There isn’t one.  Next.

So I read today that nearly 50% of OZ adults are overweight or obese.  After a while here, you forget but one quick trip to Darwin (and the Casuarina Shopping Mall) and you start to become convinced it may just be true.

I suppose it says something about the expats who are here.  Maybe they are the go-getters who are prepared to just “do stuff”.  I mean if you want to do as many things as easy as possible, you probably don’t want to be here.  And with no Maccas, KFC, Crispy Cream Donuts, fried take-away joints and no air-conditioned shopping malls to wile away the hot periods in between ice creams, well it may not be the place for those who always get their money’s worth at a smorgasbord.

Dili now has traffic lights which occasionally perform a useful function and new street lights are in operation in parts of town, so it may only be a matter of time before a true foreign junk food outlet arrives to attack our guts.

You see the occasional overweight expat but they really are rare.  As for the Timorese, I don’t think I have ever seen an obese person.  There is one exception here and that is Timorese politicians.  Some of them have clearly adopted western dietary ways and are carrying a shade too many mangos under the shirt.

At the end of the day, the constant heat coupled with the proximity to places where you can exercise freely (ie running, cycling, swimming) means that my own general health is as good as it has been for a long time.  The downsides tend to be higher risks in the hygiene area, general food safety and water supply purity.

There are two dedicated ice cream shops in Dili that I know of, but if you are really into western food that puts on a bit of tonnage, you are stuck with pizzas, hamburgers and as-many-as-you-can-get-down “pasteis de nata” from Hotel Timor (mmm).  Oh yeah, and beer.