Impressions and Images

First things first. You’re probably wondering how all this came about. Several SIL  members are part of the congregation at Diamond Valley Baptist Church. Hearing them talk about SIL and its work sparked my interest. For those of you who don't know, SIL believes that rather than read the Bible in a language in which it already exists, everyone should have access to the Bible in their native language. There are still thousands of people groups around the world that are still waiting for this to happen. However, it was largely through reading Rick Warren’s book, The Purpose Driven Life, in early 2003 that a seed was planted that prompted me to seriously and prayerfully consider whether I might take a short-term missions trip. People more learned than me are critical of this book, and many of these criticisms may be valid, but it did stir me to be more focussed in my Christian walk.

Initial enquiries were made through Richard Lee (now working for SIL in the UK, and my mentor), and Ben and Kylie Chenoweth, SIL members who have attended Diamond Valley Baptist Church. They suggested I contact SIL directly. Indeed, I soon discovered that SIL were keen to have me come and assist them in some way. They asked me if I was interested in going to the Philippines to assist with the computerisation of their library collection. This sounded like a very enticing project, and so, after several emails, application forms, and an interview, a formal invitation was issued in April of 2004. The remainder of the year was spent saving money, attending short training seminars, submitting paperwork, getting innoculations, and talking to people. Finally, a year after my initial inquiry, it finally happened. What follows is the journal that I kept whilst away. It was very therapeutic to be able to write about my feelings and impressions of being in a foreign country, but I also wrote it for my own amusement. It reveals a side to me that some of you may not be aware of, so please read it in that context.

January 1, 2005

Whoever said getting there is half the fun lied. Don’t get me wrong here. I like visiting and exploring new places; what I don’t like is the time involved in travelling to them. This trip, which was in the planning stages for over a year, is now a reality. This didn’t really hit me until we left the confines of Manila Airport, having just flown in from Melbourne via Singapore. There were people everywhere, like taxi drivers touting for passengers outside, and locals who where spending New Years Day loitering around the car park, wishing passengers like us a Happy New Year. The group I travelled with, who were on a SIL missions discovery tour, lead by Geoff and Aileen Morrow, were collected in person by John Chestnut of SIL Philippines, and driven directly to the SIL compound in Horseshoe Village, my home for the next 3 weeks. Driving in the Philippines is very different to what we know in Australia. They have traffic lights, directional signs, and road rules, but these are better thought of as guidelines rather than rules. One must also contend with a wide assortment of vehicles that make use of Manila’s streets, such as jeepneys, motor scooters, bicycles, and other motorised and pedal-powered contraptions. One bicycle I saw used a rusty chemical drum as a sidecar to seat passengers. The locals continued to celebrate the New Year in their own particular way. As I sat and wrote this in my guesthouse dormitory, I could hear firecrackers being let off in nearby streets. They’re not illegal like they are in Victoria. Initially I thought they were terrorist bombs, but I was assured that there was no cause for concern. Unfortunately, later I heard the news that four people were killed in a bombing in Cebu, a suburb of Manila, but I don’t know if it was a terrorist act or criminal activity. 

January 2, 2005

For reasons that I shall explain below, today was the day that it hit me that I’m overseas. Along with Geoff and Aileen Morrow’s group, I went to church at the Community of Christ, a small evangelical church run by the Christian and Missionary Alliance of the Philippines. This is in no way a reflection of the service, but I found myself nodding off during the sermon, and missed out on hearing most of a well-received message. I put this down to tiredness and adjusting to the humidity. The speaker was Dr. Ben P. De Jesus (pronounced hey Zeus) who is president of a seminary here in the Philippines, and father of this church’s pastor. As it turns out, on the first Sunday of the month, this church has a fellowship lunch called a “pot bless.” This gave us Westerners the opportunity to taste some real Filipino food, like chicken, fish, pork, noodles, and Filipino cakes. It would have been considered impolite not to have a large plate. This is how one shows their appreciation of the hospitality they’ve received. I was happy to oblige. Over lunch, talking with Rex, one of the church members, he asked me about my family background, and whether or not I was married. Upon hearing that I was single, he mentioned that a number of single Filipinas (women) attended that church. Was he looking to match me up with one of them, or is this the Filipino way of breaking the ice with someone you've just met, in the same way that Australians might ask someone what they do for a living? I’d been given prior warning to expect this sort of thing, so it came as no surprise, really. I never seriously considered the possibility of meeting my future wife on this trip. I was here for no other reason than to work. In any case, the only context in which I'd respond to such advances would be if the woman in question spoke with a British accent. Later that afternoon we headed into town to browse the markets. In local parlance, the “wet market” sells fresh meat and seafood, while the “dry market” sells fruit and vegetables. It was interesting, to say the least, to see pigs heads and goat carcasses on sale. Here, fresh meat is cut and sold to order at each stall in the open air, with no refrigeration. No part of the animal goes to waste. As a Westerner walking around this area, looking well-dressed and carrying valuables such as cameras and money, one needed to be alert for pickpockets and beggars. This is not an easy thing to deal with, but I had to pretend to ignore them and quickly move on. It made me feel uneasy having people in the street stop and watch you walk by. Have you ever been frisked by security guards at the entrance of a supermarket or department store? Neither had I until today. This, I’m told is quite common in Asia. Security guards are posted at the entrances and exits, with separate entry points for male and female customers. This is to safeguard against shoplifting and other security risks.

January 3, 2005

Another full day of activities. It began with an orientation, firstly around the library with Sharon Dickerson, with whom I’ll be working, and then around the SIL centre with John Chestnut. This afternoon, Jim and Edna Lush, American missionaries from Wyoming, took me out on the METRO train system into town, where, of all things, we went shopping. This was valuable as a cultural experience, but not how I’d choose to spend my afternoon. Many of the people here, at least those I’ve met so far, feel blessed and encouraged that I’ve come to help them out. Today, I’ve been struggling with feelings of homesickness and self-doubt. Will I be able to do my work adequately? I felt tired and unmotivated. I need time to adapt, but since I’m only here for a short time, this needs to happen quickly. One of the questions that may arise from this trip is whether or not I’d be suited to longer-term overseas missionary service. I don’t know. Back home at Kingsley College, I help, in a small way, to equip people to serve the church, operating behind the scenes, rather than on the front line, so to speak. Being part of a cell group at church, I get to pass on some of what I’ve learned in my Christian walk, while also learning from them. It’s true that God uses ordinary people to do extraordinary things for Him, but at this stage, I’m not quite sure that the overseas mission field is the place for me. People are counting on me to do a good job, and I hope that I can live up to this, but after that, who knows?

January 4, 2005

Today was the day I finally began what I came here to do: work. My task, which I will spend the best part of the next 2 ½ weeks doing, is to index the library’s journal holdings into an Excel spreadsheet. I hope this will be of some help to Sharon, the librarian, who will use this data to create permanent catalogue records at some later date. Without an index, library patrons can’t properly use these journals. Most of today was spent getting my head around this task, and then working out the best way to do it. My workstation is situated in a study cubicle in the back of the library building, with an air conditioner, which is virtually a necessity in this humidity. As you’d expect from being in this sort of environment, you get to meet lots of missionaries, both long and short-term, from all over the world. Americans, Canadians, British, and other Australians, are some of the nationalities I’ve met so far. My workday was interrupted by merienda (morning and afternoon tea), which Sharon tells me is ‘compulsory’ to attend. It provides a welcome relief from the routine of work here, and also an opportunity to try some snack foods that you can’t get in Australia. Now that I’ve done some work, I have a more positive outlook on being here. Paul Christensen, an American college student who was one of the twenty of his countrymen who came to study at Kingsley in second semester last year as part of our Houghton Down Under exchange program, turned up tonight at the guesthouse. He was very surprised to see me there, as was I, to say the least. I knew that he'd be in the country at the same time as me, but I didn't expect our paths to cross in this way. His parents are missionaries in the Philippines, and he was on his way home to the United States after visiting them.

January 5, 2005

Work aside, today was fairly uneventful. I’m getting settled more into the routine of life here at the compound. A typical day is as follows:

7.00 a.m. – Breakfast

7.45 a.m. – Go to work

10.00 a.m. – Merienda

12.00 p.m. – Lunch

3.00 p.m. – Merienda

5.30 p.m. – Dinner

The evenings are free to do with as I please. I’ve gone swimming in the compound pool, read some of the books I brought with me, including my signed copy of Smithereens by Shaun Micallef, and watched some cable TV in the conference room here. After hours, there are not many people around. I hope for a more productive day tomorrow. Over dinner I was chatting to one of the missionaries, whose name escapes me at this time, and he suggests that I try to find the journal records I need on line. It would certainly make things easier if rather than typing everything out in full, I could cut and paste them into my spreadsheet. If only I'd thought of this earlier.

January 6, 2005

My work here is quite laborious. The existing records amount to no more than a list. These records have to be created from scratch. It’s a big job, and I very much doubt that I’ll be able to finish it in my time here. I’m trying to find ways of easing my homesickness. SIL has an ISDN Internet connection, so this comes in very handy for listening to web casts of 3AW and GOLD FM, my radio stations of choice back home. On a lighter note, during merienda this morning, one of the Americans here asked me if I had a kangaroo or koala as a pet. Another Australian, working here as a translator, politely explained that these are protected species, which are not allowed to be kept as pets. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that most of the ones I see are usually lying dead by the roadside on the way to work. Another thing I miss here is not being able to go for walks. For safety reasons, unless I have someone with me, I can’t leave the compound. If it wasn’t for the swimming pool here, I wouldn’t be able to get any exercise at all. I long for the open spaces and the relative safety of the streets back home. Being here is challenging in so many ways. Hopefully something positive will come out of the experience.

January 7, 2005

Sigh! Typical McPhee! (This is a family in-joke, which I won’t explain here). I’ve just spent the last 2 days creating an index for a particular journal, only to find that there was one already prepared on its publisher’s website. It turned out that all I had to do was copy and paste it into my spreadsheet, and after some reformatting, I had my index. This trip is going to be less productive work wise than I thought. Tonight, aside from writing this journal, all I did was watch TV, alternating between some of the cable news channels, Nickelodeon (for Spongebob Squarepants), some incomprehensible Asian channels, with some show set in what was presumably feudal China, and TBN, an American Christian channel. This was the same channel that U.S. President George W. Bush appeared on when he was courting the evangelical Christian vote during the 2000 Presidential elections. Tonight they were having an interesting discussion about Biblical prophecy in the light of the Asian tsunami disaster.

January 8, 2005

One of the SIL missionaries also staying at the guesthouse, invited me out for an early morning walk before breakfast. As I hadn’t been outside the compound since Monday, I was looking forward to this. Unfortunately, I slept in and missed out. I had to settle for another swim instead. At least tomorrow I’ll get to visit another church, which should be fun. Not being able to go out alone like I can back home is quite frustrating, so you need to find other ways to fill in time. The library here has a stack of VCD’s, so I spent most of the day watching movies on my computer. I don’t normally spend all day watching movies at home, but with limited recreational options, you have to make do with what’s available. One of the movies I watched was Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, with Russell Crowe. It was a good movie, and besides, anything that keeps him from singing is fine by me. Being hard up for entertainment, I also watched Legally Blonde 2, which I didn’t enjoy as much as the original, and Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life, which was comparable in quality to the first Tomb Raider movie. By this I mean that they’re both equally bad. Movies based on computer games are a bad idea. 

January 9, 2005

Sunday. Not much to report, other than visiting another church today; this time Greenhills Christian Fellowship, a large, middle-class Baptist church in the inner city area. It was good to get out of the compound and see more of the city. I had the afternoon free to amuse myself, but every Sunday night, a few of the SIL staff meet to sing, pray, and share testimonies. My presence, and that of other short-termers, was acknowledged at this gathering.

January 10, 2005

I’m the last person who should be critical of other peoples’ conversational skills, but SIL table talk is riveting. It occurred to me that perhaps some people have trouble switching off. Constant talk of translation, committee meetings, furloughs, health issues, and other such matters dominate mealtime conversations. It reminded me of the librarian’s conference I attended in Brisbane in July 2004, where all people did was talk shop. It’s not hard to find other things to focus one’s attention on, such as watching excessive amounts of TV, which I don’t normally do, reading, and keeping this journal. Speaking of journal keeping, the speaker at church yesterday said that this is a good spiritual discipline. It has been said that it takes two weeks to make a habit, and some other amount of time to break it. My journal keeping to date has been inconsistent at best, so it’s probably time to turn over a new leaf.

January 11, 2005

Another fairly standard day; work punctuated by meals and sleep. I possibly overdid it a bit today, working for about 10 hours. I’m not here for very long, so the idea is to try to accomplish as much as I can in my time here. The limited opportunities for exercise here are frustrating. There may be a swimming pool here, but I can’t go for walks like I can back home. It’s not safe to be out on the streets alone, especially for someone new to this country.

January 12, 2005

These things are supposed to be filled with interesting travel anecdotes, or something witty and entertaining along the lines of Bill Bryson, Michael Palin, or Susan Kurosawa. As of today, I’ve hardly done any sightseeing, and I don’t want to bore people with the minutiae of library work. So what’s left to write about? For some reason, over breakfast today sport was the topic of conversation. I was seated next to a SIL translator from the Netherlands. Knowing that I’m an Australian, she asked me, ”What’s footsie?” As far as I know, that particular activity hasn’t become a sport yet. In actual fact, she was asking me about footy, as in AFL football, our most popular spectator sport, at least in Victoria. Most foreigners know something about Australia, and in conversation, they used whatever they did know about my homeland to break the ice with me. After hours, there’s not much to do here. I write this journal, watch TV, or do some reading, if I feel like it. Only six more work days until I come home.

January 13, 2005

My original idea in keeping this journal was to give the reader some idea of what my trip was like. It’s turned into something that I’m writing for my own amusement, so please read it in that context. Maybe I could add something about how this trip has impacted me spiritually, and what this might mean in the future. I don’t think I can really write anything about this until I come home, and have had some sort of debriefing.

January 14, 2005

I’ve forgotten his name, but tonight over dinner I had the opportunity to talk to an American missionary and alumnus of Asbury, a Wesleyan college and seminary in Kentucky, part of the same family of colleges that also includes Kingsley College. Having a background in ethnomusicology, and knowing that I was from Australia, he was keen to talk to me about Australian music. Having a young family, and having spent some time in Australia, he was familiar with the work of the Wiggles, surely our most significant musical export since Air Supply, Frank Ifield, Sister Janet Mead, or Dame Joan Sutherland. He found it very amusing that three members of the Wiggles were once part of the minor Sydney band the Cockroaches, who released two moderately successful albums back in the late 1980s, and that Peter Garrett, lead singer of Midnight Oil, is now a politician.

January 15, 2005

Sharon the librarian, and Shirley, who also works for SIL, do their grocery shopping on Saturday mornings in Cubao, a suburb ten minutes’ drive from here. Out of consideration for the squeamish, I won’t repeat what I wrote previously about the wet market, where they bought their meat. Normally I can't stand shopping, but for today I appreciated it as a cultural experience, and also as a chance to temporarily escape the compound. It also provided the opportunity to buy a temporary replacement for my watch, which stopped working last weekend. We browsed around the market stalls in the Cubao mall, which is called Greenhills, a sprawling complex where the Filipino middle class and expatriates come to shop. After some haggling by Sharon, who is well versed in such things, I ended up buying a knockoff Cartier watch for 180 pesos ($4.00 aud). Many of the stalls sell knockoffs of prestigious designer brand clothes and other items, if you're into that sort of thing. Knowing how to haggle for these things keeps you from being ripped off. Whilst walking around, men appeared from nowhere, walking alongside me asking ’DVD, DVD?’ As it turns out, this is their way of trying to sell pirated DVDs. Of course, I said, ’No’ and kept walking. I felt less guilty about buying a knockoff designer watch than I would if I bought a pirated DVD, thereby depriving the major Hollywood studios of one of their major revenue streams. On Monday I'm booked in for a bus tour of Manila, which apparently has a great museum, the American war cemetery, and other attractions, which means I'll finally get to use some of the rolls of camera film that I bought.

January 16, 2005

Today was an opportunity to visit another church, Union Church, in the Makati City district of Manila. I had a choice of two services; a contemporary service, or a more traditional one. I chose the contemporary service, mainly because it was earlier, and I wanted to be back at the guesthouse in time for lunch. This church, with a membership in the thousands, has many expatriates in its congregation. It's quite an impressive building, with a chapel, meeting rooms, offices, kitchen, classrooms, and a spacious library. Afterwards, I had the chance to chat briefly with some members from China and Vietnam, who work with the underground church in those countries. Every Sunday night, the SIL staff meet together for a time to sing, pray, and share testimonies. Geoff and Aileen Morrow's Discovery Tour group had just arrived back in Manila after several days of travelling and working in different parts of the country. It was great to hear them talk about how what they had seen and done had impacted their lives.

January 17, 2005

At last, the day I longed for: Being able to take off my librarian's hat and do the tourist thing for a change. I was part of a small group that took a bus tour of Manila. It's a massive, sprawling city, with so much to see. Carmen, a local, and a member of Union Church, offered her services as tour guide. I'll outline in brief what we did for now, but will add more detail about each thing we saw later on. We drove past the University of Santo Tomas. Established on April 28, 1611, is the oldest existing university in Asia and the Philippines, and one of the largest Catholic universities in the world. The campus consists of 220,000 m² in metropolitan Manila and enrols thousands of native and foreign students. It was started by the Spanish Archbishop of Manila in the early 17th century as a seminary for aspiring young priests, taking its name and inspiration from St. Thomas Aquinas. In the last four centuries, the university grew into a full pledged institution of higher learning, conferring degrees in law, medicine and various academic letters. Its name includes the title The Pontifical and Royal Catholic University of the Philippines. These are appellations granted by King Charles III and various popes throughout the years. UST has the reputation and distinction of graduating many of the country’s historical elite, in business, politics and the clergy. Many of the educated members of the 19th century independence movement came out of the university as lawyers, journalists, writers and priests. The campus itself is a bastion of conservatism, its administrators and students traditionally protecting status quo in defence of the Spanish against the British in the 18th century and local insurgents throughout the occupation years. During World War II, the Japanese converted the campus into a concentration camp for civilians, foreigners and POWs. After the war, the university resumed its mission and continues to be one of the more prestigious universities in the country. (http://www.answers.com/intramuros)

Another highlight was the walled city of Intramuros, built by the Spanish in the 16th century. It was the centre of political, military, and religious power during when the Philippines was a Spanish colony. Inside Intramuros were Roman Catholic churches, like the Manila Cathedral and the San Agustin Church, and convents and church-run schools, the Governor's Palace, the official residence of the Spanish governor-general to the Philippines, and Fort Santiago, the main Spanish garrison. Fort Santiago is located at the mouth of the Pasig River, it was once the prime defence fortress of the Spanish Empire in the Philippines. It was heavily damaged during the Battle of Manila in February 1945 and was restored by the Intramuros Administration during 1980's. It now houses the ruins of American and Spanish barracks, the Plaza Armas, the dungeons used by the Japanese during World War II and the Rizal Shrine, to commemorate the life and work of Jose Rizal (1861-1896), a Filipino doctor and novelist who became a national hero of the Philippines. He was an early leader of the Filipino movement for political and social freedom from Spain. The Spaniards, who ruled the Philippines at the time, executed Rizal for his activities. He was born in Calamba, the Philippines. After obtaining his qualifications in medicine in Madrid, Spain, Rizal travelled to Germany, England, and France, where he continued to study medicine. He wrote for La Solidaridad, a magazine published in Barcelona, Spain, that campaigned for reforms in the Philippines. While living in Europe, Rizal gained worldwide attention with two novels. Noli Me Tangere (Latin for Touch Me Not) was published in Berlin in 1886. Rizal's second book, El Filibusterismo (The Subversive), was published in Belgium in 1891. Both novels exposed the ills of the Spanish colonial government and Filipino society. While conducting research at the British Museum in London, Rizal came across an early history of the Philippines. The book was written by Antonio de Morga and was printed in Mexico in 1609. Morga, an early Spanish governor general of the Philippines, pointed out that Filipinos had a civilization of their own before the Spanish arrived. In 1890, Rizal printed a new edition of the history with his own notes added to the text. In 1892, Rizal returned to Manila. He was arrested and exiled to the southern Philippine island of Mindanao. In 1896, the Katipunan, a secret Filipino revolutionary society, tried to overthrow the Spanish government. Rizal was on his way back to Manila when the revolution broke out. Though he had no connection with the Katipunan or the uprising, a Spanish military court found him guilty of promoting the rebellion. On the morning of Dec. 30, 1896, Rizal was executed by firing squad. Rizal was a man of numerous talents. A gifted linguist, he is said to have understood 22 languages. Rizal was not only a novelist but also a poet, essayist, historian, musician, painter, and sculptor. (World Book Encyclopedia 2003).

We also saw the Makati City financial district. Makati is a bustling cosmopolitan city, a few kilometres from Manila, stretching comfortably over almost 3,000 hectares and housing nearly 500,000 people. Continued rapid growth over the past 25 years has made Makati the commercial, communication and financial centre of the Philippines where trendy boutiques, fashionable restaurants and department stores mingle with banks, corporate head offices and embassies. The World War II Manila American Cemetery and Memorial, on the southeastern outskirts of the city, was of great interest to a military history buff like me. It contains the largest number of graves of American military dead of the Second World War, a total of 17,206, most of whom gave their lives in operations against the Japanese in New Guinea and the Philippines. The headstones are aligned in eleven plots forming a generally circular pattern, set among masses of a wide variety of tropical trees and shrubbery.

In Manila you see a contrast between two extremes: great poverty, with beggars, shanty towns, and homeless people, and great affluence, with luxury apartment towers, sprawling, modern shopping malls, and leafy, exclusive gated residential communities with guards at the entrance. Reading newspaper letter columns, one sensed that many Filipinos struggle to make a living, and are unhappy with their lot in life. You learn more by seeing these things for yourself rather than just reading about them.

January 18, 2005

More scintillating SIL table talk. This time it was about missionary health issues. Normally when matters medical are discussed at the dinner table, I discreetly put down my cutlery and push my plate away to show my squeamishness. Tonight I decided to be polite by leaving the table as soon as I'd finished eating. Hopefully tomorrow will be more interesting. In all honesty, I feel tired and depleted, and very much ready to come home. The key to getting through the next two days will be to focus on why I came here in the first place, and to consider how this will hopefully be of some lasting benefit to SIL.

January 19, 2005

Tonight I met Daniel Singh’s friend, Anna, with whom he corresponds via email. There was nothing out of the ordinary happening here; just meeting a friend of a friend. It was about 8.00, and I was sitting in the guesthouse lounge, when the gate guard called to say that there was a visitor to see me. Her and and a friend were there with a taxi. I introduced myself to them, shook hands, and we went off to Megamall, a massive shopping centre comparable in size to Chadstone in Melbourne. I was pretty tired, and didn’t feel like doing much. We ended up going to some coffee shop for a drink. Anna herself didn’t have much to say; her friend did more of the talking. She didn’t understand most of what I was saying, and smiled and nodded a lot just to be polite. They seemed nice enough, but I don't know what they made of me, a sickly young Australian man with a strange accent. I should explain that at this time, I was coming down with something. Then there was the man behind the counter at the coffee shop they took me to. To order a drink, I had to speak in an American twang for him to understand me, pronouncing soda as soder rather than sodah.

January 20, 2005

Without going into the specifics, I spent all of today sick in bed with a fever. This was hardly the best way to spend my last full day in the country, taking various tablets, eating crackers and soft fruit, and drinking cans of lemonade. The guesthouse staff did a good job of looking after me. Fortunately, it was only one of those 24 hour things, so although I wasn’t fully recovered, I was well enough to go home the next day as scheduled. Unfortunately, it also meant that I wasn't able to properly say goodbye to everyone at the centre, especially those who made my time in the Philippines possible, or to thank them for their kindness and hospitality.

Afterthoughts

It hasn’t been easy, but in a number of ways, I believe that this trip has been a worthwhile experience. What it all means in the longer term for me remains to be seen. All I can say at this stage is that the door has been opened, and it will probably remain that way. I'd definitely consider another short-term trip in the future. What follows are just some initial impressions. I’ve been impressed by the calibre of the people I’ve met. The Christians here are simple people. I was deeply touched by their warmth, substance, and genuineness. Iit has given me a greater appreciation of the work of missionaries, which I’ll continue to support prayerfully and financially. It has also given me greater respect and appreciation of people from different cultural backgrounds. Most importantly of all, my relationship with God has been enriched. I prayed that He would get me through this time, and He did, although in hindsight, I should have sought His comfort more when I needed it. This time away has also helped me to get back into the habit of having a devotion time each morning. In short, I’d recommend taking a short-term mission trip to anyone who may be looking to take a step of faith, and who wants to deepen their relationship with God. Your life will never be the same again.