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alongside mangrove swamps, traversing desolate country more characteristic of 
outback Australia than Asia. 

Next stop: Baucau. Thanks to an enterprising Catholic bishop who paid off the 
local militia in 1999, the town was spared much of the death and destruction 
that befell the rest of the country. His song should be sung. Baucau's old city—
built in the shadow of a limestone cliff overlooking the ocean—is home to some 
of the finest examples of Portuguese architecture in East Timor, including the 
newly restored and renamed Pousada Baucau, once the infamous Hotel Flamboyan. 
Now under Timorese management, this grand hotel is the place to enjoy spicy 
Portuguese-Timorese fusion food and a glass of fine Portuguese wine before 
retiring for the night. Reassuringly, the staff now carry corkscrews instead of 
M-16s. Rooms cost $50 a night, including breakfast—e-mail flamboyan at indo.com 
for reservations. Down the road at the Perola de Timor restaurant a more basic 
fare is on offer, and the bullet-riddled walls let you know that the good 
priest's money traveled only so far. 

So, too, the strength of his religion. Though 90% of Timorese describe 
themselves as Catholic—in most cases, staunchly so—the farther east you go, the 
more likely you are to find locals who take a two-way bet on the afterlife. In 
the mountainous Lautem regency on the island's eastern edge—an area famed for 
its intricately carved traditional houses built on stilts—the pulse of ancestor 
and spirit worship beats strong beneath the cloak of Catholicism. Graves are 
marked with crucifixes and decorated with buffalo and goat skulls. A couple 
will wed in church, but only after a relative has sought ancestral approval by 
tearing out the beating hearts of sacrificial chickens. "It works well," a 
portly priest once told me. "The chickens are sometimes served up at the feast 
after the [church] service." 

Chickens are also on the menu at the Pousade de Maubisse, perhaps the finest 
hotel in East Timor. Rooms are $40 a night midweek, $70 on weekends. There are 
no phones, so visitors must simply turn up. Perched on a rise in East Timor's 
central highlands, a four-hour drive north of Dili, the hotel is surrounded on 
all sides by a jagged mountain range that resembles the Swiss Alps, without the 
altitude. A gracious establishment with wide, marble verandas, luxurious rooms, 
cultivated rose gardens and crisp, clean air, the hotel was once the favored 
retreat for Portuguese colonials living in Dili, though it quickly fell into 
disrepair under the Indonesians, who considered its 360-degree views of the 
surrounding countryside perfect for an army observation post. 

The hotel has now been restored to its former glory and once again, 
the "colonials" from Dili—this time U.N. workers helping to rebuild the country—
crowd the dining room on weekends. The view is expansive, the menu limited. The 
cook has only two strings to her bow: fried beef or fried chicken. "If you are 
here for two days it's perfect," explained the manager, with Basil Fawlty 
logic. "One day you can have beef. The next you can have chicken." Either way, 
a decision has to be made before 5 p.m., to allow the cook time to purchase the 
meat from the Maubisse market, just down the hill from the hotel, in the center 
of town. There is perhaps no more colorful market in East Timor. Out front, 
Timorese ponies are parked five to a row. In the back, roosters fight to the 
death, egged on by craggy mountain men dressed in woolen shawls and wide-
brimmed hats. In the market, women sell everything from palm wine and shags of 
wild tobacco to the beautifully handwoven rugs and blankets known as tais. 
Don't expect to haggle over prices. The recent introduction of the U.S. dollar 
as the country's official currency has confused many, and the stall owners 
prefer for now to keep prices fixed until they can master the true worth of the 
greenback. 

But master it they will. After 450 years of colonial rule—first by Portugal, 
then Indonesia—the Timorese are adapting quickly to the independence they had 
craved. "I love this freedom," says a shopkeeper selling wine at the bottom of 
the hill from the Pousade de Maubisse. "In Indonesia time no one at the hotel 
drank alcohol. All Muslim soldiers, only here for bad time. Now many tourists 
come and buy wine from me. They all here for good time. Much better."