Arriving in Dili – from Stephen

The mountains of East Timor were covered in cloud when I flew into a wet Dili on Monday.  It was great to see Simon waiting as I walked down the steps onto the tarmac in front of a very basic terminal bulding.  I was pretty surprised to see Kirsty Sword Gusmao and her three children waiting to greet me too – until I realised that she was there to meet her mother arriving on the same plane!  Apparently people are still calling it the wet season – over 2 months after it would normally have finished.  Unfortunately that has meant that the trip to Lequeracabu’u for this week has had to be cancelled as the roads are impassable again. 

I’m here for 5 days for DLA Piper, following up on pro-bono legal projects we’ve been involved with over the last year and to introduce our latest secondee from DLA Phillips Fox in Melbourne who will be working for the Ministry of Finance for free for the next 8 months.  On the Spend it Well front though, I’m also here to look for more school projects and hopefully to hire our first employee!