Bali!

30NOV08 - Secret Garden Hotel - Bali, Indonesia

Heather and I both agreed that we haven't been doing enough dorky newlywed stuff on this trip so we decided to take some surf lessons together. Aside from our weekend trips to the Oregon Coast for frigid boogie boarding, neither of us had ever really any surf experience. I mean, I tried it once in Mexico and got my can kicked in. It was a humbling experience and I have since been a little intimidated by surfing.

Plus, the surfer culture hero-type seem to be mommy boys who can surf good but probably aren't actually otherwise useful to the world. But that too is probably prejudice I have for guys who can do something very well that I want to do very well but cannot; surfing is incredibly hard!!!

Two huge massive dorks!

Legs for days! Heather is better at this sport than me...

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

23 NOV 08 - Chinatown, Kuala Lumpur


Before you travel to developing countries, do yourself a favor and pack as many bottles of Pepto Bismal as reasonably possible. Because at one point or another, you will find yourself pushing, frantically, your way across a city looking for a public toilet. You will be like the drunk guy at the holiday party looking for a place to puke because he can't drink like he used to in college. Except it's not puking you need to do; compared to what's about to happen, puking in public almost seems polite. And be prepared to conduct business, when you finally do find a toilet, to do it at a place like this:





And the thing about this kind of stress is, you aren't so bothered by the fact that the entire bathroom is sopping wet. You don't care that the bidet is covered in wet toilet paper. You don't care that you are only wearing flip flops while you are standing in this 1/4" deep standing wetness. You're only thoughts are focused on managing the mechanics of this operation...

Needless to say, Heather and I have been taking turns with stomach bugs for the last two weeks. I am not sure if it's been the same demonous bastard stomach bug, but it hasn't been pleasant. But on the bright side, I think we're onto a new diet fad. The foundation of this diet is to fear everything you eat; so you don't eat too much when you do actually work up an appetite!!!

Kualau Lumpur

In all seriousness, have you even heard of Kuala Lumpur? Without looking at a map, can you even give a vague description of where this city is? Because I certainly could not have before 48 hours ago, but this city is awesome! It is South East Asia's version of Chicago and that's no whistling dixie. It is home to the world's second tallest skyscrapers and the world's 4th tallest communication tower, it's public transit system is incredible and it is easily the most obviously diverse city I have been to.

Descent into Malaysia: I'm pretty sure this photo is strictly forbidden but you can see the never ending expanse of palm trees. Unfortunately these palms are not natural. I read that upwards of 65% of Malaysia's forests have been deforested to plant palms.

KL (Kuala Lumpur) has both a sky bridge train and a subway system. It reminds me of the 'L' in Chicago or the tram in Seattle.


Heather and I were very relieved to find a very nice and affordable room to stay in while we are here. The fact that the room is clean, secure and air conditioned forgives the fact that the walls are acoustically terrible. You literally can hear everything going on in the surrounding rooms; and I mean EVERYTHING... I've never thought of privacy from an auditory perspective.

MENARA COMMUNICATIONS TOWER:

As you can see, KL is huge and looks like it could be any city in the world. And this is only one view from one side of the observation deck. There are 15 other views to see from the 360 degree platform. From here, I spotted the building we are staying in. It's in the lower left hand corner, about 1" up from the empty lot.

A zoomed in view of the building. It's the short building in the center of the picture.

Great view of the Petronas Twin Towers from the viewing deck of the 421 meter tall, Menara Communications Tower (4th tallest comm. tower in the world). The Petronas Towers are the headquarters for the nation's petroleum company. This building is iconic in the Architecture world. I've seen it countless times in books and in lectures but never really paid attention to where it was. I always figured either China or Singapore.

SAME SAME BUT DIFFERENT

Traveling is cool for many reasons. It can bring you to tropical venues. It can introduce to you people with completely different views and opinions. But the best thing traveling does is it rewards you with valuable perspective.

Thailand was totally unlike home; I hoped and expected this. Everything from infrastructure to food, things were just strange in very good ways. And so there really isn't anyway to compare Thailand to home. But Malaysia is different, or at least Kuala Lumpur is. This city is so developed and clearly influenced by capitalism that seeing similarities is oddly comforting. Even though seeing McDonald's and Starbucks staring at each other from opposing corners makes me sick, I can appreciate the good things the free market brings; like developed human waste management.

And because this city is so superficially similar to any US city, I forget that I am on the other side of the globe... that is, until an alarming cultural difference slaps me in the face. For example:

Korner Restoran in Little India - I was stoked to find out KL has a Little India district. I was sure we could get some amazing authentic Indian food for cheap. So on our way back from the KL Tower, we swung into little India for lunch. We did find a corner restaurant that had a buffet style menu. The food was very tasty but, overall, the experience was one of the more horrifying ones yet.

You see, I had always known that some middle eastern cultures, to include India, don't use utensils to eat. I had also always known that this clearly was apart of cultural tradition. And although I had never witnessed food consumed with fingers, I was ABSOLUTELY POSITIVE there had to be a tactful way to eat with your hands. But let me tell you, there is not.

We sat down and I ordered, as non-chaluantly as I could (thinking I was mister big shot), a Tikka Masala. I knew this dish purely from my experiences at North American Indian Restaurants. The guy shook his head and went to get our dishes. My comfort zone was being challenged a little bit because not only were we the only white faces out the 30 people there, but all 60 male eyes where scoping Heather. While I was realizing this I also noticed something else: everybody was using their hands to eat. And and that moment, it was like series of quick scenes from a movie.

...Flash to a handful of curry covered rice being shoved into a mouth...

...Flash to rice pieces lodged between the finger webbing's of another hand...

It was not the kind of tactful finger eating I had always figured it had to be, but before I realised what was going on, our food arrived and there was no turning back.

I was thinking, "Get it together Madden, when in Little India...be cool"

When we received our food, I asked for two pieces of Naan bread (like a fluffy, delicious tortilla) thinking I could use the bread as a spoon. But to my dismay, it is customary to only eat bread in the evenings because it is light and will not make you bloated. So rice it was with my chicken and... fingers.

...Flash forward to bathroom scene...

KLCC MOVIE THEATRE: JAMES BOND - QUANTUM OF SOLACE
Last night, Heather and I enjoyed a slice of American Pie. We discovered that the huge (8 stories) shopping mall beneath the Patronas Towers had a movie theatre and we went to the late showing of the James Bond flick. The experience was mostly the same as back home except the seating is assigned and during the movie a small child was crying and numerous men yelled out for it to "shhhh!!!"

PERSONAL SPACE AND PRIVACY - are totally differant here. Cutting in lines is common social practice and appearantly it's totally cool to sit down next to somebody using the computer and share what they are viewing. I'm not making it up, it's every person for themselves when trying to order something. And if you are not right up on someone's ars, another person will step right in front of you. This is even if there is clearly a line formed in which you are standing in. I've had to question myself numerous times if I was actually just standing in a que for people who like standing in lines.

On our way to visit the top of the Menara Communications Tower we took an urban hike through the city wildlife preserve-- it was at least 95F but the trees and greens gave great shade! Only after we had hiked through did we see the sign identifying the dangerous species to look out for. We didn't see any though Mike was hoping to.

Typical day at the market in the heart of Chinatown, KL.

At night, more vendors set up and you can find anything from designer sunglasses/handbags/suits to claimed spa treatments to fresh pomegranates and roasted chestnuts...and they will try (very intensely) to sell you all these things.

Mikes new favorite desert discovered at the mall... I asked for 1 scoop of Neapolitan
ice cream and received this!! It was tasty! (You will be suprised to know that this is a very scrumpcious snack.)



Just a few re-cap pics from Heathers camera on the islands of

Koh Tao and Koh Samui

Fresh seafood is shown off out front of all the beachside resuraunts to entice customers in. I didn't try the Shark, but the bbq crab and fish were great!!


We rented scooters for the day and rode just out of town to a monkey preserve.
I only saw this little orangutan, but you could hear them everywhere- it was awesome!

Took a day hike to the waterfalls.

Until next time

M&H

20 NOV 08 - Ao Nong Beach, Krabi, Thailand (Nong Eeb Guesthouse)

After our horrifying experience getting to Phuket, we stayed in Phuket Town for 2 days. If you ever come to Thailand, you should know that there are three ways to move across the country:

1. to fly

2.to physically go to the bus and/or train stations and purchase tickets personally

3. to buy travel arrangements from the dime-a-dozen tourist shops. The tourist shops are cost effective and will save you time arranging connections but the trips they arrange are a genuine ordeal. You are basically treated like cattle and hurded from one point to another and put in very exploitive situations. i.e. paying for meals/snacks at a price usually quadriple what the locals pay. The only good thing to take away from this route is you know your money is going straight to the communities.

All in all, I recommend going to the government stations personally. It so much better of a trip and way more comfortable.

Phuket Town
After Phuket, we boared a government bus and had the best trip ever to go around the way to the town of Krabi. It was air conditioned, spacious and both Heather and I sprawled out to view the countryside; it was very nice.

Krabi is easily the most touristy place we have been to so far. When we first got into town we took a long tailed boat to a beach around the bend which is only accessible by sea. This place is beautiful. From here, you can either take day trips to visit national park islands that are prestine to dive or snorkel. Or you can just go out for a day long ride. In fact, the movie 'the Beach' was filmed on one the island near Phi Phi Island and you can go for an overnight camp there!

Ao Nong Beach, main drag

Ao Nong Beach;

It is still the rainy season in Thailand so some of the days have been wet but these days serve as perfect relax and restoration days. This is the beach at Ao Nong. You can see the que of long tail boats waiting to taxi cashed-up tourists to tropical resorts and spas.

Rai Lay Beach

It's kind of interesting to be a place like this because it was one the areas devistated by the Boxing Day Tsunami 4 years ago. This particular beach wasn't damaged as badly as all of the island areas. I guess Phi Phi island was completely wiped clean but has now been totally rebuilt and is the European Family's dream holiday.


Tomorrow, we are leaving Thailand and flying out of Krabi to Maylaysia's capitol city, Kuala Lumpur!!!

Here are some highlight pics from the last 1.5 weeks!

Big Buddah Pier on Koh Samui

This is the rickety arrangement of poles you walk across to board the ferry to the island north of Koh Samui called Koh Pha Ngan. (which you can see off in the distance in this photo)

Sea Breeze Resort

We still cannot figure why we were able to stay at this place for such a budget cost (roughly $15/night) but we did. This was after we stayed two nights in a room that was trecherous. The blinds didn't close all the way so anybody who walked by our windows could see right in and there was literally a Philippine Gamecock Farm directly below in the field behind our windows which we couldn't close. It was like a dog pound for angry roosters. I never understood why South Carolina chose the mascot it did but I now have the first hand knowledge that angry roosters are nothing to mess with! That must be why they are bred to fight and kill one another in arranged matches in seedy back-ally rings.

Anyway, we stayed at the Sea Breeze for 8 luxurious days.

View of the Bay of Thailand from the Resort Pool

We think it was an insect that bit her eyeball while she was sleeping that caused her to rub her eye so hard that capularies were burst, but waking up that morning was a shear panic. The white of her left eye was blood red, blurred vision and she could barely stand up because of the pain it caused. The clinic we took her to was very clean and legitamate. She was not a happy camper in this pic...

Had Riin, Koh Pha Ngan Town Center

Thailand rainy season don't mess around!!! I thought I knew what rain was...

Full Moon Party

Every month, 5,000 maniacs from all over the world come to this island for the famous Full Moon Party. I figure I had to partake simply for the full sociological experience of it. And it truly is an experience. I can't say for sure, because I don't want to be hanged or spend the rest of my life in Thai prison and I'm a clean kid, but I'm almost positive there was more than just alcohol being consume at this party. This shingdig kicks off at about 10p.m. and doesn't quit untill well after 10 a.m.

I still cannot figure out why these two guys were wearing ponchos. It wasn't raining but they did not seem to mind me taking this photo.

Banana Pancake

For a little more than 70 cents on average, these have been my primary source of sustenance. This is probably why my belly is so jiggly now but they are a scrumpcious and cheap snack.

18 NOV 08- Railay Beach East, Thailand

What do you do when the driver of the euro van that you and your young wife are stuffed into while en route from one popular thailand destination to another comes to a side-ways, angry and screeching hault in the middle of the highway at 11 o'clock at night?

When this happend, it wasn't so much that I was scared. What actually was going through my mind, unlike Heather's, was an incredible feeling of annoyance... You see, my stomach has been fine the entire trip, except for this particular day. Up until almost 24 hours before Heather saw our future's flash before her eyes, I was in perfect condition. I hadn't been feeling the NASA-type-countdown-of-explosion-urge-defication, I hadn't cared about where the nearest toilet was (western style or not) and I certainly had not been having intense periods of prespiration. But for some reason the day we traveled from the island of Pha-Ngan to Phuket, I was having all of the above.

And I was certainly in no mood for dealing with carrying our bags in the pitch black of night through, what is to us, the middle of no where all because a half dozen whiny, huge-baby Euro boys that were in the van with us started heckling the driver because he wouldn't stop so they could go pee.

It was not like we were very far into the most unconfortable 4 hour trip from Surat Thani to Phuket; we had only traveled about 35 minutes before the heckling began. It started with douchebag number 1 saying in an english-as-a-second-language accent, "Driver, some of us think it is too cold back here. Can you turn down the AC?"

I was thinking the opposite.

When the driver gave no recognition of this request, douchebag number 1 asked it again. And then again 4 more times. The response from the driver was the same every time; nothing.

Before long, the antagonizing begain...

Douchebag number 1,2,3,4,5 and 6's repeated screaming of, "AC DOWN!!! AC DOWN!!! AC DOWN!!!DO YOU SPEAK ENGLISH?", finally came to a relative success when the driver reluctantly fussed with the dash controls and turned the AC... UP.

I thought this felt very good. Although I am not sure the driver meant to do it, the tempurature did get cooler and it came as a nice relief to my sweat-saturated clothing.

It was very dark in the cab, but both Heather and I had front row seats to the hole debacle as we were both stuffed into the sole front passenger seat of this trainwreck. After 5 or so minutes another kind of shouting began. This time, the baby team of douchebags needed to all pee at once. (We left Surat Thani at 10 pm; it was 10:39 when all of this started going down.) The requests began slightly polite this time around with another duechebag, douchebag number 2, asking in the same kind of english accent "Driver, some of us need to use the toilet. Can you pull over?" This time around, the driver made no concession but a similar round of heckling began.

After douchebag number 3 offered to piss in the van as a result to absolutely no response from the driver, I had the feeling the situation was getting out of control. It was only 10:58.

I had actually began to ignore all of the shouting going on by the half dozen guys shouting in the back about needing to relieve themselves. I was doing such a good job that I was almost snoozing on Heather's shoulder when both of us were bolted forward, finding our faces inches from the windshield. I think at that moment, Heather's exact words were, "Oh my God, oh my God!"

Her next words were, "We are not getting out of this van!" This was, of course, in a very clear whisper...

All we could see from our seat (singular) through the headlight-lit-scene was half of the highway we were just driving on at 140KM/hr and half of the absolutely dark countryside that did not look good for two Americans to be wandering lost into. (This was my fear.) Actually, we could aslo see the driver standing in front of the van, irate and pointing to the guys in the back to "GET OUT OF MY FUCKING VAN!."

And He was also yelling, "This is Thailand, not fuck you of where ever you are from!"

Appearanlty he speaks perfect english.

From the back, I could hear douchebag number 1 instructing everybody to get out of the van, everybody. But there was no way Heather and I were going to move from the van. I would fight tooth and nail before any of those girgly pretty boys with weak blatters tried to pull us both from the van. WE WERE NOT GETTING OUT OF THE VAN!

All we wanted to do was go to Phuket. Simple. It was not our fault you nancy boys couldn't hold your bladders. It was not our fault one of you douchebags decided in the midst of your crying to reach forward and slap the back of the drivers head. And it was certainly not our faults the driver was calling the police through the view of the vans headlights. The Thailand Police...

This is when Heather's fears escalated. You see, the one common thing you read about in travel books regarding the Thai police is they don't care about tourists. There is no such thing as innocent until proven guilty. Guilt and innocence are ideas proved in the courts only after the suspect has spent an arbitrary amount of time fighting for rice pieces in Thai prison without the knowledge or help of the forienger's friends, loved ones and/or parents.

I cannot imagine what the toilets there are like there.

And, guilt by association does not matter either. (This is what Heather was thinking.) Heather was imagining the police showing up and taking all of the males in the van away forever. I wasn't as concerned, but I could tell by the fact that she was trembling uncontrollably, she was scared...

Even after the driver got back into the van after 20 minutes of talking on the cell phone, nobody was sure where he was taking us at that point. I tried to squint at each road sign we passed(luckily the town names are printed in english too) to get an idea of the towns we were by just in case we could get out. Because at that point I totally believed we were on our way to the nearest police station.

But thankfully after another silent hour on the road, we pulled into the designated rest stop; the one we were always supposed to stop at to make sure all passengers could comfortably relieve themselves. Everybody got out to get snacks and use the toilet and the 6 guys responsible for the ridiculousness, bargained their way passed the 10 thai guys who surrounded our van when we pulled up. From what I could tell, they each paid 1,000 Bhat each (roughly $28USD) for their childlike behavior and ignorance of the Thai Police...

This was the day when home never felt so good in my memories. When Heather and I finally got to our guesthouse, safe and sound, in Phuket Town at 1:30 a.m., I decided we needed a new approach to our trip.

Today is Tuesday, 4 days after this whole scene, and we are getting ready to leave Thailand. Our visas are about up and the rest of southest asia is looking really good.

We both have been looking at the this travel blog and realise we should be updating more. The things we have been posting do no justice to our experiences.

Ultimately, you should know we are safe, sound and loving every minute of it.

07NOV08 - Koh Phangan, Thailand (Sea Breeze Resort)

The best story-teller I have ever known is my best friend and, basically, brother Dylan. It is not that his stories are remarkable but that he relays his life's experiences by one basic premis; it is to never ruin a good story with the truth... (and to tell it with such vigor and charisma that it HAS to be true!)

I try to implement this same strategy into all of my life accounts and especially into my travel tales because I believe it makes believing this version of reality more fun and likeable. But after two full weeks in Thailand, the things Heather and I have been subjected to cannont be altered by this persausion because they are, in themselves, nearly unbelievable and were, almost unbearable!

They include:

5 Hours on a bus that leaked water onto my sleeping head from the rain storm, and reeked of human waste
4 Hours waiting at a disserted boat launch for a ferry ride at 3:30 in the morning.
3 fungal infections in places not appropriate of mention
2 extremely lousy nights in room more suitable for torture than sleep
1 stolen debit card and primary source of financing


And we do all of this because we like it, we want to believe it's good for us and know that it makes for good stories!


We have traveled to another island in the Bay of Thailand called Koh Phangan. We originally had a reservation at a place on the northeastern part of the island, but could not find a taxi to take us there under our terms. Because this new island, which is relatively small and undeveloped, does not have very many taxi's and has even less drivers willing to except reasonable rates. They do not operate with a meter and feel they have the right to absolutely purge any western visitor of their money. AND because most foreigners here are from, what it seems, the countries of the EU, they can afford to pay prices easily within the cost of a cheap meal in their respective homelands. But seeing as how we came to this place specifically for the cheap travel, we could not justify spending the exuberant rates. Based on our research and talks with travel agents on Koh Samui, we were led to believe we could get anywhere on Koh Phangan for 100 Bhat per person (which equals about $3.16US). But when we got off the ferry in 95 degree heat with 110 percent humidity, carrying 70 lbs each, we absolutely could not find a taxi for less than 1,000 Bhat! We were told that drivers lease their taxis and not the ride...

Of course, this reasoning makes no sense to a person from a controlled and regulated country, but we get it. We come from a place where the empolyee opperating the register of the most patronized restaurant in the United States asks if "you want fries with that" makes more money in one single hour than the person of equal social rank in Thailand makes in an entire month. The fact of the matter is we are visitors to this place. We should really appreciate the relative power our money brings and respect this opportunity to enjoy a very beautiful and unexploited part of the world.




A TOTALY SAFE JUMP ROPE... right!?!?!




Sunrise Beach.

Question: Do you recognize this woman?

Answer: It's the woman of my dreams! (it's Mrs. Madden a.k.a. H-Bomb!)
Don't worry folks, karosene only leaves superficial burns!!!

01Nov08 - Koa Samui, Thailand (Matlang Resort)

The most common thoughts I have when I travel are;

Why am I not doing more of this?
Why is traveling not more reveared/valued in 'Merica?
Why are my close friends not here to see this with me because they would love it just as much!?
Why do I work so much back home when I know my time on earth is getting used up so quickly?


I don't know why, but I love seeing new and crazy things. And I'm positive the most attractive thing about Heather is that she likes it too. I suppose John Stienbeck said it best when he wrote:

“When I was very young and the urge to be someplace else was on me, I was assured by mature people that maturity would cure this itch. When years described me as mature, the remedy prescribed was middle age. In middle age I was assured that greater age would calm my fever and now that I am fifty-eight perhaps senility will do the job. Nothing has worked. Four hoarse blasts of a ship’s whistle still raise the hair on my neck and set my feet to tapping. The sound of a jet, an engine warming up, even the clopping of shod hooves on pavement brings on the ancient shudder, the dry mouth and vacant eye, the hot palms and the churn of stomach high up under the rib cage. In other words, I don’t improve; in further words, once a bum, always a bum.”

As you can tell from the rhetorical questions up top, we are having a very good time. Our days are being used to read all of the books we've always wanted to read, ensuring we obtain the proper amount of vitamin D, sleeping until we are rested and maintaining a strict diet of as much Thai food as we can stomach!

After we spent an afternoon in Bangkok, we realized that it was way too crazy for our tastes and we jumped on the first bus out of town we could find. This was probably a good thing because somebody blew up 12 people with bomb at the parliment building a couple days ago. Meanwhile, we have been hanging out on a string of islands in the Bay of Thailand. The first of which was Koa Tao a.k.a. 'Turtle Island' and for the last two days, on Koa Samui.

Koa Tao is a place to go if you love to dive, prefer a slow pace and can manage to live off of a $10US per day budget (to inlcude three square thai meals, a roof over your head, an afternoon Thai massage and enough Beer Chang to be effective for the beach front fire dancer shows at midnight.)

Koa Samui is a place to go if you are just married, love the tropics, love crazy-loud-techno parties and/or are eastern European. It seems like the only difference between this island and Bangkok is a stretch of white beach front and overpriced taxis.

We do not know where we are going next. We were originally thinking about going north to upper Thailand and then to Cambodia but we have read that there is unrest in the parliment and soldiers between the two borders are shooting at eachother. So between this and our interest in learning how to surf, Indonesia is looking pretty good!!!



Sunset Beach Restuarant on Koh Tao.

Travel necessities: Ipod music player, libations, bug repellant, Tiger Balm for area on the skin where the previous item failed, glasses, sun screen, camera, fake wallet with minimal cash (just in case a 'luggage gangster' thinks he needs our wallet more than me), bottle opener, reading material, journal, waist pouch to keep sensitive items like passport and real wallet and extra toilet paper!

Typical bathroom;

There two ways to use:

Option A: Western Style

Step 1: discard your body's waste

Step 2: Place used tissue paper not in toilet, but in garabe can to the left (ANECDOTE/WARNING: typical Thailand sewage systems cannot take the waste load of tissue paper and will back up into your room. This is not advised!!!)

Step 3: Fill small blue bucket with water

Step 4: Dump water into toilet to allow gravity to push waste down the drain.

Option B: Bidet Style

Step 1: discard your body's waste

Step 2: Use the hand held spray faucet, like the one on your kitchen sink, to do as Wikipedia defines "wash and clean the genitalia, inner buttocks, and anus."

Needless to say, this operation takes some getting used to.

The tropics are awesome. We have made it a daily habit to get a fruit smoothy from a local fresh fruit dealer everyday like this one in Koh Tao. For about 75 cents, you can get a fresh thai coconut. You can see them on top of the cooler next to the guy in the black T. The guy who ran this stand got to know me so well that he started to give me free fresh banannas which are very differant from the ones I usually purchase from Fred Meyer.

Sunset.

The view from the first bungalo we stayed in Koh Tao.

Some bathrooms are scarier than others... For this particular model, use the squat/hover method, your own toilet paper (as none is provided)... and try not to touch anything.

This is the main street in Koh Tao. It is a string of cafes, local restaurants and mini-marts that parralell the beach front.

We figured since we were here, we had to see some live thai boxing. Jason, I thought of you when they came out for their warm up and worship routine to the tune of "eye of the tiger"! ..no joke! I was suprised that noboby seemed to be concerned with me filming, but I couldn't resist. These were the amatures of the night but definitely the best fight. The primary fight was between a lanky thai guy and a short, stalky white boy from switzerland... and as far as the outcome of this fight, Tyler Dirden was correct - lanky guys do fight to the death...