1.Mate Ka Moris Ukun Rasik An
Dickheads shit-talk huddled and single-file. first-world
frat-boys and prairie skinheads who will never walk a mile or
mourn a murdered friend in this tiny woman's shoes. drink up and
mumble you
Se. i'm still humbled by it all：around the same time that i was
riding with no hands, busting windows and getting busy behind
the sportsplex (with labonte's older sister decked out in her
speed
Bella was flinching from the sting of a depo proveran 'family
planning', her own pearl harbour and a holocaust spanning 25
years to the rest of her life. a prison my country underwrote
Aradise. and in the shadows of santa cruz, she crossed her
fingers behind her back. built suharto a trojan horse and lay
still till the motherfucker sent her north where as night fell
she emerge
H a box under her arm that held her pledge of allegiance and her
uniform. she laid it at the gates of the general's embassy and
her whisper echoed into dawn as she disappeared：
The truth will set my people free.
This song was inspired by the real-life story of bella gahlos.
we met her in 1997 at an east timor alert network benefit in
winnipeg. we are humbled to have crossed paths with her. this is
her s
？
Bella gahlos is one of three east timorese who have defected to
canada. she was only three years old when indonesia invaded her
country. her two young brothers were beaten to death and her
fathe
Thrown into jail when the indonesian military entered her home
in january 1976. after the dili massacre, her older brother was
jailed and brutally tortured for having made a 'free east tim
Ot; t-shirt worn by some of the demonstrators.
Although she focused on her personal experience as a young
survivor of the indonesian occupation, bella also addressed u.s.
complicity in the invasion and occupation of east timor and the
united
Es government's continuing military and economic support for the
brutal suharto regime.
In her talks, bella often recounted her experience with
indonesia's forced sterilization of timorese women and girls.
she was only thirteen years old when the military came to her
school and ask
L the young women to line up after forcing the boys to leave the
room.
'they told us we needed to be injected to stay healthy,' she
explained. 'i was frightened; i didn't trust them. five of them
had to hold me down, and they had a very hard time. th
Ey came to my home the same week and injected me again.'
Much later, with the help of bishop belo, she discovered that
she and her classmates had been injected with depo-provera (a
birth control drug).
Bella also spoke of living under a constant fear of being raped：
'women in east timor are raped all the time by the military.
they just come into your home and force you.'
Bella began to work with the underground resistance in 1989,
helping to plan demonstrations and convincing other women to
take an active role in the movement. in 1991, bella helped to
organize t
Aceful march to the santa cruz cemetery in dili. when the
indonesian military opened fire on the demonstration, bella
managed to get herself and her pregnant aunt over the high
cemetery walls to
Ty. more than 250 of her friends were not so lucky, being
brutally killed in the massacre.
In the aftermath of the massacre bella joined the indonesian
military youth corps to mask her involvement in the
demonstration. for three years the indonesian authorities
trained her to fight ag
Her own people. during this time, bella secretly used her army
salary to help the resistance movement.
In 1994, after months of interrogation and instruction, the
indonesian government selected bella to represent east timorese
youth in the canada world youth program. she was well trained to
speak
He canadian media and to portray suharto's propaganda machine's
version of a 'typical' young timorese _ educated, successful,
and pro-integration.
Bella defected after her arrival in canada with the help of her
uncle, constâncio pinto, who had escaped east timor shortly
after the dili massacre. since then, bella has been perfecti
R english and touring canada to speak for her country's freedom.
to learn more or to join her struggle, visit www.etan.ca
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