Timor-Leste and Patria

Join Patrick on a captivating journey to Timor Leste, the first nation to gain independence in the 21st century, as he explores the significance of its national anthem, "Patria." This episode delves into the rich history of this small Southeast Asian country, uncovering its colonial past and the struggle for liberation from Portuguese rule and later Indonesian occupation. Through the lens of the anthem, Patrick highlights the resilience and unity of the Timorese people, exemplified by the poignant words of poet Francesco Borja Costa and composer Afonso Redentor Araujo. As he reveals the profound emotional impact of the anthem, listeners will gain insights into the cultural identity and spirit of a nation that has faced immense challenges. Prepare to be inspired by the story of a land that fought for its freedom and the anthem that symbolizes its enduring hope and strength.

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Patrick: 00:00:19

Hello and welcome to the Anthems Podcast. I'm Patrick and I'm here to tell you the story of a song that helps to tell the story of a nation.

Today we are journeying 6,397 miles, or 10,295 kilometers, which is equal to just a bit more than a quarter of the planet's circumference. More interestingly though, if it is a straight line distance, capital to capital, 94.1% of it is spent over the Indian Ocean.

Of course, making a direct 11 hour and 40 minute plane ride is not a ticket that you can currently get. So this trip requires at its fastest 29 hours of time on four separate plane flights to get to Timor Leste.

Officially the Democratic Republic of Timor Leste. We are out here on the boundary line between Asia and Australasia this month because of oysters.

Not because Timor Leste has a thriving oyster based economy, even though seafood does account for about 31% of the animal protein eaten there, but because I love to eat oysters and my wife and daughter do not, since it's not a food that I want often. Instead of buying them once a month or so I'll go out and I'll grab a pint and a half dozen of the guys.

I've been going to a particular spot for them for about a year and a half and the same guy is always there and he always serves me. So I told him what my show is about and asked him what he'd like to hear.

He chose Timor Le because his sister in law is from there and it sounds like an interesting place. An excellent excuse for me to tell you about Patria or the Fatherland. The reading for this episode is full of surprises.

I'm guessing it's probably mostly because until last month I didn't even know that Timor Leste existed as a country, nevermind a tautologically named place. In this case, it's because Timor and Leste both mean East.

So another of the many blank slate episodes that you get from me, and one of the many, many educations that I receive on a slice of a particular country's history.

So prepare your ears because the recording you're about to hear is the anthem of the only Portuguese speaking country in Asia and the very first nation to obtain independence in the 21st century. It's a recording that is actually quite special. Why? Come on folks, I can't give you a spoiler like that.

You're gonna have to wait around 3 minutes and 33 seconds so you can hear the anthem. Lo My initial reaction is some for real happiness.

This song sounds like an anthem should sound, even if it is not the highest quality recording in the world.

But it is a very important recording because this is the actual performance of the anthem that was made during during the country's transition from occupied nation to free nation. Like literally going through midnight into the first day of freedom that the country saw for a very long time.

use this was recorded live in: 2002

Like this is the version that you had to hear because I might not ever get to show you the first version of an anthem that has ever been played before. It's a pretty big deal.

So let's find out in the world where we are and then we will circle back to this very moment in the timeline Timor Leste is in Southeast Asia.

It's actually very near Papua New guinea, roughly 400 miles or 640ish kilometers north of the northernmost extent of the province of Western Australia.

The country occupies the eastern half of the island of Timor, a couple of smaller islands, an exclaved portion of the half of Timor that Indonesia controls. And exclaved is a new term for me. It means that a portion of the state's territory is fully contained within another state's borders.

Off the top of my head, I can think of no other nation that's like that, but I'm sure there is more than one.

The island of Timor is part of the archipelago, the Lesser Sunda Islands, which means we're in a place that is part of a volcanic arc due to plate subduction. The country in full is about 14,900 square kilometers, which is 5,770 if you're counting in miles.

It's pretty mountainous place, and the 1.34 million people that live there speak some 30 indigenous languages.

The two official languages though are Portuguese and Tatum, and I'll get to that combination in just a minute because first I want to talk about biodiversity. Specifically, I want to mention the coral triangle.

It's a roughly triangle shaped area that is basically the coastal waters of all the stuff in between Asia and Australia.

There are at least 500 species of reef building coral in each region and several thousand species of reef fish here, as well as hundreds of mollusks and crustaceans. With such a wealth of biological resources, it's not a wonder that the region has been called the Amazon of the sea.

And it feeds about 120 million people a year.

Since Timor Leste is pretty isolated, their reefs have managed to stay in good shape compared to other more touristy areas, but climate change and unsustainable fishing habits do continue to threaten these underwater biogems no matter where they are. You might guess that the reefs predate people.

That's my guess at least, but I've not thought about where coral enters into the timeline, even though you are doing that right now because I mentioned it. So you're welcome.

I hope onto the story you might have guessed from Timor Leste being the only Portuguese speaking nation in Asia that this is yet another episode in the series on the fall of colonialism, a process that is definitely not over by the way, but that is entirely another podcast. The first people to reach the island got there roughly 43,000 years ago, according to what paleontologists have uncovered so far.

Obviously these folk were incredible sailors because all this stuff is in the middle of the ocean.

There was a later migration that pushed the population into the mountains and decided that seafaring was not for them much, as many people on neighboring islands did too. And things were pretty alright with the booming sandalwood trade.

se first arrived in the early: 1520

ans didn't really begin until: 1769

Even with that, the territory was mostly a backwater in the Portuguese Empire, kind of a neglected trading post where the government sent certain criminals or people that it wanted far, far away. The main export was sandalwood, and during the 19th century coffee started to gain some traction there too.

Really though, even during this economic expansion they did very little to support or manage the colony in pretty much any way.

That began to change at the turn of the 20th century because the economy back home in Portugal was poorly managed as well and the empire began trying to extract more colonial wealth to make up for their failings on the home front.

As is pretty much always the case with these things, encouraging economic growth in a colonial framework means probably racist depression, such as forced cultivation of cash crops that are probably not even from the region, forced labor to build infrastructure that I call slavery but historians seem to generally not do for some reason, and forcing a non representative head tax on to the people. Despite this, the island never became a reliable source of income for the Empire.

There was a continual resistance that was fairly low level, and it does not figure too heavily into this story. Other than that, not a lot happened on Timor Leste in the first three decades of the 20th century.

g you about. And honestly, in: 2024

Then World War II happened, and we're going to wade into it for just a little bit this time.

At the beginning of the war, the Portuguese government decided that despite the 550 year old alliance they had with the British, they were remaining neutral in this conflict.

However, they were not allowed to for very long because the Allies were very interested in keeping the Japanese from invading Australia, and the island of Timor was in just the right spot to stop that. This occupation was a direct violation of Portugal's stance on the war, but that did nothing to dissuade Japan from invading Timor.

In February of: 1942

The occupation resulted in Indonesian independence, but Portugal was fairly seamlessly able to regain control. Funnily enough, it was mostly their general lack of interest in the region that made it easy to reestablish control.

Not having spent much money there meant there was no intellectual elite, in colonial terms anyway.

And a lack of nationalist sentiment in the country, coupled with the Empire kind of letting the locals run the show in most practical respects, as long as it led to the British not being there meant that the Empire had no hard line to walk across. Easily regaining the territory did pretty much nothing to make Portugal care about investing in the colony.

of the Portuguese Republic in: 1955

I'll note, possibly for foreshadowing reasons, that during the transition from Japanese occupation back to Portuguese occupation, that Indonesia expressed no interest in the eastern half of the island of Timor.

They were focused on gaining full control of the formerly Dutch territories and even went so far as to mention they were not interested in expanding, specifically expanding into East Timor at a meeting of the UN.

But anyway, in December of: 1960

And the countries that abstained from a vote include Portugal. Surprise. As well as a who's who of colonial interested countries. We'll talk about them some other time.

finally became independent in: 2002

e was a smallish rebellion in: 1959

, in: 1974

Honestly, I've read barely anything about it at all, but I bet you'll hear me talk about it when I talk about Portugal in however many episodes it takes me to get there. What it means for us now is that the empire's ability to project power and exert control across the world was, at least temporarily, completely gone.

And especially so in a place like Timor Leste, where their presence was lackadaisical at best, and they were real far away. Despite that, one of the first things they did was appoint a new governor for the country.

And at this point I honestly don't know if it's a colony, a territory, a province or what. So I'm calling it a country.

The Guy, his name was Mario Lemos, Paris, and he has the distinction of being the very last person from Portugal in charge on Timor Leste.

To the guy's credit, one of his first acts was to legalize political parties in preparation for election to form a legislative assembly, which is sort of a pre governmental body that drafts the constitution.

The three major parties that developed and a smattering of smaller parties were all for freedom of expression, association and religion, which are standard modern progressive lines of thought. So it got complicated in Timor Leste very quickly, and that was alarming to the Indonesians and the Australians.

It should not be a spoiler for me to tell you that it was mostly because of wildly overblown fears about communism.

May in: 1975

We'll hear about the Portuguese Empire again, I think, while dealing with internal political turmoil at home.

th of: 1975

More foreshadowing, since the Fredelin could not secure the return of the governor, they decided to make a unilateral declaration of independence and become the Democratic Republic of Timor Leste. The only countries that recognized them were Albania, Cape Verde, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Mozambique, along with Sao Tome and Principi.

And they were all left leaning Marxist led countries at the time. That prompted Indonesia to steamroll in an annex Timor Leste, which we will talk about in a bit.

th of: 1946

I know that he was born in Manituto, went up to the fourth grade in Soy Bada, and then he moved to the capital Dilly, where he finished high school and then entered the civil service.

I'm assuming that he got into journalism because he was in Lisbon doing an internship at a newspaper that is still around, actually called the Dioro di Notices. And the Carnation Revolution happened while he was there.

Costa returned to Timor Leste now as a journalist for the paper Vaz de Timor, the Voice of Timor, and became one of the founding members of the Fratellin Party. All the while, though, he was writing poetry, mostly in the Titim language.

And it's a well known poet in Timor Leste that an important foundation bears his name. Their mission statement is to study and promote the language along with the culture and identity of the country.

It falls nicely in line with the Fedolin mission of developing a national identity.

Unfortunately, all this patriotic involvement in the country, becoming independent meant that Costa was also on the death list of probable dissidents that Indonesia was working off of. He was captured with others on day one of the Indonesian invasion, lined up on a pier, shot in the back and kicked into the sea.

th of: 1975

He was posthumously awarded the Order of Dam Boaventura in East Timorese honor for resistance fighters or contributors to independence. And Costa's birthday, October 14, has been declared the national day of Timorese culture.

nd of August in: 1942

With him we're given a historical figure that is somehow both quite significant and quite elusive.

He is an important figure of culture in Timor Leste, having also posthumously received the Order of Dom Boa Ventura and being one of several of his siblings that were involved in government and or revolutionaries themselves or a writer of their music. He wrote other kinds of music, but was much less well known for his non patriotic stuff. And that's like pretty much all I can tell you about Afonso.

in a single night sometime in: 1975

orces in February or March of: 1979

They've used a phrase we've heard on this show before, or something very close to it, and said they were interested in protecting their own citizens in East Timor and quote, stabilizing the region.

But in reality they invaded with the tacit approval of the United States, States and others, because everybody was scared of the possibility that independence would lead to communism. We can't know if that would have happened because it doesn't always happen. Granted that sometimes, yes, it does.

This of course, caused the Timorese resistance to consolidate and citizens mostly did what people generally do in these situations, which is set aside their differences and unite across them to fight somebody different. I'm not going to go through the war of resistance. It was brutal and more than 250,000 people were killed.

population in timur. Then in: 1998

The people showed up with a 98% voter turnout and 78.5% of them voted for independence. This momentary triumph resulted in pro Indonesia militias going on a scorched earth campaign of outright destruction and murder across the country.

still recovering from this in: 2024

of the reconstruction. And in: 2002

It's a YouTube video now, so go see the show notes when the anthem Patria was used to sing the flag up for the first time in an independent Timor Leste. And with that we have the anthem and I can talk about the song itself.

With Patria we have an anthem that was composed by someone that was on the ground when independence was happening and made as an active part of the process. It reminds me a little bit of Il Canto degli Italiani from way back in the second episode.

It's music that fits an anthem's purpose well by trying to be straightforward and evocative at the same time. The diatonic patterns help convey pride and resilience.

Using a major scale lends the accessibility and memorability, and that works really well in an anthem.

The combination of a narrow vocal range, a steady rhythmic progression help with the country's unity by making something that most people can take part in and sing. And you know, that's one of my asks for a good anthem. In that same vein, we have a march, adjacent rhythm and a simple harmony.

A source says it's triadic, whatever that means. The music is pretty good. I like it.

Like pretty much all the anthems so far, this is done with everything from a large formal choir to a military band to an informal group of people to an enthusiastic amateur playing guitar on YouTube. It's an anthem. Everybody plays these things lyrically.

We start and end with a two line cyclical refrain with two verses of four variable length lines. There is a certain rhythm to it that comes through just reading the thing aloud.

The back and forth of hard and soft consonant alliteration coupled with the variation weave tension into the writing. Even not being able to read most of the Portuguese that it's written in doesn't keep me from feeling the arc of the thing.

So in my head it's a good poem.

As always, here I will be reading in English and not the original language, but this version gets the meaning across very well, despite being translated from Portuguese. Fatherland, Fatherland, Timor Leste, Our nation, Glory to the People and the heroes of our liberation. We vanquish colonialism.

We cry down with imperialism. Free land, free people. No, no, no to exploitation. Let us go forward, united, firm and determined in the struggle against imperialism.

Enemy of the people, until final victory on the path to revolution. Fatherland, Fatherland, Timor Leste, our nation. Glory to the people and to the heroes of our liberation.

Costa was a good writer, and this is not the first piece of patriotic, purpose driven writing that he did.

The poem opens and closes with a refrain that sets the tone right where you think an anthem should be by espousing pride in the country and gratitude for freedom fighters. The formal stately rhythm of the anthem is framed by cyclical refrain and lines up well with the solemn theme of liberation and resilience.

The opening lines also convey ownership with that pride.

When Costa addresses Timor Leste as our nation, we get the sense of a shared heritage and a collective identity wrought through a personal connection to the land as well as a historical and recent struggle against colonialism and imperialism. The song goes on to proclaim the nation's victory over colonialism and shout at imperialist interests.

Recall that the Portuguese were on the island for some 273 years.

And despite my downplay of the overall historical significance of the resistance, I bet the people living through it felt like it was pretty incredibly significant.

Stuff like that can become sort of a cultural memory, and the East Timorese people used that to remain cohesive throughout years of Indonesian efforts to might as well say it culturally genocide them into just another part of Indonesia. It's an incredible story of resilience and at the same time, one of the saddest things that I've ever learned about.

The third line in the verse broadened the idea of independence from just territory to ideological pursuit. Of course, this is an ideal in a poem, but liberation of land and people from oppression was happening as Casta was writing this.

When he goes on to say that no, no, no to exploitation, I don't doubt that he felt deeply while writing, having lived only in a place that served another place and not the people that live there. The anthem goes on to remind us that the people need to remain steadfast and united and committed to the struggle against imperialism.

The proactive and progressive tone encourages a collective resolve through the struggle. The final two lines make this point again and remind us that the struggle is not over and refers to the future as a path to be followed.

The end of the verse really hammers home the point that when Costa was writing this, it was supposedly the literal eve of the beginning of the revolution.

He very much expected an ongoing situation against the Portuguese, but instead he helped build a cultural base that helped keep the people intact during a brutal occupation by an entirely different nation.

This is a good work to be the cornerstone of that, because it universalizes the Timur Leste struggle, bringing in a broader solidarity by linking the struggle to similar events worldwide in an inspirational reminder of the need for unified justice throughout the world. Patria is both a memorial and a call to action. We hear an anthem that celebrates independence and actively warns against complacency.

The general tone is assertive and although it fails to rise to militaristic, it does manage resolute, direct and confrontational. A well written and composed piece that reinforces the unity and strength a people need to continue on.

The story here turned out to mainly be the story of the first part of the tale of independence in Timor Leste. I read the second part.

It's really sad, but it's a story that you should learn too, because keeping the memories of horrors alive keeps them from coming again. One would hope.

As it is though, you will actually have to do that on your own because the only thing I have left to say to you today is what's in the credits. The writing, recording and production for the show are done by me and I wrote and played the theme music.

The music is used with my permission unless otherwise noted.

The anthems I play are public domain or some other equivalently free to play license or a thing I got permission to play or I have at least at the very least made a good effort to get permission to play this time. The audio comes from the YouTube channel of a place called the community.com they bill themselves as a social network for peace and human rights.

I have reached out to see if they have permission to give me for playing the anthem, but I have not heard back as of yet. Despite that, I had to play this particular version of the song because I told you before I have to play that version.

-: 4255

It's a post about the show and you like the show, I hope. I also don't have the bandwidth to get on all these other social networks because this is just me doing this stuff guys.

For now, I try to get the episode shared on whatever platforms I can through mostly fans and stuff with the hashtag anthemspod.

So it'd be cool if you hashtag the post like that and maybe, just maybe, it will help lead to a world where we're less likely to be subject to tyranny.

-: 8375

Maybe you'll accidentally set this episode as a friend's ringtone and then when they call you, it'll be during a live TV interview, causing millions of people to hear a cool fact about Timor Leste. But even if all that happens is that you listen to one more show, then you are in fact the best.

So go do something nice for yourself before you hear me again.

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