When it comes to supplies of imported items often bought by expats in Dili, there is one key item that defines the state of play with these supplies. Yogurt.

Some people ask if one has seen any yogurt in any of the supermarkets. At the Hotel Dili, the sign would read at breakfast time, “No yogurt due to no stock at the supermarket”. At the Hotel Timor, there would be no sign and no yogurt at all.

There has been no yogurt for around 10 days until a couple of days ago. So you know the boat has just come in and customs have cleared it. But there has been some enormous delays at customs over the last 2 weeks and I don’t know why.

But at least yogurt is back.