INDIGENOUS CONVERSATIONS (page 2 of 7) Back   Next

Charmaine: Jose what about yourself?

Jose: It has been great, you know, to see East Timorese in exile maintain our culture and our identity. I just left East Timor five years ago and, when I was in East Timor, we never practised our culture and our identity, especially in school. We only learned about Indonesian history, Indonesian culture and Indonesian language, but not our own. So it is great to see East Timorese who live in Australia, Portugal and other countries still maintaining our culture, our identity so that we can continually teach our next generations about our own culture and identity as well. So I think it is very good to see people like Elizabete. We should acknowledge that she left East Timor when she was seven, but still wants to find out about her identity and her culture through her parents and the elders of East Timor, I think that ís good.

Charmaine: What sort of challengers have there been for you? I mean you are in a foreign country. Your families are in exile. What sort of challenge has it been to try and maintain your links with, not just East Timor, but your own links with your own language and your culture?

Elizabete: There have been great challenges because Australia is a very easy culture and lifestyle. I can just forget about the struggle of my brothers and sisters in East Timor and just live an easy life. Party all the time, like most people do. But no, I didn't choose to do that and maybe one reason why, is because people like Jose and Sancho, were there in very difficult situations but still wanted to keep the struggle alive. They wanted to fight for freedom in their own country and I was here in a free country where everything is so easy. If I didn't anything what kind of person would I be? So what motivated me a lot was how people in East Timor, under such brutality still have the courage to go out there and fight for what they dreamed - freedom. So the least I could do is to follow that strength and fight for our self-determination in any way that I could.

Charmaine: What were some of those ways that you let other people know about: one, what is going on in East Timor and two, a bit of insight into the culture of the East Timorese people?

Elizabete: I was involved in the struggle by participating in cultural performances, through learning our traditional cultures and showing it through dance and song and later on through poetry and theatre. That ís the way I did it and going to demonstrations of course, and showing our anger and frustration and demanding our rights for freedom. Like, we had to go to work and I was studying too, so I had to juggle all that. Still, my priority was to go to demonstrations, go to rehearsals and maintain the cultural life.

Charmaine: Sancho, what about for yourself? I mean, you were in East Timor under the Indonesian regime. What sort of things did you have to do to try and maintain your own culture - to find places where you could actually speak your own language, pass on your own traditions, your own dances?

Sancho: It ís very hard to tell. When I was a kid of fourteen or fifteen years old I really didn't what culture meant to me. I just began to understand when I came to Australia and I have learned a lot of things here. But now I know that the culture is part of our identity, that culture is part of our life and part of our nation; it tells everyone that we are different to others.

Charmaine: Was it almost as if you were endangering yourself by speaking the language. By having to sneak off. What risks were you running in practising your own culture?

Sancho: When I was at school everyone talked about what was going on in East Timor and that ís the only opportunity we had. Because we were living at the college, we had the opportunity to talk about issues and to organise something to do for our own country and for our future. After I finished school, I learned a lot of things from my friends about what we had to do for our country and our future and I heard that our struggle was not only in East Timor, but also here outside East Timor, in Australia as well. So, we discussed what is the best thing to do and some of my friends decided that some of us would have to leave East Timor. I chose to come here and tell people all over the world, especially in Australia what was going on in East Timor.

Our struggle is not only one part, but three parts. One, you understand, is resistance which was run by Xanana Gusmao and the second was diplomatic, run by Ramos Horta.

I'm here today with my friend Jose to tell everyone what has been going on in East Timor. We are here to tell and to keep our struggle alive. That ís the third part. To tell the people, and to ask the people to support us in our struggle. In East Timor, we could not stay in one place together. If we stay in one place together and the enemy came and threw the grenade we would all die. If we are all dead, who is going to keep our struggle alive?

Now we got our independence with your support. So I am grateful to all of you here who supported us.

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