Luperon

No Dispacho, No Dispacho, Si Dispacho!!!

Posted on February 18, 2017 by Deborah

Ok, let me see where we left off….we had been denied exit authorization on Monday. So Tuesday we had planned to keep a low profile and specifically NOT see any of the officials or the Comandante in hopes that over time he would get over his little power trip thing and whatever may have been stirred up by him losing control of his harbor and vessels leaving without authorization the day before. Unfortunately in the afternoon as we were walking back to the boat from town the Comandante spotted us before we spotted him. He approached us and after a quick greeting he told us something of which we got out of: GO NOW. We were not sure if it was that we needed to go now or he wanted us to go now. Either way the weather window that we wanted to use Monday was closed and gone and there was now a north wind. Not bad weather- just not the weather we needed or we probably would have just accepted and gone- no questions asked. Instead we told him that, no, we wanted to leave tomorrow (when the wind direction was good again). He shook his head. No, no…got a phone call….bad weather….can’t go tomorrow-no despacho. Seriously?!? Here we go again! I immediately walked over to the bar we’ve been going to everyday and asked for bartender to just translate for us and he did. We explained the weather was very good tomorrow and we needed to leave then. After a lot more talking than we asked for to be translated the bartender told us we would be OK tomorrow. We looked over at the Comandante, said Thank You, and confirmed that we were all good for clearing out tomorrow. He didn’t look happy and was looking at the ground but said yes. I am not sure what this has been all about but I know it is not the weather! I also don’t know how much of where we were now standing factored into what had just happened. Wendy’s bar, the main cruisers hang-out, is run by a local family and also an ex-pat (married into the family). Norm, the expat, runs the morning VHF cruisers net and always asks for any reports of problems encountered with the locals and asks for new boaters to report any excessive requests experienced while clearing in and dealing with the officials. He has been working hard on cleaning up the reputation and improving the experience of the visitors to bring more people back into the town. As we walked back down the street the Comandante offered us a ride in his shiny, chromed-out, decaled-up personal car. Thank goodness we were stepping into one last shop and could politely decline. It was weird even though we got an OK, we were not feeling that confident that everything was going to go smoothly on Wednesday.

Early Wednesday morning we gathered with our friends on Blabber and Antares and all together headed ashore to hopefully get our despachos. We commented to each other that we saw people working on the Navy boat and they even had the engine room hatches open. Prepping for futures escapees? We also saw the Comandante on the pier. Together we walked up the hill to the office and once again asked for our despachos. I know you are going to just as surprised as we were to hear the answer…. “No despacho”. This time they cited that the Comandante was in Puerto Plata. No despachos today. BS. He was in the harbor. We, well our friends that speak better Spanish than us, explained that we were told no problems today by the Comandante himself yesterday-please give him a call. We sat down and waited. I think they knew we were going to stay until we had a resolution. After a while of politely going back and forth and just smiling while we waited one of the guys had us fill out a piece of paper and they took photos of our passports with their phones (nothing is done on computers). Then we were told we could meet them on the dock at 12. They wouldn’t give us a copy of the papers we just filled out. I got the feeling he had just done it so that we would leave, but since he had given us a time, we hoped we were wrong. Keith took me back to the boat since I was feeling crappy, he had shared his germies with me, and he went back to the dock to wait just in case they were early. (We wanted no excuses) By eleven we heard from another boater that they would come out at 2:30. This was cutting it too tight, we needed to leave in the afternoon to make our whole trip work-besides they didn’t tell any of us that. At noon no one showed up.

Before we got to the DR I had written down the number for the US Embassy in Santo Domingo just in case we got ourselves into something scary while touring. I never envisioned requiring it from the boat. While technically we were being held without our consent for a bogus reason- I wasn’t ready to call it that yet (nor-do I really believe it was that yet). The whole situation evoked range of emotions including frustration, confusion, dismay, and sometimes even humor over the last three days-but we never felt fearful or scared. Not even a little. However, now, humor was long gone and so was the just go-with-the-flow and accept it attitude and we really needed to leave within a few hours for a safe trip. The situation was starting to turn into something else if we missed this opportunity. I started playing out the phone call to the Embassy in my head. Ben and Keith went to find the Comandante as they had not told us it was going to be later. Finally by a little after 1:00 we had gathered the officials (we didn’t need to go to Puerto Plata to find them) and loaded them into our dinghies and brought them out to our boats. We were first. We filled out the same little piece of paper we filled out in the morning and as we did we handed out cold bottles of water. The Comandante was not interested- he wanted something better. Sorry. We had bought several bottles of rum specifically with the intention of giving them to the officials, but after the past few days of antics I plan on drinking them myself. ( I am glad we bought them nice rum!) We don’t have a problem with giving a tip to make things smooth or show appreciation but not in this scenario. They didn’t ask us for more gifts but they did on the other boats. They, as our friend described perfectly, acted like rotten, rude children while aboard and their talk about the women on the boats in front of and to the husbands was off-the-chart unprofessional and vulgar.

FINALLY!!!! We had our despacho!!! I was also now the proud owner of a 102.8 fever. Awesome. What a way to start off a 50+ hour sail!

If you read our blog because maybe one day you may want to travel the same path (it is why I have read so many blogs the past few years), I don’t want this one situation to be the take-away of the Dominican Republic. Please, please don’t let this be the only story that you share when talking about this country. Just like I don’t want to be judged because of the man that heads the US, it would not be fair to judge the DR on the perversions of their Armada. Toss a bottle of hand-sanitizer, a roll of toilet paper, and a map in your backpack and enjoy the DR. It is worth the “troubles”!!! Really, don’t pass it up just because of a few child-like men.

On that note- instead of writing about our passage (I am typing this post from Boquerón, Puerto Rico), I would rather share two short stories that better wrap up our experience in DR and leave on a happier thought.

One Beer Bottle of Gasoline

One of the days that I was feeling lethargic Keith took the motorcycle out for drive by himself. We had already learned here that you do not fill up the tank before your return your rented vehicle, you just put in what you use for the day. (Even if you are renting two days in a row) He was just riding aimlessly but started to head back to the town when the gas was low- he thought he had put just enough in to last the day. Not quite. He ran out on one of the country roads. He switched to the reserve tank (that had been full the day before) and found it to be empty now too. Whoops! A car stopped immediately and tried to help Keith switch to the empty reserve tank, then a guy from the closest house came out to help, then his brother came out too. The brother tried to blow through the lines and make sure they were not blocked. Not much they can do when there was no gas! They offered to call him a motoconcho, but Keith was just going to push the bike back to town (he had almost made it back). The guys suggested he stop a few houses down first. Keith stopped when he saw some guys working on a bike, but that was too far. The guys gave him a “push” back up the hill (They drove on their bike and put their foot on his making it go). At this house more people came out to help. One was carrying a Presidente Grande beer bottle full of gasoline. Love it. The guy filled it up, choked it and even started it for Keith. Keith could have done it himself but they wanted to assist. Keith made sure to pay for the gas (It is the one very expensive thing here) and give big “gracias-es” all around. Just one more way to make some new friends. He made it into town and bought a few more pesos of gas to finish off playing for the day.

Our Valentines Date

The night after we were supposed to have left was Valentines Day. We, in general, don’t do holidays but the town was quite excited about the day and we got excited too. Red a white balloons were getting stuck on motorcycles and in doorways. Women were getting their hair done up in big curlers and the men were gathering slabs of meat and collecting vegetables getting ready to cook a big meal. Wendy’s Bar was hosting a dance and Freddie was making a pot of Sancocho. They were providing lessons for Merengue and Salsa later. It didn’t matter that we both felt completely crappy, we knew this was a night we shouldn’t miss! I guess for Valentines Day it is customary to cook a huge meal and share it. All through the streets were large cauldrons of meaty stews over wood fires set on cinderblocks being stirred with long sticks. We were invited to taste them as we walked by. The one we had for dinner was green and bubbly. It looked like a witches brew- complete with bones and everything! It was the best thing I can remember tasting! It was like chicken soup- but with three types of meat- and little like split pea soup as it was thick and creamy. It had lots of vegetables and herbs in it. I’m going to Google it later, but there is no chance I could ever cook it the same. The bar served it in huge bowls for free. As we were laughing and enjoying the night Keith said “I’m not ready to leave here yet.” Umm…That is good-because at the moment we can’t! We wanted to hang around to watch the dancing but didn’t make it that late. We heard the rest of the night was all fun. It was still a very enjoyable date and now we need to go back so we can get those dance lessons we missed!

DR, you are a happy, welcoming, fantastic, fun, green, tasty country. We can’t wait to come back!

Denied Exit

Posted on February 15, 2017February 14, 2017 by Deborah

Dominican Republic has been a blast, but it is time to move along. After monitoring all our normal weather sites for a few days and even getting a personalized weather forecast/routing report from Chris Parker (the professional marine weather forecaster/router) we were all a GO for leaving Luperon and headed to Samana, our next port in the DR and about 130 miles away. Normally we would just up anchor and be underway within ten minutes but here in the DR you not only have to clear in and out of the country, you also have to clear in and out of each port. You have to do this within an hour of leaving. This is really, really difficult to do when the officials only keep office hours and most of the sailing around here is done at night or very early morning when the trade winds die down. Lucky for us we found another great weather window with the winds so light we were afforded the opportunity to sail all the way to Samana without having to make stops along the coast or trying to leave at midnight.

Ready to go, we went to visit the officials. We waited on the stoop about 20 min for the first of them to show up and unlock the offices, then we made our way through each department filling out papers, checking passports, and, of course, paying money. It went smoothly though. Once the paperwork was all done we had to go to their Navy and have the Comandante (the big guy in charge) give us our despacho. The despacho is the piece of paper that allows you to leave the harbor and clear into the next harbor. Before you leave they will also come out to the boat and check things out (or collect gifts- however you might want to look at it). We walked up to the offices at the top of the hill and showed them our completed paperwork and receipts and asked for our despacho. No despacho. We asked as many different ways as we could think of but still only got “no despacho”. After a while of working out the language differences we figured out that they were not going to give us permission to leave the country because they thought the weather was bad. We were very confused. The weather was good-not bad. Even though we had spent hours checking the weather the last two days and were confident that we had a good and safe window to travel, we thought maybe they had some valuable local knowledge about something we missed. Another boater who was also trying to get permission to leave asked what was the concern with the weather. The officers couldn’t tell us exactly because they have no internet to see for themselves. It seems like some guy in the city told them the weather was bad. Awesome.

We were not the only boat trying to leave, at least seven boats that we knew of were asking for permission to leave but no one was allowed to go. Confusion and frustration was certainly palpable. We tried to convince ourselves that perhaps they were acting in our best interests and maybe saving us from some unknown dangerous conditions offshore that we couldn’t see despite all of our data, but this was coming from the same people who can not understand why you need to leave the harbor at certain times of the day (or night) in order to either avoid bad weather or to get into the next harbor by a certain time for safety reasons. I won’t even go into the aspect that we all captain our own boats and they are our homes and our decisions on when and where to travel and in what conditions are ones we take seriously and full responsibility for- nor do we leave those decisions for others who do not know our boats or how they travel! To add to our doubts we started hearing from a few locals that perhaps the restaurants did not want the cruisers to leave-they would miss the business. As we were watching our good and safe weather window slip away in front of us, I found this suggestion unsettling. However, we did not get even the slightest impression from the officials that money would have changed the situation. We gathered with the crews from Antares and Blabber in the local plaza and used the Wi-Fi to try to find the source of this mysterious bad weather. While the group was convening I wandered off to find the ever elusive Dominican Republic toilet. After a few strikes I found a café that looked promising. The old man at the counter asked me “just pee-pee?”. “Si, Senor.” Like most bathrooms here-no water so no flush. Just a little more weirdness thrown into an already bizarre morning. We never found why they thought the weather was no good. Wind was under 10k and seas 2-4. Long period swell. No squalls.

Defeated, we tried to regroup and make a new plan. We decided to wait for two more days because we think the weather should be decent enough to sail all the way across the Mona Passage and to Puerto Rico without making any more stops in the DR. We had already heard there are a lot of problems in Samana with corruption. Like here, we had thought we would just go with an open mind but I am not sure I really want to check in and check back out through one more harbor anymore. Especially if it is supposed to be much more difficult than here! I certainly don’t want to deal with another “Hotel California” scenario. We also learned by asking around to the long-timers that refusing despachos citing weather (which, again, was in fact good) is not the norm and we were not the only ones befuddled by the denial. Oh yay- we were the exception. Grrrrrrrrrrr. On top of the up-heaved plans for the day we were not sure what to do about all the paperwork we had that was stamped for us leaving the harbor within the hour. We were assured it would be OK. I will be interested to see if we have to pay again in two days though- if we even get clearance to leave that is!

Update: At least three maybe four of the boats left the harbor after being denied permission today. I can’t say the thought didn’t cross my mind in frustration a time or two today but was quickly dismissed as we still have to sail along the coast of the country for over 150 miles before you even start to make the jump to Puerto Rico. (that takes more than 24 hours by sailboat) The local military boat doesn’t seem to be in commission at the moment as it has derelict boats tied up to it and it is growing a pretty good reef on its bottom, but it is not like you can out-sail a phone call. There are other military boats in the fleet. This evening we saw a disgruntled looking Comandante commandeer a go-fast Panga fishing boat with a large outboard motor. He had a list of all the boats in the harbor and was going around carefully doing a roll-call. We also heard calls on the VHF to at least two of the escaped boats. The go-fast boat did not leave the harbor to go after the missing boats after the attendance was taken so I’m not sure what, if any, the repercussions might be. Should be interesting to see what the next few days bring.

Love Sick

Posted on February 14, 2017February 14, 2017 by Deborah

We fell in love with the DR on sight and with every step further into this beautiful country we seemed to fall deeper and harder. Within a week we had already decided that we wanted to spend hurricane season here instead of Grenada. Keith picked out which motorcycle he would buy and I was amassing lists of the places to go. Envisioning a much further place in the future our ears perked up when the cost of land was discussed and we have been diligently practicing our Rosetta Stone Spanish lessons in the morning and trying to learn as fast as we can. If your idea of pretty is manicured, you might not see it, but the towns have a beauty to them and the countryside, well, obviously it is breathtaking. It is the people though, the people, that make us just want to be a part of this place. If I had to pick one description I would say happy. They are happy. And they act happy. They make us happy. No doubt, we caught the DR love bug.

Did you sense a “but” coming on”?

While we love almost everything about Luperon, as the days go on and the rush of love chemicals begin to mellow, we have started to miss water-of all sorts. We are missing clean water to swim in and fish in. The harbor, though pretty, has filthy water. All the street gutters and sewers lead into it and there is almost always a sheen of diesel on the surface from the old fishing boats. We also miss fresh water. Because of the pollution we can not run the water maker so we have to buy bottled water. I miss our water maker very much. We also miss running water-as in plumbing in the town. There seems to be plenty of city water available for the houses, though everyone buys bottles for cooking and drinking, but even so there is a serious lack of sinks and toilets with running water. Even the places selling food more often than not do not have a working sink. If there even is a bathroom it is unlikely that water is plumbed to the toilet. Toilet paper or soap? Not happening. I am just going to throw this out there- If you can’t wash your hands, the person prepping your food can’t either, if the person cooking your food didn’t wash their hands you start to notice that there are also no toilets. Just saying. Even beyond food prep the hand washing thing is exhausting. Keith had someone blow their nose into the street with his fingers and immediately hold out his hand to shake. Unfortunately , the love bug was not the only thing we caught. We’ve both picked up some cruds.. Me gastro, Keith respiratory. Now we are just trying not to swap with each other. After a few days of being feverish and lethargic the lack of hygiene and sanitation all around starts becoming harder to ignore and the desire for clean water more intense.

Yes, we eat just about anything or anywhere. To be honest the street food sometimes feels safer at least it is coming straight off a hot grill or out of a pot of boiling oil. They have been safe so far. It is the sit down places that have pained me. We also eat non-peelable veggies. A no-no. I can’t help it the produce here is gorgeous! It just gets a healthy bleach bath first.

We also learned something else about ourselves that has no reflection on Luperon: We both seemed to have an infinite attention span for blue water, but a finite attention span for green peaks. After only three weeks, I only glance at the beautiful mountains surrounding our anchorage where as I could sit and just watch the tide go in and out all day long everyday when the water is pretty.

With all of that said, we love the DR. But maybe in more of a summer fling kind of way and not a soul-mate kind of way. We will be back, I am sure, but for now I think it is time to head out and there is a good weather window coming up.

Baseball

Posted on February 4, 2017February 7, 2017 by Deborah

After two days of motorcycle touring and a day of waterfall jumping and cock fights, today’s only adventure was to find a barber shop and a salon to get out hair done.

The lovely family that rents us the motorcycles has been very helpful in learning our way around. Keith asked one of the older sons, Ronnie, for a recommendation for a barber and he walked us through town. The first barber was on the second story up a very steep and narrow set of concrete stairs. He didn’t know what to do with Keith’s blond head so we followed Ronnie to another barber. At first we got a little panicked when he just started hacking haphazardly at his head, but it was just because its been so long since he got it cut and he was getting to a starting point. I turned out to be one of the most meticulous cuts he has gotten. We took a break and had breakfast at our usual little shop and then we went off in search of a salon. There are several here, I got a recommendation for Antonia’s. She was delightful and had a tiny room in her house to work out of. She pulled up a picture of what she was doing so no surprises. I got the full experience with big curlers on my head and all. I am sure Keith enjoyed waiting the whole time.

By Saturday morning we were ready again for some more action. The locals organize a softball game between themselves and the boaters. When we got to the field the kids were playing, they ranged in age from probably 6-17. It was fun to watch. Baseball is taken very seriously here, I think the Dominican Republic has the most or second most amount of professional players. When the local guys started showing up on the field Keith had some second thoughts about playing- they looked tough and to be honest quite intimidating! I had enough bumps from the waterfalls, I didn’t even contemplate participating. It became evident pretty quick that they were there to just have a good time. They didn’t take themselves seriously at all. Keith joined in. It was a good time. The local guys would pretend to miss a ball or slo-mo run to the base. Even then boaters still only managed to score one point! The game had take a recess while a heard of cows wandered through. They stopped in the outfield to graze.

^^Think he wants to be a baseball player when he grows up?

^^They provided the gear for the boaters. Clearly labeled even.

After the game everyone-the kids, the locals, and the boaters-hung out at the corner bar. They had provided the game, we contributed to the beer and soda. The beer is drunk more like wine here, a bottle is ordered and it is shared in little plastic cups. Very social. I love it. Ben from Blabber started to serenade the group with a song from the radio and about caused those tough-looking guys to snort their beers. Lots of laughs. We are going to do it again next week for sure. I can’t believe we arrived only a week ago today- it has been one very active week!! (edit: I am a full week behind getting this post loaded up-the game today was just as fun)

On Sunday we went to the real softball game between the Luperon team, Los Normans, and a nearby town. This time we got to see the serious side of the game. Wow, they pitch fast! Definitely fun to watch and neither of us are sports fans. We will do it again too.

Motorcycles!!!!

Posted on January 29, 2017January 29, 2017 by Deborah

Keith, I may have mentioned once or twice, has been obsessed with getting on a motorcycle here. He finally rented one for the day.Unfortunately we had to stay close by because the cold front was arriving and we were not sure what to expect in the harbor. We had so much fun just touring close by that after telling Antares and Blabber about it we all rented motorcycles for the next day. They cost about $10.00 a day. We had already rode around so much that our butts hurt, but it didn’t stop us from going again!

We had arranged to have three motorcycles the night before and they were waiting for us in the morning.

^^ Walewijn, Quirijn and Hedda from Antares all set to go!

^^ Ben and Ingrid from Blabber all set to go!

^^Wright Away all set to go!

We quickly left the town and got on the country roads. There are lots of small family farms. Some had gardens and field crops others had pastures. It was very overcast but the views were still stunning!

We passed lots of horseback/donkeyback riders. Some were herding cattle some were carrying produce. Others were just traveling.

^^ One of many “where are we- where should we go” stops. Also provided a “give my butt a break” stop.

^^ One of many traffic jams we encountered. It is against the law to honk your horn at a cow here. Not that we ever would.

Everyone we met was so helpful and everyone we passed waved and shouted “hola”. It was easy to find someone willing to help with directions and if we were stopped on the side of the road to rest or sightsee we were asked if everything was OK.

The floods that hit Haiti also hit the Dominican Republic. We came across a bridge that had be swept away in the floods. This man has made a raft and ferries the motorcycles, and their riders, across the river. It was so fun to watch.

^^Here is us deciding whether we should cross the river or not. It looked like a fun experience, but in the end we decided not to. We were not sure what was on the other side of the river and also we were afraid that when we came back the raft tender might not be there anymore. Sensibility won out and we chose another route.

^^ The horse did not ride on the raft, it crossed up river where it was a shallower.

^^ Another traffic jam

^^ One more traffic jam.

^^ We stopped in the small beach town of La Isabella to grab lunch. It had the perfect little beach shack. We were the only ones around and it was beautiful!

^^ Despite the bar offering a picture menu, it didn’t have a tourist feel to it.

^^ Perhaps not the most local choice of cuisine, but I think the brothers that owned the shack were from Spain. I think, I’m not sure. The pizza was good though!

We rode around for a few more hours and stopped at the ice-cream shop next to the red and white polka dot café. An ice-cream cone is about 50 cents here.

It was another fantastic day!!!

Luperon- A Little More

Posted on January 28, 2017January 28, 2017 by Deborah

We couldn’t wait to see more of the town of Luperon the next morning so we set off in search of breakfast. It was actually harder to find than we expected. It was hard to tell what many of the shops have to offer and we don’t have enough skills to ask a lot of questions. We finally came across a tiny shop with little tiny tables in it and we asked if they served breakfast. The gentleman waved us in and from there we have no idea what he said or what we ordered. His wife brought us out two ham and cheese tostadas-and they were perfect. He helped us work out our Spanish for the items and gave us tastes of his fresh squeezed juices. It was so good and he was so nice we ended up going back there the next day too. By then we were able to place our order using complete sentences. Woohoo! Two tostadas and two fresh juices is less than $2.50 so why not. Plus, the owner is so patient and we had fun sharing our Spanish/English book to have a basic conversation. He liked looking up words in it too. I think we will become regulars.

Even though we had just eaten breakfast the smell of the pork and chicken being cooked over a fire drew us to these street vendors. They gave us samples and Keith bought a 100 pesos worth of pork. It comes in a plastic bag and no napkin. (I’ve already learned to go no where without hand sanitizer!)

^^ This lucky pup got some pork too.

We were standing on some corner, with our still greasy hands, Spanish book, and a piece of paper with notes when a motorcycle stopped and asked if we were finding everything alright. Might we have looked too obvious? We started talking to him and it was a fellow cruiser anchored two boats away from ours. He came here seven years ago and fell in love with the place and never left. He was pointing out where everything was and what to see when he said to just jump on and he would give us a tour- it would be easier. So we did. I know, you probably think we are crazy or stupid, but it really felt fine to do. (And, spoiler, it absolutely was) He gave us a tour of the town then drove us out to the beach where there is a cute little beach bar. We pull up to find Ingrid and Ben (Blabber) had already found the beach bar!

^^Photo credit to Ingrid (thanks!)

We stayed and shared a beer with Bruce (the guy driving us around) and absorbed as much info as we could. He also gave Keith the details on where and how to buy a motorcycle here if we are going to stay for any period of time. Oh boy. While we were there Hedda, Walewijn, and Quiryijn (Antares) wandered up. Funny, with no planning we all found the same place! After our beer we hopped back on the bike with Bruce to finish our tour and went next to the marina. We met some more cruisers and Bruce’s wife and hung out for a while. Bruce was staying for lunch and we were still full from our pork so we decided to walk back to town. Half way up the hill we started second guessing our choice, these hills are steep. Just then the boat boy, Handy Andy, drove up on his motorcycle and offered to call us a motoconcho but before he could he flagged down a friend of his in a yellow jeep and we had a ride back to town. It turned out it was another cruiser who also owned land here, we had even met him before in the Abacos!

^^We finished up the day on our boat with Blabber and Antares eating Mahi tacos from the fish we got on our sail here.

^^ I love how the “slips” are made using branches stuck in a line.

^^We did a little exploring with all the boats we sailed in with one day. At any one time we would have one conversation going on in English, Dutch, French and Spanish. I have come home mentally exhausted every night! Even with out trying our brains are working overtime trying to pick out the familiar and put context to the unfamiliar. More Advil please! Really, it is SO much fun.

We introduced Blabber and Antares to our new breakfast spot, the owner, whose name I still don’t quite have, was sharing a fruit that he juices. None of us had seen or tasted it before. He calls it Jauga. It is very sweet and makes a nice juice.

^^ Vendors like this are common. We see them selling everything from bananas to shoes. We haven’t been approached by any of them wanting us to buy something.

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