Eusabio

I haven’t told you guys about Eusabio.  I have made it this far and considering our situation I almost made it the whole way.  Damn.

Eusabio is an odious man.  Truly, an awful guy.  When I was in my terrible sales job if one of us reps ran into someone truly odious my boss would say, “You can’t teach a pig to dance, it frustrate you and it annoys the pig.”  It was our way of saying, while you must sell everyone if one or two are awful we don’t want to do business with them.  Eusabio fit into that category.

He was a teacher trainer in my first real training, or he wasn’t.  He was there for the first couple of days then gave me an earful and disappeared.  He wasn’t on the rolls with the ministry.  This happens sometimes.  There are itinerant Timorese who wander from training to training pretending to participants for food and training pay.

  He was the type of person to sit in a training with his arms crossed and snort when heard something he didn’t like, and that was always.  The first thing he said to me was while he was as he stormed out.  His English was pretty good.  “This never work, never.  People here shit, no good!  You think it works but you Malae we want you think that. You money, always money.”

And then he was gone.

I saw him again at a Malae bar in Dilli right after Christmas.  He was either drunk or stoned; a short man with a thick but ill kept moustache.  I didn’t recognize him but he recognized me.  “This Malae he buys me beer! You remember Malae is Eusabio.  Good training.  Good cakes!” I bought him a beer and he proceeded to tell me that the Timorese people were shit and things here would never work.  He was in favor of annexation by Australia.  “They come here, we go-we say Yes Sir, everything, everything!  We work!  Thing work.  They leave, now shit.”  I walked away after paying for his beer.  I was in a hard enough spot without listening to that stuff.

I haven’t brought him up because if I start focusing on negative things I catch a spiral right back to can’t sleep-ville.  There is an element of his externalized self hatred here in Timor.  “We’re shit, things are not good, we’re no good”.  But never have I seen it concentrated with such vigor. 

I ran into Eusabio again today. 

I was on my way back from Baucau.  It was our final call.  Come in to Dilli.  Most of these end in evacuation; just a matter of signing the papers.  We caught a sweet ride with Jessie’s NGO.  I hopped off on the outskirts of Dilli because I saw Alfonzo, my consultant, and I needed some time.

Alfonzo and I talked, he had a DVD player in one hand and a bag in another.  His family was already gone and he was going to take his motor scooter out as soon as he had tied up some loose ends.   Did I want to come and see his house?  You know, before?  The question hung in the air. I was supposed to be in the Peace Corp Headquarters NOW.  But I decided to take the time.  “Great” he says and hops on his scooter ”I will be right back here.”

And here wasn’t a bad place to wait.  There was a mass exodus of Dilli going on.  Buses and trucks teeming with people, pigs and goats strapped to the side all manners of valuables from mattresses to television strapped to the top.  I stayed at the side of the road almost out of sight.  There were indicators of trouble all around, the corner vendor for phone cards was selling them at double their value.  The beer vendor had slashed his prices and was waiting to get rid of his stock so he could stash his cart and leave.

And as I waited for Alfonzo to come back someone shouted my name, well Malae.  It was Eusabio, rumpled and damp in the humidity.  He had a huge pillowcase for a bag, it looked to be filled with packets of cigarettes, nesquick mix a coffee and bottled water.  He had a katana at his side.

“Malae!  Malae!” and he is approaching me; I have nowhere to hide.  He takes me by the hand and leads me to the beer vendor.  “He is buying me tiger half price.” The beer vendor is already selling his wares for half but soon Eusabio had one for a quarter.  It was hard to stand in the way of someone so dedicated I paid for the beer. I started to walk away. He had already drained a good portion of the beer and began to castigate me.

“Now we is burning we is hiding. all malaes they go. Other malaes they come is have guns.  Is shit. Is no good.”

We were in the shade of a large tree, I had only been waiting ten minutes so I turned and pulled out my pipe and took a seat.  Eusabio was worked up.  I listened to his ramblings until I found a suitable ride in.  Alfonzo had taken too long.  I wish I had stayed for more.  At the end Eusabio had gotten another beer off me and was shouting as I got into a taxi.  The driver told me he was crazy and then quoted me a price for in Dilli travel ten times what it had been the week before.  I didn’t argue.  I have no ideas what below is true.

Please do not take my attempt to write broken English as anything but what it, is the best I can do.