Raj and Lois in Timor

Maluk Timor welcomes our new Executive Director Mrs Dillyana Ximenes in a couple of weeks. And the questions come... Why are you leaving? Because I have done what I can in 4.5 years, and it's time to hand over to a team that can carry our work forward. We arrived in Sept 2020, and have watched our team grow over the years from a scrappy little start-up to a scrappy little scale-up.  We're leaving not because things are bad, but because things are good. Are you leaving because you fought with someone/did something wrong/got fired? No. See previous point and next point. When did you make this decision? The day we came to Timor, actually. Always start with an exit plan. We have always been looking for leadership that can take the team forward. We talked about it again seriously in July 2024  with our team. Are you sorry to leave Maluk Timor? Yes. Very. Raj and I have spent more of our married lives in Maluk Timor than in any other place. Some of my happiest memories are dancing ...

When holding your breath is safer than breathing When letting go is braver than keeping When innocent words turn to lies And you can't hide by closing your eyes When the pain is all that they offer Like the kiss from the lips of a monster You know the famine so well, but never met the feast When home is the belly of a beast The ocean is wild and over your head And the boat beneath you is sinking Don't need room for your bags, hope is all that you have So say the Lord's Prayer twice, hold your babies tight Surely someone will reach out a hand And show you a safe place to land. From A Safe Place to Land , Sara Bareilles Maybe future me will look back and say aiyo past L, how come so emo? Dear Future L: most of it warn't fit for publication.

  The voice you hear in Ramah is inconsolable.

 铁面无私: 形容公正严明，绝不因徇私或畏权而讲情面。 "iron-masked and without self": strictly impartial (idiom) So this is the taste of iron; the irony is that integrity is what tears you belly to sternum. One flapping half is the leader, brow furrowed, making the hard but rational calculation; The other, the breast-beating sister - friend, hating both selves for the choice that we just made. It's like a DNR talk, which is like a breakup. It's oversteeped tea, it's Kubler-Ross spiralettes, it's us-not-you platitudes. It's passionfruit and sun-juicy mangoes trampled, burnt to cinders, bitter, moruk.    

Song intro'd by SK. And appropriate to the occasion, I think.    (There is also a quite lovely NDP song this year, but this is not about that.) Almost half of my working life has been spent in the majority world. I recognise that I am a citizen of no mean city. And I am grateful.

 

I was incorrect. In other news, it is raining again here, a little early for the late rains, but too late for rainy season. It's pleasantly cool after the rain; the grey clouds, having wept themselves dry, slip into the distant and ever-present mountain mists, and the dusty earth drinks up the water like a promise. Half-naked kids run through the downpour screaming with laughter and in the office we shut our laptops with an air of finality as the internet crashes. -------------- Raj has taken the HIV line management load off me, leaving me free to concentrate on creating training content for clinical and managerial training. I miss the team but I am grateful for the extra time this frees up -incidentally for work that I find enjoyable and meaningful. I might muse about some of the learning points from this process along the way.  -------------- I might as well speak directly of it: Raj and I had a difficult conversation about our exit strategy with our team this week. I trust the t...