I originally started “Dili-gence” after an exhaustive and mostly futile search for blogs on Dili that might tell me what to expect, what to bring etc. That was early 2005. Apart from Nick Hobgood’s dive site and fantastic underwater photography, there wasn’t anything of note that I found.

“ReefScenes.net – Timor-Leste’s Underwater Wonderland” by Nick Hobgood

A result of the crisis period (let’s say that is May to July), has been an influx of foreign military/police and a resurgence in the foreign aid and foreign volunteer presence. I have found myself reading other blogs more than feeling the need to write much myself.

“tumbleweed in timor lorosae” has been around since mid-2005. She is an aid worker who has the odd tale to tell. “Dili-Dallying (2 years in Timor-Leste” has also been around since mid-2005. Both of these have been quiet of late but may be on holidays.
“Nomad Lachy” appeared in May 2006 and I was reading this only last week but it is no longer there at blogspot. She was running the free Pilates classes at Temptations and is into diving. I believe she moved the site somewhere else.

“Dutchpickle” provides small picture postcard views of things he/she has encountered. I am going to take a guess “he” is a freelance photographer.

“Beyond Teresa” from Lisbon writes mostly in English on whatever takes her fancy. She has some interesting insights into events that paint a little more of the picture of what it is like living here.

On the more serious side, there is the all encompassing academically oriented “re-publish everything you can find about Timor on the internet” site called “east-timor-studies“. Another usually serious blog is “Living Timorously” which sometimes borders on irreverent but always comes up with a different angle on something.

“Adventures with flipflops” tells regular tales of the life of a water and sanitation engineer working for an aid agency. Normally, water and sanitation engineers would extract a collective groan but this guy is out amongst it digging wells and basically getting some decent services in place for IDP camps that are looking at a pretty wet future once the wet season takes hold. This guy usually works out of central Dili and that makes it different.

A new one that “east-timor-studies” put me onto is “Rai Ketak“. This is from a Timorese who left here in 2003 and as a result of a 10 week visit in 2006, decided to re-publish earlier writings plus impressions from his recent visit. I still have a fair bit of reading to catch up on with this one. Written in a very personal style (warts and all), it is a valuable contribution for us non-fluent Tetum or Portuguese speakers.

Speaking of Portuguese speakers, one blog which publishes a lot in Portuguese but some English is the “Timor Online – Em directo de Timor-Leste” blog. It re-publishes a lot of Prime Minister’s office press releases, Fretilin party statements, UNMIT press releases, UNMIT security updates and other press articles. It seems to salt a fair bit of political comment on top of all this and I understand the commentary is largely written by Fretilin party supporters.

There will be more (and the non-English ones) and some obvious one that I forgot.