Another day in Timika

July 3, 2012.
The news this morning featured footage of a waterbuffalo running amok in one of Indonesias small cities. He trotted through an open market and into traffic, goring the occasional car as he loped along. Eventually the rogue animal was diverted into a neighborhood, which proved less hectic but much more dangerous for the waterbuffalo. The cameras recorded a slight barefoot man emerging from his cinderblock home with a pistol. The range at which he shot the massive animal suggests the man had low confidence in his marksmanship. And then it was all over.


I am sitting by the rooftop pool of our hotel. Kenny G's Christmas album "Miracles" is playing on the sound system. A moment ago "The First Noel" was drown out by the 4:20 call to prayer of the Muslim Mosque several blocks away. It is a strange moment in a strange place. The Grand Tempaga Hotel is a four story oasis in what can only be described as a landscape of disturbing poverty. Garbage fills the ditches and streams. The stench of rotting organic matter comes and goes as we walk past the stalls, down the alleyways where locals have set up a blanket or stand to sell what they have grown, caught, found or made by hand. Staring is not impolite in Timika, and Carrol, Roger, and I gather plenty of stares.


Carrol Masheter is a university professor and PHD from Salt Lake City, Utah. Her longtime passion for mountain climbing took her to the summit of Mt Everest 4 years ago and has persisted ever since. As her employer was no longer willing to grant the unpaid leave she required to climb mountains, Carrol chose to retire recently. She is an energetic, silver-haired dynamo of positive willpower. Carrol has branded herself "The Silver Fox." She often speaks of herself in the third person and is given to howling when she is happy. I point out that Foxes do not howl, to which she then howls and declares "this is a magic fox!"


Roger is an in-house patent attorney for a major telecommunications company in Dallas. He is affable and ready with the quick wit typical of Texans.Though he does not strike the physique typical of mountain climbers, Roger has summited a number of majors, including Kilimanjaro and Aconcagua. He is in his early fifties and contemplating marriage.


The people we pass are friendly. We wave to one another. Some want to shake my  hand. If we stop to talk with one local many others will gather around to watch the conversation. We are a curiosity. A man holds a large fish above his head for me to see. He is proud of it. I point to my camera and then to him. The man enthusiastically nods in the affirmative. He smiles broadly with his chest pumped full of pride. As soon as I take the shot one of his fellow vendors shouts a comment in Indonesian and all the men roar with laughter. The deflated man throws his fish down on the table before him and stomps off half smiling.