Dili graffiti – gangs, memorials and Jackie Chan

First blog for over a month as I’ve been away and really busy with work. I have nearly completed a couple of posts on Dili, so in the meantime, here’s a taster of something you’ll immediately notice when you come here: the ubiquity of (mostly bad) graffiti.

I’m a fan of graffiti (or “street art” as the good stuff has been rebranded) when it’s done well and in the right place, especially if it’s provocative, political or just pretty. There’s some really good stuff back home in London. Unfortunately, most stuff in Dili is terrible. For some reason, the jovem (youth) feel like they have to scrawl their neighbourhood gang affiliation over any spare piece of wall. So, you notice pretty quickly when you move from a “Seven 7” area to a “Mambo no 5” area (see photos). I live in the border between “Bambros Vila Verde” and “Malcovi”.

Part of this is due to the martial arts club stuff that was all over the media a few years ago (see here) but now seems to mostly have died down. At its height, the martial arts club were even covered on Ross Kemp’s gangs programme (see here), and Jackie Chan came to Dili to teach the Timorese to use their skills for good! (here and here)

Despite all the crappy gang graffiti, there is some better stuff on offer, such as the peace messages all over the walls of the football stadium, which must have been a commission of some sort (see photos). Hopefully Dili Cidade Da Paz (Dili city of peace) will stay as true as it is now, though there has been some trouble this week with the police evicting 1000 people from Bairo Pite (see here).

Not many of the scrawlings actually say anything in Tetun, though there is some stuff near my office to do with rival boxing clubs, e.g. “King of Boxing beik ohin rahun”, which translates into something like “If you’re not careful King of Boxing will smash your face in”. Nice.

There is also some memorial-related stuff, e.g. the memorial to Kuka (see picture). Kuka was a promising young musician killed at a party by police breaking up a fight which he wasn’t involved in (see here and here). It’s a sad story, and controversial too, as the police reportedly kept the house blockaded for 45 minutes during which time he could have been taken to hospital and saved.

Dili-dwellers, if you're reading, please recommend some of the best (or funniest) stuff and I'll add it.