood, gravel, cement and other things as well as Timorese labour.  Once that is done, we can put some doors and windows on, tiles in the sewing room and try to get the girls some space to sew.  There are no overheads on this project.  I cover all the admin and ra ra.  Any money donated goes straight into raw materials and Timorese labour.  A lot of it local too.  The gravel comes out of the river 100m away (paying the river guys and trucks) and the blocks are pressed in the neighbouring village.  The wood to support the slab comes from the palm forest just down the along the beach from our place.  Actually, Tobias was bringing the support poles along the beach by boat but things went wrong and the boat rolled.  Tobias was bruised but ok.  The motor is not so good.  The roof of the boat was once again demolished.  He’s spending hours cleaning out salt water and sand.  I’ve been giving him a couple of lessons on the carburettor and replacing the water impeller which died trying to pump sand.  Just dumb stuff I gotta do to lay a suspended slab.  Hallelujah!

Tobias with the boat motor apart and feeling quite down about the whole affair.

Posts from the palm forest waiting to hold up formwork for a slab – quite oblivious to Tobias’s feelings

 

Some work begins on setting up formwork.  Plywood goes on top, steel, then the concrete is poured.

 

Forming up a concrete post.

 

If you’d like to contribute we have a few ways:

Through The Salvation Army in Australia:

Account name: The Salvation Army (NSW) Property Trust
Bank: Westpac Banking Corporation
BSB: 032005
Account No.: 000495
Swift Code : WPACAU2S
Note: The remittance should include "Timor Donation" & Donor’s details

Direct to our Australian Account:

Account name: Samuel and Cynthia Bacon

Bank: Teachers Mutual Bank

BSB: 812170

Account No.: 14670

Include “Timor Donation” in the details

Direct to our Timor Leste Account:

If you happen to work in US dollars, you could send it in USD straight to our account in TL which operates in that currency:

Account name: Samuel Bacon

Bank: ANZ

Branch: Dili

BSB: ANZBTLDIXXX

Account No.: 1012119641030

Include “Timor Donation” in the details, and you could send us an email as we don’t yet get statements from this bank.

 

God bless.