Things that don't happen every day

I've had a week of them. And I've had a Sunday morning in which to reflect on these happenings. A Sunday morning spent drinking Italian coffee, reading a Japanese novel and gazing out at the Arabian Ocean crashing into rocks and the beaches of South Goa,  I might add.

What's happened this week?

I went spice shopping with our beloved cook, Prashant, yesterday. This was an experience I'd been looking forward to for some time and hope to repeat again before too long.  I got to point at things and ask "What's this? What do you use this for? How do we make this?" a lot and to see which spices were good, and which blends were not so good. We went to the supermarket first and then to the market in search of vanilla pods. We only found one very sad looking vanilla pod, that smelled fantastic, in the whole of Chawdi. Prashant managed to get it for a lower price for me - 40 Rupees (that's 40p to you and me). I came home loaded with spices - cardamon pods, cinnamon bark, nutmegs, cloves, tumeric root, mustard, peppercorns.... and lots more. We then ground the cardamon, cinnamon, and cloves to make chai masala mix which smelled (and still does smell) amazing. I'm plotting how to send the package home - that will be next week's project.

Currently, I'm undergoing treatment for my pelvis and spine, which have become displaced (long story, not going to go into it here). I also broke my wrist in May whilst learning to drive a motorbike in Hanoi. So I'm undergoing physical therapy for the two things with a holistic, third-generation ayurvedic physician and osteopath from Manipur. Part of this therapy includes daily "stretching" (full body workout) under the watchful eye of the therapists. This is to re-align the body and train the tendons and  muscles to work in the right way. We are an expanding group of injured people from all over the world and the general dynamic is friendly and mutually supportive. I get a lift in with a French woman who I meet for chai and banana bread at 7 am, and then a lift home with whoever is available.
Yesterday, the available person was a Transylvanian bee-keeper. He agreed to let me come and collect honey next summer if I wanted to, or at least see his family bee-farm and told me all about what the bees would be doing now. They spend winter in constant movement inside the hive, taking it in turns to be on the outside of the group and flapping their wings to generate heat to protect the collective. They are great problem solvers, apparently and very intelligent creatures. Fascinating stuff.
We stopped for sugar-cane juice at a little stall on the side of the road run by a wizened old tiny woman in a blue sari. I'd had sugar cane juice in Hanoi and found it far too sweet, but this one was made with some lemon and was lovely.

Three unusual experiences in one day.
Other things of this week have included: discussion about karma and awareness at the beach; cutting my foot open on a door (it's recovering now); watching one of our new puppies become more and more insane (she's called "Vata" and is living up to her name extrememly well); learning a little more Hindi with the boys in the kitchen; teaching the people in the cybercafé the basics in Spanish (much to the confusion of a German customer); eating my first masala dosa at the Hotel Krishna - fantastic brunch fare; having a disturbed crow fly to me and try to get inside my clothing for safety from the gang of cats closing in on her...
I saw a baby leopard the week before.

I really should carry my camera around with me more often.

It would seem to be December and Christmas is starting elsewhere. I can't quite imagine what that is like....

Why not, coconut?

Our cook makes coconut milk. He hacks open the coconut with a viscious knife, cuts out the flesh, grates it (by hand) and blends it with water. He also makes soya milk from soy beans if you ask him to.

He's one of the most hard-working people I've ever met and is happy creating his culinary wonders. You ask him for something and he says "Why not, coconut?" and if you apologise for something he says "Don't worry, chicken curry!"

My neighbours and landlords make coconut oil. Actual coconut oil, that you go and pay vast amounts of money for in shops. You know why you pay vast amounts of money for it?
Well.... over this week I have been observing the process.

The coconuts are cleaned and smashed and cleaned more and dried; then turned and covered and lovingly examined; then gathered and taken to Chaudhi where they are ground and pressed and the oil comes out. The whole family is involved and it takes a long time. It is all done by hand and with a lot of care and effort. What you pay probably goes largely to the marketing companies, because that's how The West works. It certainly doesn't go to my hardworking neighbours.

Please try to appreciate this next time you slather coconut oil over you after your shower.

How to remember you're in India...

Well, apart from the cows. And it really is true what you get told about the cows - they are everywhere and do seem to rule the roads. And the beach. And anywhere they choose to be.

Today is Dussehra. This is (according to the Great Font, Wikipedia) one of the most important Hindu festivals.

Patnem was turned from sleepy street  town to raving paradox.

A van/truck-type vehicle with a rather large sound system on the back crawled along the road stopping at intervals to allow the gathering crowd of be-muscled young males* to jump about to the dance-techno-pumping mix blasting out of it. This reached its peak on our street especially when our yogis went and joined in the dancing causing the local girls, who had been shyly swaying around the edges, to move with a lot more verve.
The best is yet to come.
Following this mobile party was a Ford fiesta** hatchback with its back door up revealing a small alter/shrine accompanied by a tiny little ancient man with a beard sat behind it. The more sedate and slightly older folk followed. There were no frenetic boppers behind this one. A local lady explained that today was Dussehra. She didn't explain what Dussehra was, she just pointed at the two polar opposite celebrations of it right in front of us and considered that explanation enough.

There was Hindu mass singing emanating from a temple on a little further up the road and fire crackers going off everywhere.

The interesting thing is that this did not initially seem that weird. It was only when I took a step back and witnessed it from a slightly different angle did I see the very Indian nature of it - an ancient and a modern world completely mixed in spirit but separated in essence. Very clear methods of celebration from different parts of the world coming together in a perfectly accepted manner. The excitement of village dance, the solemnity from the Easter parades in Spain, the reverance of the elders and, well, a rave all thrown together.

This is how to remember that I'm in India.

*human, not bovine (just to clarify)
**intended?

steps, leaps, bounds.....jump!

Sometimes things happen really quickly in life. Often, in fact in my case. But then things are allowed to happen, so, in the manner of chilldren in a playground, they do.

I'm on my way to multiple adventure. One is the adventure of the heart, another of spirit. The rest, still a mystery. Still, life is changing completely. It's brilliant.

Few words adequately describe that tickling bubbling spa pool of excitiemnt that sits in your belly bursting at the surface every so often with a sparkling *ting!* that shimmers through your entire Ness. It's pure sensation; one that you've either had, or you haven't.
This is the thing that keeps us like children; remember the time when you saved up all your pocket money to go to that shop to buy that thing you'd been fascinated by for simply ages*? Or when you'd heard about this amazing place from your school chums and you found out you were actually going to go there? Well, it's like that, but better.
It's better because despite being told for years that adults don't have this kind of fun, you realise that actually you do. You really can jump up and down with GLEE clapping your hands excitedly.

That's what I'll be doing for the foreseeabe future. That smiling, beaming face over there? yup, that's me.



*circa two weeks

How languages melted my brain.... and pizza saved me!

They say that learning a language can help you to avoid degenerative brain diseases in later life. This is surely a good thing. Not, however, if the brain in question is turned into a melted ball of mozzarella di bufala earlier in life as a consequence of having too many idioms flying about its neural pathways causing havoc with communication.

I am simultaneously blessed and cursed by my ability to understand languages relatively quickly (it goes with the territory of the work I do, plus the Jedi powers I've possessed since adolescence) and my natural desire to understand what is going on and communicate with people helps/forces me to speak something resembling the native tongue of the country I happen to be in before I resort to English*.
Also, something peculiar happens to me and I am often initially incapable of using English. I find this fascinating, despite understanding why it happens, as my first language really shouldn't escape me, ever. But escape me it does and I end up speaking a bizarre mixture of languages in the nearest accent I can jab at in the hope of getting the message across. Sometimes I speak English with a weird "foreign" accent (see Eddie Izzard's smersh agent impression), especially in Europe, as it seems to work better. Other times I manage to converse in a combination of the limited grasp of native words I have, a bit of understanding, a lot of repetition, hand gestures, laughter and patient shop-keepers. That last method is my favourite.

The problem often is that although I have two genuine, fluent languages that I can use, I have several others that I have learned to the point necessary to get by in - because I've lived in that country for a little while and made an effort, or I've been there for a week or two and made the effort, or I've just got there and I'm trying - the ultimate of which will be my instinctive default response.**
This wasn't too bad when all my travels were limited to Europe as there tend to be crossovers, but the last place I learned to speak in was Vietnam.

I fondly remember standing at a kiosk in Poland, just beginning to grasp the basics, being elated at understanding a question put to me and cheerily lurching into my affirmative response of,
"Sí! ....er Tak! Yes."
The "Sí" being the Spanish I had been using for 2 years prior to moving to Poland; the "Tak" being the actual Polish for "yes"; the "Yes" just to make sure and also to give me something to cling onto. You can almost feel the different mental cogs whirring in this kind of situation. I was privvy to a slightly stranger linguistic incident today.

I had a lovely afternoon. I arrived in Napoli, Italia, I got to my hotel without being mugged***, I found out from the very helpful woman on reception what I should do with my few hours and where I could eat the best pizza, then set out to explore the old quarter. In many ways, I was returned to my first travelling days of inter-railing round Iberia ten and a half years ago when I had tentative knowledge of Spanish (after a ten-week beginner's course) and was wandering around Bilbao wondering why I couldn't understand anything (it was all in Basque). Napoli happens to be very similar to Bilbao in numerous ways, including a street in the old town that looks and smells identical. I smiled and missed CC, my faithful travelling companion of the day, who is now all settled on the other side of the world.

I located the pizza restaurant - the famed Pizzeria Sorbillo - which was not difficult as there were hoards of pizza-starved people outside. Luckily, there was a smaller branch of the same a little further down the Via Tribunali. I managed to communicate, in my idiosyncratic manner, with a middle-aged woman and she instructed me to go inside and leave my name. I did so in Italian and amazingly understood all the Italian that came back at me (with a Napoli soft -ci "shi" accent), then waited in the street watching hungrily through the window as they prepared their fare. Once inside, I followed the advice that I had been given: Margherita is the only real option (there is a vast pizza menu, but I ignored it) and was most pleased with my choice. At first, I wasn't that convinced by its brilliance, but as I worked through it, with my piccola Nastro Azzurro to help, I was converted. Dough, tomato, mozzarella and basil, stone-baked, delivered hot: devoured. Yum.
Content, I got the bill and left. All communication in Italian (actual Italian, I know the ordering-food bits, of course) left me feeling a bit better about my Babelfish® being in place.
I ambled a bit more about the Centro Storico feeling decidedly full and sleepy and in need of a caffe. A macchiato was had opposite el Duomo, also acquired entirely in Italian. I know this isn't exactly the equivalent of the FCE, but remember the first time you went into a café in another country and fumbled over the words? Well, exactly.. It's still incredible when you try something you're not entirely convinced is going to work and it does, basic or not. I was semi-tempted to try conversation with the owner of the bar, but decided against it. Baby steps.
A bit more pootling led me to a slightly dodgier end of the street - circumvented - and back down on the other side and into the elected Random Museum of Naples AKA Museo del TESORO di SAN GENNARO (capitals as per name on sign). This contained vast quantities of precious metals honed into saintly figures and chalices, beautifully decorated ceilings, a secret entrance into the cathedral (closed at that point in the day), the blood of San Gennaro himself (in a glorious golden container, not just lying about the place CSI-style) and a bored and chatty security guard.

I get to the confusing linguistic event of the day. Bored and Chatty Security Guard decided to talk to me. I managed to clear the first general conversational hurdle, which prompted him to ask me, in surprise, if I spoke Italian.
"Un po. Parlo espagnole e comprendo un po de Italiano, pero non parlo buono" (Is that anything resembling your language, Italians?)
I could see him calculating the likelihood of being able to have a meaningful conversation with me of any kind and bravely launching into Social Interaction: Level I.
"Is this your first time here in Napoli?" x 2 (I'm translating as I haven't a clue how to write it)
Now, as I mentioned earlier, simple responses that you use everyday are the ones that stick the most. Particularly short answers: yes and no, for example.
I managed to bite back the first "vâng" (Vietnamese for "yes") and struggle out a "si" (my brain obviously doesn't allow me to revert to Spanish despite it being the most similar).
"te piacce?" ("do you like it?")
Answering becomes more complicated when you actually have to consider the question. I decided to go with the best answer. It came out too quickly, which meant that I caught myself a little, but not quick enough. "Sung" was the result (si + vâng). He looked confused. I managed a "si" to cover my tracks and then to make everything ok blurted out "la pizza es muy buona!" and chuckled heartily. He laughed in relief that he wasn't going to have to deal with an idiot, or at least only with an idiot who has good taste in food, patted me on the shoulder and then went to talk to some real Italian speakers.
He came back for more after a while and actually managed to prompt, amongst other languages, some Catalan, which rendered us both bewildered. He left me alone after that...

This broke the seal, however and despite the initial urges to say "vâng" and "không" I've plunged onward, managed to have a long, circular conversation about cards and envelopes (new italian word: busta), follow two lots of directions and buy a train ticket (during the last one I did resort to English for the travel agent's sake).

En fin: dementia I will avoid, but perhaps nobody will be able to tell the difference as I will be gibbering in a variety of languages, making half of it up and delivering it all in the local accent of choice.

Allora...



*This is partly to do with my resolute stubbornness and partly to do with an innate dislike of any arrogance that assumes every other person in the world should speak that particular lingua franca. They can, generally, and to a better standard than I can master their language, but still....

**It may be worth noting here that these words also come out when I first return to the UK as they are functional and trip off the tongue without thought. They are the simple, one-word responses like "yes" "no" "here?" "this" etc

***This was not my prejudice but that of everyone else I've told, including Napolitanos, that I'm coming here. Although now, after living in Asia where  nothing can happen to a westerner unless you really misbehave, I seem to have been catapulted back to my first ventures abroad and belief that Europe is the most dangerous continent on the planet....

Local life

Typical conversation of an eve at the local shop:
Me: Chào em.
Em (name unknown): Chào chi
Me: cho chi hai chai nuoc/bía (depending on the day)
Em: You come very late! (while getting water or beer)
Me: That's because I work very late!
Em or Me: How are you today?
Me or Em: Bin tuong (not bad)
Em: not bad but not good!
Me: Ok.
Em: Are you married?
Me: Still not married. Not since last week, when you asked me the last time *smiles to show humour*
Em: Why not?
Me: I haven't had time!
Em: No! Why you not married? You beautiful, clever, funny...
Me: I don't know em. (like the last 17 times we had this conversation)
Em: It not good! Be alone is not good!
Me: Nah, I'm ok.
Em: You Bin tuong, not ok.
Me: What about you?
Em: I alone, like you. *smile smile*
Me: You see, it's ok!
Em: Well...
Me: Bao nhieu tien? (how much is it?)
Em: 8000
Me: ok, day (here you are)
Em: You get married soon.
Me: Bye bye, em.

*sigh*

A good friend is getting married tomorrow. I wonder if they just had the same conversation on repeat until he gave in... (I'm not going to marry the man from the shop)

Expat days

Before moving here, I'd never considered myself an "Expat" or really sure what criteria one had to fulfill in order to be classed as such.
My dictionary says that an "Expat" is "a person living outside their native country", but I think there's a bit more to it than that.

I've lived in a few different countries and have just been a foreigner living in another place. I could integrate to some extent and even speak the language in one case. Essentially, I lived like the locals did.

Here, it's different. Yes, I've tried to speak the language and still do use as little I can get away with it on a daily basis* to ease life without getting too frustrated at not being understood when I'm trying really really hard; I've moved out of the more western-populated area to a little community area where I can say hello to the local shop-owners and xe om drivers in a friendly way**, buy my fruit off a woman who sells it out of polystyrene boxes and moves from one side of the road to the other for reasons beknownst only to her, and peer over at the post-lunchtime draughts game without raising any eyebrows.
But I cannot integrate. I'm a Westerner. I live very differently to the locals. And as such I feel it is more suitable to accept Expat as a label.

Expats behave in a particular way. It is feasible to do certain activities that are either entirely normal in London and not in Thiscity-life; or activities that are completely normal and unthinkably expensive in one's homeland.

My day went like this:
Yoga
Shiatsu massage
Hair wash and dry. That's right - hair wash and dry. I didn't have it cut, just washed for me by somebody else and blow dried. Blow dried by two people at the same time, I might add. I gasp at my own extravagance. (It gets better)
Goats cheese salad lunch (not typical Thiscity fare) in a French café
Visit friend (that's fairly normal anywhere I think...)
Bimble a little in second-hand bookshop and purchase a book
Home, change.
xe om to Old Quarter, marvelling at the tourists en route (That is definitely Expat Behaviour)
Waxing (to cries of "trắng,trắng,trắng!"***) pedicure & manicure. The last two at the same time.
xe om home.
Order food online.
Write blog entry.

Two of these things I had never done before, and I suspect proper "Expats" have their own motorbikes or drivers (economic level depending). But I think I did pretty well in fulfilling my role today, whilst thoroughly enjoying myself in the name of research, of course.

And all for about a tenth of what it would cost elsewhere in the world.
Now for that food that's just arrived....



*which is more than a lot of people 
**and they won't try to sell me anything or insist on driving me anywhere. Usually.
*** "white white white!" which is a prized skin-colour here, so it's ok.

Two cities in South Korea

I love it. I've been in this country for 6 days and in the capital for only 4 and I am not only beginning to understand the written script (things to do whilst waiting for the metro), but also completely capable of going into a kimbap joint, ordering my veggie kimbap, paying and departing with all the necessary pleasantries in a language I knew nothing about a week ago.

This is very different to the part of Asia I actually live in.

Ulsan was my first port of call, reachable by no hassle at all and simply clambering onto a bus at Incheon airport armed with some Tuna kimchee wrap and some fresh juice. There was snow and lots of it. And it was coooold.
I hadn't expected to a. see snow; b. feel real cold; or c. be in a dry climate again for at least the next 12 months, so it was all very exciting.
The bus stopped at a service station on the way down. I could have been anywhere. I had one of those great moments when you blearily, jet-laggedly look about you and wonder "Where am I, really, in relation to anything I actually know?" I could still buy a Cafe Mocha, though, so it wasn't that disorientating...

Ulsan was quiet. It's a city, it was busy - in its way. There were even traffic jams, but these were only noticeable by looking at the cars as there were no sounds, constant tooting, revving or utter chaos, which I am now, surprisingly used to. It was eerie. Nice, though.

I didn't go on this, as I value my life didn't have time, but I thought it worthy of a photo or two:

 

I had some great sushi, some equally great saki, met some nice folk and caught up with some good friends. I also almost froze to death, so decided that some Coat Investment with Silly Hat Additions may be worthwhile, especially as the predicted temperatures in the capital were -10º to -14º C. I successfully changed money and got myself some cheap Korean food using the local language as well (admittedly all written out for me on a bit of paper by my mate, but still...).

Then the trip to Seoul - yay! We could only get first class tickets as it was, to all extents and purposes, christmas weekend over here. The KTX is the Very Speedy Train* in South Korea and got us there in relative comfort in two and a half hours. Then onto the metro - YES! There is a metro! Bliss! -and out in Anguk, the older part of the city, to our guesthouse, a quick dinner search (easy) and then to sleep in a wooden, paper-windowed, floor-heated annex covered in snow and icicles.

Exploration of the city, with another mate, who lives here, began the following day. There was shopping in Insadong (gloves and travel chopsticks), general wandering a-plenty, and a trip to Seoul Tower, which now costs a ridiculous amount to go up to the top, incidentally.

Some views:

They do that thing with padlocks here, reminiscent of the bridge in Paris, only this is Korean style: 

This was followed by a trip to a rather sedate Gangnam, tried to do the photo on the main stretch and (thankfully) failed, dined well, had tetra-brick sake (mistake), fun all round. Hurrah.

The following days consisted of a palace visit:

where I managed to see some be-Hanbok-ed ladies and dressed-up guards:

...more wandering about a completely deserted Seoul, seeing an empty Dongdaemun market, and a thumping Itaewon (ex-pat area ergo Lunar New Year means something else). Bringing me to today, my first day loose in the city without Korean-Savvy friends, during which I visited the National Museum of Korea, closed:

(yesterday was a public holiday)

So I wandered about the lonely and empty grounds, which was actually pretty cool. I, like a friend of mine, have a fondness for lonely places, especially when they are meant to be thronged with people.

My next visit was to the War Memorial. Also closed. I managed to get a shot of this beautifully moving statue before my camera died:

There's a better one here with a bit of blurb about it too. It had me captivated for a good half an hour. I saw many tanks and planes (including a B-52) and other vehicles of death before going off in search of lunch (achieved) and meeting the Seoul-based pal for a visit to the Samsung Gallery. This was pretty interesting and gave me a much needed dose of art, something I'm hoping to get more of later in the week while I'm in London.

Shopping, ambling, kimbap later brings us up to date.

I like this country.

*direct translation+
+ nah, I'm joking

Literature is Art

I've just had a lovely experience. I was umming and ahhing about heading over to the Temple of Literature to investigate the calligraphers that are currently in residence and decided, thankfully, to go.
This is (some of) what I found:

I chose a venerable looking gent and with the help of a random reporter managed to make my request.

Whilst I was sat there looking about in amazement and soaking up the very bohemianly intellectual atmosphere, I noticed a chap next to me being thoroughly worshipped by an artist and people in general, so I asked the reporter who he was. He's the most revered Calligrapher in Vietnam and has a PhD in the subject not only in Vietnamese, but also in Chinese. He had a long beard and was, in my humble opinion, cool.

Here he is overseeing his student's work:

It's a shame the picture's a bit blurry.

His student/artist friend decided after we had talked to each other for a couple of minutes (obviously not understanding a word the other was saying) that he wanted to paint me. So he did:

No money was to be given. It was a gift for the new year. I was touched and now proudly have my picture waiting for a home in my home.

I then got interviewed for national TV about my "feeling" about the street with the calligraphers. I explained it in a very wordy and British way and then she repeated "So, how do you feel?". "Good," I replied more succinctly.

Such a lovely afternoon I even walked most of the way home, past Uncle Ho (first time on foot) and then got ripped off by a cheeky xe om. But it is Têt, so I'll let him off.

Chúc mừng năm mới !

Lâu

My Pre-intermediates (as I affectionately call them) decided to take me out for dinner last night as a pre-Têt celebration.
Têt (which should have another diacritic above it, but my keyboard isn't that special) is the lunar New Year (or Chinese New Year as it is generally known in the West, probably to the consternation of other Asian nations). This happens in just under 2 weeks and is a public holiday. Hurrah.

So, after some discussion in the preceding weeks, it was decided to go for "hotpot" *. I've had various thoughts about Hotpot or "Lâu" since I was told of its existence some nine years ago by my lovely Chinese students back in the UK. I've wanted to try it, but in the right place. And obviously with the right people: it is not a solo dish, or at least I thought this was the case, as you share a big pot of hot stock with your fellow dinners and cook your food in it together. This requires a certain amount of mutual understanding and trust, to my mind.

As it was decided on my behalf that Hotpot was what was to be had, I happily went along having images of being sat cross-legged on the floor around a big steaming communal pot, trying not to eat anybody's bit of Thit Bò (beef) and looking directly out over Truc Bach lake.
It was much better. But not as earthy, and possibly lacking in some of the romantic charm that existed in my imagined version. But it was great and saved any possible problems caused by the fact that I've stopped eating meat** and am a bit clumsy sometimes with my chopsticks, having been known to throw mushrooms all over the table when not paying attention...
The restaurant was, well firstly, a restaurant with tables and indoors and everything. We sat on the top floor, overlooking Truc Bach lake (I got that bit right, just not the height), at a modern wooden table which had individual pot-heaters! We got presented with a plate each of random gubbins consisting mainly of mushrooms and vegetables, but also some tofu***, dumplings (meat), sausage and pig fat.
Then we could choose what source of protein we wanted to submerge in the bubbling stock in front of us. I went for salmon - from Sapa, apparently. Nice and, as I was cooking it, was exactly right.
It was a whole interactive and entertaining way to eat, which also seemed to me to be the definition of slow food. You choose your ingredients, you cook them and you eat them. It sounds simple, but this sequence of events makes you focus entirely on what you're eating which is the best way to do it, in my opinion.
The company was pleasant and I was looked after. I was also forbidden from paying anything, which is standard practice, if a little frustrating. I'll return the favour in some way, I'm sure.

It's nice to be teaching adults again.



* note to English folk: this has NOTHING to do with Lancashire hot pot
**this happened in December. I don't know how long it's going to last, and I eat fish. I'm not calling myself a vegetarian, or even a "pesky-tarian" (as a canadian friend calls it) because I'm not - I am just unwilling, for health and lack of knowledge as to the origin of the meat in this country, to eat meat at the moment. It may change any time. It may not. But I'm not going to label myself as having that lifestyle, when I'm not entirely sure that I do.
 My students reacted with a shocked look, akin to the reaction I would expect if I'd told them I had a terminal disease, and asked "but..... why?"...
***Also being avoided after a massive hormonal upset due to replacing meat and dairy with soy products at the beginning of the year. Really - it's not good for you in those quantities.