I went to school with a guy called Tom Payne. We were in the same class for at least a few years, I don't really remember. Anyway, today I read this about him, and a few other familiar faces:

Kevin Dunn has been tapped to co-star on HBO's drama pilot "Luck," with "Rome" alumna Kerry Condon and Tom Payne also set and Nick Nolte in talks for the horse drama starring Dustin Hoffman.

"Luck," from Michael Mann and David Milch, takes a look at the worlds of horse racing and gambling through a diverse group of characters surrounding a racetrack. It centers on an intelligent, intuitive tough man (Hoffman) who always has been involved with gambling.

I'm sure my big rise to stardom is just around the corner, but still, this is amazing. Hats off to the guy.

Indonesian news outlets are running stories speculating that Dulmatin, a member of regional terrorist group Jemaah Islamiyah, has been killed in Pamulang, South Tangerang, West Java, Indonesia. Dulmatin was one of the mastermind's behind the Bali bombing in 2002. He has been an international fugitive ever since and there is a $10 million bounty on his head. He was believed to have been hiding out in The Philippines.

There was apparently a half-hour shootout in a raid by Densus 88, Indonesia's counter-terrorism squad, and two men were arrested, one was killed. The body was taken away in an ambulance, so it hasn't been confirmed who it was. But there is a lot of talk about it being Dulmatin.

If you can read Indonesian or use Google Translate, there are stories being aggregated by Google News. Check updates from AFP, Reuters, AP et al as more is revealed.

Latest: Jakarta Post is reporting, possibly prematurely, that he has been killed. The raid was apparently at an Internet kiosk. Indo-language media still isn't saying it's confirmed.

From Jakarta Post:

The raid comes less than two weeks ahead of the arrival of US President Barrack Obama on March 22. The United States said it would release US$10 million as part of the bounty allocated for Dulmatin.

This from the BBC:

Anti-terror police chief Tito Karnavian told media the dead man was a "big name". Police are due to hold a news conference later on Tuesday.

After six weeks of learning Bahasa Indonesia at UKSW in Salatiga, I can honestly say that I am exhausted. At first I was incredibly keen, but with only a couple of days left, my brain can barely cope with a few new words a day. I might have been better off only coming for four weeks. Most people left after four weeks and it’s really all been downhill from then on.

Though I have enjoyed studying here, I am very much looking forward to spending a week winding down in Bali. I really need some time just to gather my thoughts and prepare for going back to Timor-Leste.

I’ve been away from Dili for a few months, so this will in effect be my second stint there. Given the nature of aid work, I imagine that there will be many new faces around town.

I don’t imagine much has changed in Dili. I don’t have anywhere to live yet, so that’s one thing. I also don’t know where the key to my old motorbike is. Given how temperamental The Scorpion has been, I’m uncertain if I’ll ever be able to start it again. Rather a lot of my clothes are also bundled up somewhere in Dili.

Come to think of it, when I arrive next Saturday, I’m going to be generally a bit confused about what to do. At some point I’m going to have to find my Timorese simcard and hope that Timor Telecom hasn’t cut me off.

I don’t know how long this stretch in Dili will last, but it has to last a little while so that I can really get some work done. With little clue about how long I’m going to be in Dili or what I’m going to do afterwards, it’s an uncertain time for me. My gut feeling, though, is that I’ll only stay in Dili a month or two, then go back to West Timor for a bit, and then make my big move to Jakarta.

When I first started learning Bahasa Indonesia, someone told me that it would be best to learn the basics before diving into any kind of intensive course. That was good advice because it is easy enough to get a hold of basic Bahasa Indonesia by yourself. This way, you save a lot of time and money because you don’t have to plough through beginner classes.

I used two main resources to learn things like numbers, pronunciation, simple phrases and so on. First of all, I downloaded all the lessons from LearnToSpeakIndonesian.com. There isn’t much material, but these lessons were a good introduction to Bahasa Indonesia.

Even better than those lessons were all the free lessons I downloaded from LearningIndonesia.com. There are about 50 or so free lessons you can download from that website. Each lesson is about five to 10 minutes long and the “hosts” are an American man and an Indonesian woman. They’re both easy to understand and I picked up a lot from these lessons.

Once you have finished all the free lessons, there are more lessons that you can download for $11.75. I downloaded a couple of these and they were useful for the extra vocab and the listening exercises they contained.

I’m now about four months into learning Bahasa Indonesia and I’m more than halfway through my intensive course at UKSW. Everything has gone fine so far. I graduated from the four-week Upper Intermediate level with a high distinction and scored 91% overall, which I was really pleased with.

I now have a couple more weeks of classroom time. We started UKSW's Level 4 today. I feel like a bit of a jerk because after the class, I asked if I could go in a class by myself because I only have two weeks, whereas the others have three. I just wanted to go through things a bit quicker really.

Anyway, I recently bought a couple of Indonesian novels from the Gramedia book store in Semarang. It makes for a refreshing change to have something to read that isn’t some kind of text book or a newspaper.

I find myself reading the Nyata tabloid quite a lot because the language used in it is far simpler when compared with regular newspapers. But there’s only so much fun I can have reading about Indonesian celebrities.

The first book I bought is called Orang Miskin Dilarang Sekolah, or A Poor Person Forbidden from Going to School. It’s by Wiwid Prasyeto. A lot of the books in Gramedia were either translations or else they looked like the book equivalent of chick flicks. This one seemed to have a more serious edge to it.

The second book I bought is Sebuah Memoar Cinta, or A Love Memoir. I’m about halfway through it and have found the language manageable enough. What I find most interesting is the way the author describes things like the sky or the weather, often as a metaphor for her own emotions.

I don’t know if either of the books I bought are considered good reads, so to speak, but they suit my needs perfectly.

I was sat on the beach in Kuta and one of those chaps selling blowpipes and bows-and-arrows stopped by.

Him: Hey. You want look?

Me: I have no use for a bow-and-arrow.

Him: Use for decoration. See. Looks good.

Me: I don't even have a home to put it in. What would I possibly do with it?

Him: It's good for killing cat, see? You can use to shoot cat.

Me: But I like cats.

Him: OK. See you.