Plane

On the flight between Dili and Bali, I sat beside Rosa. She the Directorof Housing Policy for East Timor. She was on her way to a Habitat conference in Dehli, a follow up to the UN Housing conference in Ecuador a few months ago. The Dehli conference is about developing implementation strategies.


Housing is a major issue in East Timor. She alluded to landlords, and I didn't probe (I have laryngitis, so talking is a challenge today). The structure of Timorese society doesn't lend itself to western style housing strategies.

Timorese society is patriarchal, family-centric and traditional. There are few options for someone busting out go the family mold, or someone who is pushed out.


I met one young woman who is has two children. Her husband told her to get out, so she did. She hasn't seen either son in more than two years. She is banned from parent teacher conferences, but she regularly talks to the teachers privately. The other day, she was exceptionally proud because her eight year old topped his class in Math.


She also has kept her family circumstances from her parents. Her mother will ask after them on the phone, and she'll say they are out with their father.


I can't imagine this young woman’s challenges; I brought her up as an example of someone who could benefit from subsidized housing, or from housing period. She’s the sort of person that Rosa would like to be able to help through a national housing strategy.


Rosa and I also talked building codes. I tried not to snort or chortle. I’ve seen absolutely no evidence of building standards, and I can't imagine any Western standards being successfully implemented. Rosa mentioned the notion of bringing in Portugals system of building permits. Again, not a recipe for success. If you're going to have permits, you need an infrastructure being the permits. People have to feel they are getting something in return for the permit.


In Canada, that something is insurance, and the ability to sell the home at some point in the future. I haven't seen any evidence of insurance in East Timor. Vehicles are licensed, but not insured. Some Westerners have insurance from their home country, but Timorese don't.


There was a discussion in the office one day about extended health insurance (basic health care is free, but some people have horror stories about quality of care). The married people saw the virtue of the plan that was on offer. The single people didn't. Unfortunately, the plan was an everyone enrols or no one does deal. I didn't hear the outcome of the vote.


Returning to Rosa’s challenges: I mentioned the housing development that we saw in the middle of no where, and she said that politicking will always exist. A national housing strategy will have to acknowledge developments like that one, and be attractive enough to discourage more such developments.


She said she faces many many challenges.


And then we landed.


I wonder who will be my seat mate on the way to Yogyakarta.