i am you know..
it just won't stop...yesterday afternoon, heald place...vodka and orange on the doorstep, inhabitants of my house up to high jinx and laughing in the sun....not working sucks...but it has its merits...!
its kind of a needless post, i know...its just been so long since i blogged three days in a row....!
sorry............
miércoles, abril 26, 2006
martes, abril 25, 2006
dream jobs: the timeline...
ok here follows some home truths about me that even john peel himself may have blushed over...you've guessed it, the definitive list of life-time ambitions, fleeting or fanciful, ridiculous or retarded.....none of them has, as yet, come to pass....but have i really tried? that is, for now, neither here nor there.....
what i am curious about, after a slight epiphany in the job centre this morning, is whether there are any themes emergent from this list, and whether from them i can glean any tiny insights as to what i perhaps ought to be pursuing. ok, here we go..
1985: librarian (seriously..)
1991: un peacekeeping person (this came to an end during latter high school, upon my realising i would have to basically be in the army)
1993: childrens' book writer
: news reader/reporter
1994: lawyer for people on death row (you may want to note the prevalence of john grisham in my reading habits of the day)
1995: teacher of english in spain
(from this point, my obsession with spanish and all things spain takes over to such a degree that all the following, until otherwise stated, are jobs that would, in the mind's eye, be located there..)
1997: music journalist
1998: eu translator
1999: youth worker
: coffee- and book-shop owner
: aid worker
2000: some kind of praying person
2001: coffee- and book-shop owner
: backing singer (for whom? who could say...)
: writer for human rights watch
2002: make-up artist, hairdresser, nail technician
2003: journalist/war-reporter/author/writer of any kind (god used his powers of veto on this one 'unitl i could be trusted with it'.....i think i may still just be holding out for this one to be honest....)
: careers advisor
2004: tefl teacher in spain
(from this point, location is no longer the be all and end all...)
2005: counsellor (post conflict preferably, or with people with eating disorders...or with people who work in financial institutions ie city of london)
: secondary english teacher
2006: human rights lawyer
: community advocate
: (today) travel writer, story-teller....
what i am curious about, after a slight epiphany in the job centre this morning, is whether there are any themes emergent from this list, and whether from them i can glean any tiny insights as to what i perhaps ought to be pursuing. ok, here we go..
1985: librarian (seriously..)
1991: un peacekeeping person (this came to an end during latter high school, upon my realising i would have to basically be in the army)
1993: childrens' book writer
: news reader/reporter
1994: lawyer for people on death row (you may want to note the prevalence of john grisham in my reading habits of the day)
1995: teacher of english in spain
(from this point, my obsession with spanish and all things spain takes over to such a degree that all the following, until otherwise stated, are jobs that would, in the mind's eye, be located there..)
1997: music journalist
1998: eu translator
1999: youth worker
: coffee- and book-shop owner
: aid worker
2000: some kind of praying person
2001: coffee- and book-shop owner
: backing singer (for whom? who could say...)
: writer for human rights watch
2002: make-up artist, hairdresser, nail technician
2003: journalist/war-reporter/author/writer of any kind (god used his powers of veto on this one 'unitl i could be trusted with it'.....i think i may still just be holding out for this one to be honest....)
: careers advisor
2004: tefl teacher in spain
(from this point, location is no longer the be all and end all...)
2005: counsellor (post conflict preferably, or with people with eating disorders...or with people who work in financial institutions ie city of london)
: secondary english teacher
2006: human rights lawyer
: community advocate
: (today) travel writer, story-teller....
lunes, abril 24, 2006
you'd better put the kettle on...
if you have the time, i've got the story to tell...
go and get your coffee...
ireland is almost invariably good to me, but the north.....i've only been here once before, but i'm fairly sure i could stay...i won't, (yet) but i could....here in the quiet of county tyrone, its kind of like yorkshire moors meets riverful tipperary, and it seems like it's glad i'm here.
we three (barlow, drage and na) arrived on a cold saturday morning, my prayers for sunshine still ringing round my ears...we were met by a giddy emma, who had that look about her of one who has spent a week or two at home: good food, comfy bed, many walks, some hard work pruning. the four of us tramped around belfast for a couple of hours in the tank (not literally a tank, clearly...that would be contraversial....), getting a right luxury tour of the old town. emma has clearly being doing her research lately, and looked surprisingly at home even in her four-by-four....for me, it was all new....the falls, the shankhill, the muralled gables and the painted kerbstones had been mainly myth and legend in my head. my one trip to the north in 1995 had involved a route that bypassed the city (it had however passed almost alongside the cowan family farm as it would happen), and the tyrone towns on that road had shown me the fierceness of flags...but the city itself is something rather diffferent. not myth, the signs of nations and banners and histories, the faces of victims and prisoners and martyrs painted on walls, the slogans and promises of small armies of boys and young men....these are real and rather rife in the cities suburbs. you feel like they're glaring at you saying - do you really expect i'll ever be pulled down? - you can't argue easily with a flag. by the end of our tour i felt like my lungs were being wringed out by some very strong hands. i hadn't cried but i had instead felt just that - like my insides were churning or being kneaded. i didn't want to leave though - it had a strange pull on me that i knew meant until i had got out of the tank and walked around i wouldn't feel everything that there is for me to feel for the place. the walk is for another time.
so we took coffee and raisin bread at common grounds, possibly the most delightful coffee house i have seen for a while - take note rikes, you should come check it out...
then we proceeded to the farm. i'm not sure i know how to describe how homely someone else's house is, but when shown to my room, i felt i could stay a week and not miss anything or want to be anywhere else. emma had left a careful selection of books on my bedside table, and the accuracy of her understanding of my literary requirements was uncanny. seamus heaney awaited me there - the death of a naturalist - which i haven't read since i was about seventeen. he will resurface later in my story. alongside it was silver linings, by martin fletcher, which any of you wishing to know more about this place and why it has been so contested over should probably froogle for. (isbn 0-349-11251-7)
we ate lunch and enjoyed jimmy and rosemary's observation of us, his historical insights and her loving the chat from around the table. we sat around that table for what felt like the whole afternoon, so when we four came to depart for the boat, i felt sure it was nearly evening. emma then told us she had sneakily prayed that the minutes we were all together here would feel like hours...and lo, it was only about half-three....
the drive west across almost as far as enniskillin was for me a bit of a musical journey, through towns and across rivers, whose lovers and legends i had only heard sung about. (mostly by my dad, who i quietly wished was there for that particular leg of the trip). i read with wonder the book of irish history emma had provided for just such a road, and finger-traced our progress across the width of ulster on its map, wondering if one half from the south and half from over the water could ever really know what it means to love this place.
our expectations of 'the barge' came crashing down when we discovered that the cowan family boat was in fact a 'luxury yacht' (so named by the girls who have little concept of boats and less concept of luxury..!) it is moored on the banks of a river heading north from the upper lough erne, in county fermanagh, alongside about a dozen others, most of which are seemingly owned by friends of emma's parents or relations of the butcher from up the road, or so-and-so from james's classes' parents.
we set up house, and then get drunk. we laughed heartily, told some sad stories, some family stories, school stories...and a few about how good god is..tried to make emma say rude words (which, it appears, is probably more tricky than trying to get me to talk about poo....) we ate salmon when already drunk, we drank more wine than i knew we had brought, we smoked cigarettes enroached with rizla-packet-tear-offs, to the point that all that remained was a pile of papers with nowhere to go....we each left drunken messages for poor mr vino, whose impending marriage formed a large part of the evening's conversation...emma and i sang, badly, and not for long.....mostly we laughed. the boat was an instant home to us and we loved it.
when we woke, the hangovers didn't last long....the fruit salad and coffee saw them off for us....but then what do you suppose happened.....?
the sun, the sun came out, and there it stayed. the suntan i jokingly prayed for on the plane....? its here, its on me. i got it.....we sat out on deck, painted our toe-nails and drank more coffee, read our books, wrote our books, and in general were at ease. rosemary and jimmy arrived later, and off we went on a trip down the river to the lough and back again. we moved along the river having types of birds pointed out to us and then argued over like only parents can do.....we drank coke and ate crisps and kind of felt like kids i think. the cowan parents are, it seems, such innately parenty parents that if you are roughly their child's age, they'll adopt you for as long as they can see you. we moored again the other side of several miles of lake and a few islands.....we ate, slept, walked, and the time it just went on and on....it was half four when i thought it surely nearing eight.....madness.....on the way back, we all found our place on the boat. drago of the indoors was reading on the couch......snuggled and warm with a hundred layers over her. she had lamb and the chilli peppers on the laptop and was content, i think....claire and emma huddled like a pair of old washer-women, car blankets round them and sitting at the very front of the boat, headed towards the sun going down and being as close as friends are when they know that one is about to get married and they don't want to miss out on anything that might happen before then.....jimmy and rosemary steered the boat and loved eachother like kids i think..she smoking away, him with his tea and his life-jacket.....me i found a small seat in the corner right at the back......i got my hat and jacket so the wind didn't bother me.....the sunset on the river and through the trees on the islands around us was not even photographable...well, i just mean it was too good for photos....with a cigarette and a cup of tea in one hand, and the - death of a naturalist - in the other, i was as happy as i can remember being.....he is from this way, you see, seamus heaney, and it shows....when i studied this book for gcse english, i realised i could understand poetry by myself. i also realised i was glad to be irish, and didn't need to be proud just to be glad. i became friends with paul f over that book, and also learned to write poetry a bit because of it, i think. punctuation is very important to him. as are all aspects of nature, and ways in which man uses and enjoys nature are kind of themes. it turned out that that dog-earred copy in my lap had been used not only by emma and later her brother james while at school, but also by rosemary, in 1974...reading it was good right then because i saw that i was different from when i last read it...but also the same, i think.
i found one poem in it that i do not ever remember reading before.
rashly or not, i there and then named it my favourite of the book.
and here it is....
scaffolding
masons, when they start upon a building,
are careful to test out the scaffolding;
make sure that planks won't slip at busy points,
secure all ladders, tighten bolted joints.
and yet all this comes down when job's done
showing off walls of sure and solid stone.
so if, my dear, there sometimes seem to be
old bridges breaking between you and me
never fear. we may let the scaffolds fall
confident that we have built our wall.
i'd like to know how it feels to build love.
i haven't enjoyed writing for a long time as much as i have this morning.
i still have a few hours left, so i'm off to make soup for the girls for when they return from their walking tour of the county.
if you have got this far, thanks.
back home tonight. love you x
go and get your coffee...
ireland is almost invariably good to me, but the north.....i've only been here once before, but i'm fairly sure i could stay...i won't, (yet) but i could....here in the quiet of county tyrone, its kind of like yorkshire moors meets riverful tipperary, and it seems like it's glad i'm here.
we three (barlow, drage and na) arrived on a cold saturday morning, my prayers for sunshine still ringing round my ears...we were met by a giddy emma, who had that look about her of one who has spent a week or two at home: good food, comfy bed, many walks, some hard work pruning. the four of us tramped around belfast for a couple of hours in the tank (not literally a tank, clearly...that would be contraversial....), getting a right luxury tour of the old town. emma has clearly being doing her research lately, and looked surprisingly at home even in her four-by-four....for me, it was all new....the falls, the shankhill, the muralled gables and the painted kerbstones had been mainly myth and legend in my head. my one trip to the north in 1995 had involved a route that bypassed the city (it had however passed almost alongside the cowan family farm as it would happen), and the tyrone towns on that road had shown me the fierceness of flags...but the city itself is something rather diffferent. not myth, the signs of nations and banners and histories, the faces of victims and prisoners and martyrs painted on walls, the slogans and promises of small armies of boys and young men....these are real and rather rife in the cities suburbs. you feel like they're glaring at you saying - do you really expect i'll ever be pulled down? - you can't argue easily with a flag. by the end of our tour i felt like my lungs were being wringed out by some very strong hands. i hadn't cried but i had instead felt just that - like my insides were churning or being kneaded. i didn't want to leave though - it had a strange pull on me that i knew meant until i had got out of the tank and walked around i wouldn't feel everything that there is for me to feel for the place. the walk is for another time.
so we took coffee and raisin bread at common grounds, possibly the most delightful coffee house i have seen for a while - take note rikes, you should come check it out...
then we proceeded to the farm. i'm not sure i know how to describe how homely someone else's house is, but when shown to my room, i felt i could stay a week and not miss anything or want to be anywhere else. emma had left a careful selection of books on my bedside table, and the accuracy of her understanding of my literary requirements was uncanny. seamus heaney awaited me there - the death of a naturalist - which i haven't read since i was about seventeen. he will resurface later in my story. alongside it was silver linings, by martin fletcher, which any of you wishing to know more about this place and why it has been so contested over should probably froogle for. (isbn 0-349-11251-7)
we ate lunch and enjoyed jimmy and rosemary's observation of us, his historical insights and her loving the chat from around the table. we sat around that table for what felt like the whole afternoon, so when we four came to depart for the boat, i felt sure it was nearly evening. emma then told us she had sneakily prayed that the minutes we were all together here would feel like hours...and lo, it was only about half-three....
the drive west across almost as far as enniskillin was for me a bit of a musical journey, through towns and across rivers, whose lovers and legends i had only heard sung about. (mostly by my dad, who i quietly wished was there for that particular leg of the trip). i read with wonder the book of irish history emma had provided for just such a road, and finger-traced our progress across the width of ulster on its map, wondering if one half from the south and half from over the water could ever really know what it means to love this place.
our expectations of 'the barge' came crashing down when we discovered that the cowan family boat was in fact a 'luxury yacht' (so named by the girls who have little concept of boats and less concept of luxury..!) it is moored on the banks of a river heading north from the upper lough erne, in county fermanagh, alongside about a dozen others, most of which are seemingly owned by friends of emma's parents or relations of the butcher from up the road, or so-and-so from james's classes' parents.
we set up house, and then get drunk. we laughed heartily, told some sad stories, some family stories, school stories...and a few about how good god is..tried to make emma say rude words (which, it appears, is probably more tricky than trying to get me to talk about poo....) we ate salmon when already drunk, we drank more wine than i knew we had brought, we smoked cigarettes enroached with rizla-packet-tear-offs, to the point that all that remained was a pile of papers with nowhere to go....we each left drunken messages for poor mr vino, whose impending marriage formed a large part of the evening's conversation...emma and i sang, badly, and not for long.....mostly we laughed. the boat was an instant home to us and we loved it.
when we woke, the hangovers didn't last long....the fruit salad and coffee saw them off for us....but then what do you suppose happened.....?
the sun, the sun came out, and there it stayed. the suntan i jokingly prayed for on the plane....? its here, its on me. i got it.....we sat out on deck, painted our toe-nails and drank more coffee, read our books, wrote our books, and in general were at ease. rosemary and jimmy arrived later, and off we went on a trip down the river to the lough and back again. we moved along the river having types of birds pointed out to us and then argued over like only parents can do.....we drank coke and ate crisps and kind of felt like kids i think. the cowan parents are, it seems, such innately parenty parents that if you are roughly their child's age, they'll adopt you for as long as they can see you. we moored again the other side of several miles of lake and a few islands.....we ate, slept, walked, and the time it just went on and on....it was half four when i thought it surely nearing eight.....madness.....on the way back, we all found our place on the boat. drago of the indoors was reading on the couch......snuggled and warm with a hundred layers over her. she had lamb and the chilli peppers on the laptop and was content, i think....claire and emma huddled like a pair of old washer-women, car blankets round them and sitting at the very front of the boat, headed towards the sun going down and being as close as friends are when they know that one is about to get married and they don't want to miss out on anything that might happen before then.....jimmy and rosemary steered the boat and loved eachother like kids i think..she smoking away, him with his tea and his life-jacket.....me i found a small seat in the corner right at the back......i got my hat and jacket so the wind didn't bother me.....the sunset on the river and through the trees on the islands around us was not even photographable...well, i just mean it was too good for photos....with a cigarette and a cup of tea in one hand, and the - death of a naturalist - in the other, i was as happy as i can remember being.....he is from this way, you see, seamus heaney, and it shows....when i studied this book for gcse english, i realised i could understand poetry by myself. i also realised i was glad to be irish, and didn't need to be proud just to be glad. i became friends with paul f over that book, and also learned to write poetry a bit because of it, i think. punctuation is very important to him. as are all aspects of nature, and ways in which man uses and enjoys nature are kind of themes. it turned out that that dog-earred copy in my lap had been used not only by emma and later her brother james while at school, but also by rosemary, in 1974...reading it was good right then because i saw that i was different from when i last read it...but also the same, i think.
i found one poem in it that i do not ever remember reading before.
rashly or not, i there and then named it my favourite of the book.
and here it is....
scaffolding
masons, when they start upon a building,
are careful to test out the scaffolding;
make sure that planks won't slip at busy points,
secure all ladders, tighten bolted joints.
and yet all this comes down when job's done
showing off walls of sure and solid stone.
so if, my dear, there sometimes seem to be
old bridges breaking between you and me
never fear. we may let the scaffolds fall
confident that we have built our wall.
i'd like to know how it feels to build love.
i haven't enjoyed writing for a long time as much as i have this morning.
i still have a few hours left, so i'm off to make soup for the girls for when they return from their walking tour of the county.
if you have got this far, thanks.
back home tonight. love you x
jueves, abril 13, 2006
wednesday o' wonder
has replaced the super sal saturday..
yesterday she and i went into town and mooched around. it was surprisingly windy, so we wound up in cafe rouge eating delicious french onion soup.
i didn't make her cry either. we actually just laughed, alot alot, all day. and had ice creams with flakes. and i got new shoes with higher heels than any of you have, i'm sure, ever anticipated seeing me hobble around in. i feel like a real live girl when i wear them...i can't move, but i look hot...
we then watched narnia in the lounge camp with the projector...it is projected onto the white curtain these days, what with the invasion of the wallpaper and all...and i was quite distracted during most of the film, by wondering what it might look like from the outside of the house....does it go through? can you watch narnia, soundlessly and backwards from outside? who knows...i was also rather distracted by the wonderous homemade beefburger that i weas given for supper....
all in all, a lovely day..thanks sal
i got home quite late, and while i was pottering around putting out the trash wearing my new shoes for practice, my phone rang, and as i looked at the screen, i gasped to see the words...calling...caitlin...
and a joyous two hours ensued, of joy and laughing, story-telling and question-asking, grinning and sighing with the sheer relief of being known.....these are happy days indeed...
i still have no job, but its somehow ok...
my kitchen is white. whiter than white. ben helped., i wouldn't have finished it without his help i don't think....thanks ben...
resa and krister are in town for a few days, which is fun...if any of you are in the manchester area, do come to heald tomorrow evening, for hanging out with them and eating cake and hopefully drinking wine and laughing.....anytime in the evening, just bob over...
ok enough news and thank-yous...expect maybe one more, to fran..for the cookies just now...hot, just out of the oven.....as i said..happy days...
yesterday she and i went into town and mooched around. it was surprisingly windy, so we wound up in cafe rouge eating delicious french onion soup.
i didn't make her cry either. we actually just laughed, alot alot, all day. and had ice creams with flakes. and i got new shoes with higher heels than any of you have, i'm sure, ever anticipated seeing me hobble around in. i feel like a real live girl when i wear them...i can't move, but i look hot...
we then watched narnia in the lounge camp with the projector...it is projected onto the white curtain these days, what with the invasion of the wallpaper and all...and i was quite distracted during most of the film, by wondering what it might look like from the outside of the house....does it go through? can you watch narnia, soundlessly and backwards from outside? who knows...i was also rather distracted by the wonderous homemade beefburger that i weas given for supper....
all in all, a lovely day..thanks sal
i got home quite late, and while i was pottering around putting out the trash wearing my new shoes for practice, my phone rang, and as i looked at the screen, i gasped to see the words...calling...caitlin...
and a joyous two hours ensued, of joy and laughing, story-telling and question-asking, grinning and sighing with the sheer relief of being known.....these are happy days indeed...
i still have no job, but its somehow ok...
my kitchen is white. whiter than white. ben helped., i wouldn't have finished it without his help i don't think....thanks ben...
resa and krister are in town for a few days, which is fun...if any of you are in the manchester area, do come to heald tomorrow evening, for hanging out with them and eating cake and hopefully drinking wine and laughing.....anytime in the evening, just bob over...
ok enough news and thank-yous...expect maybe one more, to fran..for the cookies just now...hot, just out of the oven.....as i said..happy days...
martes, abril 04, 2006
in honour of our patron..
today is the birthday of the lovely dr angelou
she is now 78 years old
when i was eleven or twelve, and was a total geek, the school librarian, upon seeing my distress at having no further books left unread in the library, handed me a book named 'i know why the caged bird sings', by said lady
it was the first book i had ever read that made me feel sick, made me laugh, made me cry, made me lose sleep, made me not rest until i had it read, made me want to thank the person who had written it.
if you, dear readers, have come this far in your lives having read none of her books, please come round to my house and borrow one...i have all of them,. they are many. if you live in a foreign country, i will send you one of your very own, should you wish.
i am sorry again for such a lapse in posting..i wish i had been busy doing exciting things and had some thrilling tales to tell you all, alas..they would have to be made-up stories! i am well, unemployed, which is mildly scary, but have been having a lovely few days of no work, learning how to dream and hatch plans again, after the dream amnesty of 2005.
i am not going to be studying the law, god has moved me on from that particular idea..praise him
am learning lots and thinking lots about community advocacy, about the city, about neighbourhoods and the issues facing cities, especially this fine one of ours...
had been thinking through all those things for only about a week, maybe ten days, when i happened upon a course at manchester metropolitan university. it is named MA in European Urban Cultures. it is amazing and i kind of do this strange gasping thing when i read the pages about it. which i do often. its one of those things that you look at and then think, god, god, god, let me pleeeeeeeeeeaaaaaassssseeee!!!
it is a rather sharp detour/diverion/something else, from what i have thought of doing before, until you really think about it....
imagine being an advocate for a city, and for cities in general. imagine being someone who in ten years' time can really have knowledge and heart wide and deep enough to be able to speak to those running the great cities of europe, maybe even talk to them about what it means to love the place. to really love it, to give to it, invest in it, and dream for it and with it...
i don't know guys, it doesn't make much sense to me either, and i'm nervous about even writing this much. it sounds dumb. but i'm enjoying the idea, and i'm reading lots...went to urbis today to look and think...felt like a field trip.....am sketching things in my head, rough outlines of what job it could be in the end.....and at the same time, thinking about what job am i going to do next week.......
it will probably all pass, in favour of yet another new idea, almost certainly....i don't want it to this time though.....it such a pretty idea in my head....and i'd get to live in helsinki for three months.....god god god plleeeeeeeeaaaaaseeeeeeeee
she is now 78 years old
when i was eleven or twelve, and was a total geek, the school librarian, upon seeing my distress at having no further books left unread in the library, handed me a book named 'i know why the caged bird sings', by said lady
it was the first book i had ever read that made me feel sick, made me laugh, made me cry, made me lose sleep, made me not rest until i had it read, made me want to thank the person who had written it.
if you, dear readers, have come this far in your lives having read none of her books, please come round to my house and borrow one...i have all of them,. they are many. if you live in a foreign country, i will send you one of your very own, should you wish.
i am sorry again for such a lapse in posting..i wish i had been busy doing exciting things and had some thrilling tales to tell you all, alas..they would have to be made-up stories! i am well, unemployed, which is mildly scary, but have been having a lovely few days of no work, learning how to dream and hatch plans again, after the dream amnesty of 2005.
i am not going to be studying the law, god has moved me on from that particular idea..praise him
am learning lots and thinking lots about community advocacy, about the city, about neighbourhoods and the issues facing cities, especially this fine one of ours...
had been thinking through all those things for only about a week, maybe ten days, when i happened upon a course at manchester metropolitan university. it is named MA in European Urban Cultures. it is amazing and i kind of do this strange gasping thing when i read the pages about it. which i do often. its one of those things that you look at and then think, god, god, god, let me pleeeeeeeeeeaaaaaassssseeee!!!
it is a rather sharp detour/diverion/something else, from what i have thought of doing before, until you really think about it....
imagine being an advocate for a city, and for cities in general. imagine being someone who in ten years' time can really have knowledge and heart wide and deep enough to be able to speak to those running the great cities of europe, maybe even talk to them about what it means to love the place. to really love it, to give to it, invest in it, and dream for it and with it...
i don't know guys, it doesn't make much sense to me either, and i'm nervous about even writing this much. it sounds dumb. but i'm enjoying the idea, and i'm reading lots...went to urbis today to look and think...felt like a field trip.....am sketching things in my head, rough outlines of what job it could be in the end.....and at the same time, thinking about what job am i going to do next week.......
it will probably all pass, in favour of yet another new idea, almost certainly....i don't want it to this time though.....it such a pretty idea in my head....and i'd get to live in helsinki for three months.....god god god plleeeeeeeeaaaaaseeeeeeeee
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