Tiny voices echo in ransacked Dili orphanage
Tiny voices echo in ransacked Dili orphanage
By Kurt Schork
DILI, East Timor (Reuters): Shafts of sunlight knife through the ransacked rooms of a Dili orphanage as a barefoot boy wanders through its empty hallways playing haunting, discordant notes on his recorder.
He is one of half-a-dozen former residents who return every day to play and wait for the return of the other children who lived here, most of whom were evacuated on Sept. 6 as pro-Jakarta militias rampaged through East Timor's capital.
"We're living in the stadium now but this is our home and we feel happy when we're here," 12-year-old Madalena de Castro said, explaining why she comes back to the orphanage every day.
"We're waiting for the others to come back. I want to be here when they arrive so we can live together like we used to."
About 72 children -- some orphans, others surrendered by parents no longer able to care for them -- were living at the government home known as Panti Asuhan Seroja Dili when this city descended into chaos after East Timor opted to break from Indonesian rule in an Aug. 30 ballot.
Most of the children were evacuated to West Timor, but a handful stayed, cared for by the parents of a neighborhood boy.
The urchins now live among several thousand other internally displaced East Timorese at Dili's football stadium, which is protected by multinational troops sent in under a U.N. mandate to restore peace to the territory.
Amandio Soares, 13, remembers well the morning of Sept. 6, when he and a few others fled on foot through the streets of the devastated capital.
"The militiamen were at the front door and the back door and we could hear them talking about throwing a grenade inside, but they didn't," Soares recalled.
"We walked through the street to get away. I was afraid because we could hear shooting and there were a lot of buildings on fire."
"When we returned to the orphanage the militia had stolen everything -- our rice, our medicines, the generator, our beds and even our knives and forks."
Comic books, sketch pads and school lesson sheets litter the floors throughout the orphanage.
Mounds of school uniforms have been discarded in the courtyard. Some school buildings were burned. All were systematically looted, including even the toys.
"We had a football and another ball but the militia took those too," complained six-year-old Alfredo Amaral. "Some days we get bored."
As Amaral spoke the other children took turns rolling a bicycle tire through the orphanage hallways. One tried on discarded, mismatched shoes but couldn't find anything to suit.
The Australian-led multinational forces are gradually restoring security to Dili and beginning to branch out to other areas of the territory. As a result, many internally displaced persons are beginning to return home.
But the future for refugees evacuated to West Timor, as were most of the orphans from this home, remains unclear.
Militia activity in that part of Indonesia is strong and the children at Panti Asuan Seroja Dili may have a long wait for the return of their friends.
Playing amidst the debris of their former home the children seem happy enough, believing as only children can in the future.
Lying on the floor near them, next to a poster displaying British footballer Eric Cantona of Manchester United in full flight, was a poster depicting Jesus, on which was written:
"I asked Jesus: 'How much do you love me?'"
"This much," he answered.
"Then he stretched out his arms and he died."