Asakiyume mita

A bit back I posted about spirits that live in geodes in Timor-Leste. Here's a real-life example people interacting with the spirits. It sounds like something from an old folktale--only it's from 1994. I came across it in the memoir A Woman of Independence, by Kirsty Sword Gusmão. She, you may recall, is the wife of Xanana Gusmão, the current prime minister of Timor-Leste. In 1994 Xanana was in prison in Indonesia, and Kirsty was his English teacher and liaison. They were communicating only by letters, and Xanana sent Kirsty this letter, regarding a photo she had been given to send to him, of a boy in an orphanage, a boy Kirsty had been told was Xanana's son.



Xanana wrote to her,

He is the son of one of my best commanders who headed up a guerrilla company in the eastern part of the island. He had capture more than a hundred weapons from the enemy and was one of the greatest commanders of operations in the history of Falintil [the name of the armed resistance]. He died in combat . . . because of his son.

You may already have heard that, in the heart of Falintil, there are those who bear amulets. Some of these amulets are 'lulik' [sacred, meaning here, sacred spirits] which are central to the belief systems and faith of my people. There are many kinds of amulets with different rules attached. A common rule concerned relationships with women. This particular commander received from his own lulik a kind of protection against bullets. It permitted him to get married, but on the condition that his wife did not bear him a son. His first child was a daughter. He was punished with a serious wound. When his wife gave birth to a second child and his soldiers came to know that the baby was a boy, they all cried. They all knew that their commander will die because his substitute had been born. It was the rule, the relentless rule of our beliefs which modern standards classify as 'superstition.'

At that time I was on Matebian mountain. He died near Loré in an ambush he laid on the road between Loré and Los Palos. In recognition of his feats which had contributed hugely to our military resistance, I wrote to Father Locatelli at Fatumaka College, asking for help. And so one day, at night, guerrillas from another military unit near Baucau brought the boy to the priest. Since then, he was known as my son as I gave to him my name.

Kirsty Sword Gusmão, A Woman of Independence (Sydney: Pan Macmillan Australia, 2003), 84–86.

This story entrances me, the story itself, most of all, but also the way Xanana shared it with Kirsty. It's a delicate thing, explaining about beliefs. The world is a complicated place, and how people live in it is different in more than just material ways. Some people experience a world that's thick with spirits, others a world with very few, others a world with none at all.

More on the book when I finish it--I'm nearly done.