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ardysez

~ surrender to yourself

ardysez

Tag Archives: England

hurts so good…

13 Saturday Oct 2018

Posted by Ardys in Travel

≈ 12 Comments

Tags

England, life, Spain, Travel, USA

Three days home. Travel brain is nearly gone and home-brain is working again. Mostly.

We have been away traveling for nearly six weeks. I was going to give you a heads up that I might not be writing and then, with no warning, I developed a nasty head cold a week out from departure. It did not go away before flying. This is not a good thing. If you have ever had to fly when your sinuses are in turmoil, you will know what I mean. In fact the cough and sinus stuff did not leave until three weeks into the trip. So, I was not feeling like writing much of anything and hope you understand.

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Guggenheim exterior, Bilbao, Spain

Travel is a good thing. It is. But it is not among the easier undertakings one might pursue. When I say travel, I’m not talking about a vacation to the beach where you bask all day, between margaritas and naps. Our version of travel, while perhaps not arduous, does deplete one’s energy. We walk a lot, see a lot, process a lot of information. Therein lies the second physical challenge for this trip. Walking. I have had a sore foot for months. It gets better and then worse, then even worse still, which it did on the trip. ‘Plantar Fasciitis’ is a common problem for which there is not much known about either cause or cure. Some things work and some don’t. Sometimes it leaves and sometimes it doesn’t. I know because I had it 15 or so years ago and that is exactly what I experienced. The exercises the podiatrist gave me did not work, in fact made it worse. Stopping them, adding stretches of my own saw it go away in a couple of months. This time I’ve had it much longer, have tried both the previous methods of stretching, as well as nothing, had a couple of days of complete absence of symptoms but essentially nothing has fixed it. So I walked. In pain. For six weeks.

I dropped into bed every night of the trip, exhausted mentally and physically, but did actually manage to take in the experiences and enjoy it for the most part. Just not the pain.

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Well’s Cathedral Musical Director practicing with musicians for a future performance.

And while we are at it, there are a few other things I will enjoy not dealing with for a while.

  1. having to forage for every meal based on food intolerances. This is not easy and I spent a good deal of the time being hungry. Yes, I lost weight.
  2. having a different shower to figure out with each and every change of accommodation…It is a fact, every hotel in the world has a different shower mechanism from every other hotel. Am sure there was a primordial agreement in the ethers that caused this to happen.
  3. soooo much processed food…if it says on the packet it is healthy for you, it isn’t. Generally, food that is good for you doesn’t come in packets. And while I’m thinking of it, not everything must be consumed on a waffle or wrapped in bread, piled on pasta or rice or have onion or garlic flavouring added.
  4. searching for a place to wash our clothes—I nearly kissed my washing machine when we returned home. What do other travellers do to clean their clothes? Hand washing is just not possible, most hotels and B&B’s don’t even allow it, and frankly, hand washing is not my idea of travel fun.
  5. crowds—I can hear the neighbour’s little dog yapping this morning, and even that is music to my ears compared to crowded, noisy places.
  6. the smell of cigarette smoke in front of every building on every street in every country.
  7. filthy toilets–having to lay toilet paper on the seat before I can sit down, because there are never paper seat covers in the toilets where they are needed, only the cleanest ones have them! Humans are filthy creatures at times.
  8. bad coffee—there are a lot of people who don’t realise you can have the best coffee machine but if the beans are bad, it won’t make good coffee. Likewise, stewing coffee or storing it in an urn is just ruining any chance that coffee has of being good.
  9. loud mouth people in airports, especially on their cell/mobile phones (don’t you know everyone around can hear you? and does not care about your employee problems??)
  10. crappy hairdryers–(my husband hypothesised, there must have been someone traveling just ahead of us putting the same bad hairdryer in each different hotel, or there had been an excellent sales pitch to sell the same inferior device to four different hotel chains!) I have a new shorn hair style and vow not to need a hairdryer for future travels.
  11. bad lighting in bathrooms—worst lighting prize went to two, otherwise nice, B&B’s, best lighting prize goes to the Sheraton at the Falls in Niagara Falls, with a magnification makeup/shaving mirror with it’s own lighting as well as a surround light for the large mirror. Bless them.
  12. filthy, smelly taxis—our daughter has promised to explain to us how to use UBER. Nuff said.
  13. and while I’m at it, taxi drivers who use their phones while driving (not to mention bus drivers who talk on their phone WHILE filling out paperwork, WHILE driving—please leave multitasking to people who are not driving, or walking down the street)
  14. High fructose corn syrup—my sworn enemy.

The foot is strapped and receiving regular ice packs. The mountain of laundry is done, repairs to the garden are nearly done. And there are murmurs…of future adventure…

What keeps me traveling? I’m glad you asked. The mechanics of it are tiring, frustrating and downright unpleasant at times. However…when things take my breath away, or a sudden connection of a piece of knowledge turns on a light inside me, or something unexpected brings me to tears, it feels all worthwhile. When I see Wells Cathedral and a lump sticks in my throat, when I am gobsmacked by the incredible Guggenheim at Bilbao, when a Spanish woman spins her grandson in dance to a Basque folk song, when the most powerful show of water I’ve ever seen tumbles and mesmerises so that I can hardly look away, or when I stop in an ancient cemetery and realise that the man in that grave signed the Declaration of Independence…that is when I know I’m not done yet.

It hurts so good…give me more.

Samuel Adams resting place in downtown Boston, Mass.
Samuel Adams resting place in downtown Boston, Mass.
Niagara Falls from the Canadian side
Niagara Falls from the Canadian side
Dancing to the Basque Folk songs in Donostia-San Sebastian
Dancing to the Basque Folk songs in Donostia-San Sebastian

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Give me a head with hair…

20 Tuesday Aug 2013

Posted by Ardys in Life, Recommendations

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

Darwin, England, Hair, hair care products, Moroccan Oil, Oxford

long beautiful hair. 
Shining, gleaming, streaming, flaxen, waxen…

Flaxen, Waxen?

Flaxen, Waxen?

Our hair is given to keep us humble.  I have thought as well as repeated this many times in my life.  As mine has greyed it has changed texture in places and only gotten more difficult to manage.  Does this mean I am more humble?  Possibly.  More frustrated?  Certainly.

Sorry fellas, this one may not interest you, but there’s something for you at the end, so scroll down…

Recently when we were travelling in Darwin and the UK, the heat and humidity caused my hair to do very abnormal things.  Some days I took on a very Medusa-like quality, both in appearance and temperament, I fear, due to the frustrations of trying to manage my locks.  After about 10 days of looking bedraggled and be-frizzed, I determined I would find a local hair salon in Oxford and see if they could recommend something.  No sooner had I decided upon this course of action, and I saw a very busy, upmarket looking salon. As I peered through the window there was a young woman with the good taste to sport almost exactly the same hair cut as myself. Meant to be.  Once inside I walked up to the young woman behind the counter and explained my dilemma.  She looked up at my hair standing on end, waving madly back at her and very non-judgmentally, she said “Well, your hair is fine and wavy, whereas mine is fine and straight, but have you tried Moroccan Oil?”  No, I hadn’t.  I had nearly every other hair product in the world in my suitcase or at home in the cupboard, but not that one.  To be honest, I thought it was a fad product that would run its course and since my hairdresser doesn’t sell it, and therefore he hadn’t recommended it, I had not tried it.

Magic elixir

Magic elixir

She got one from the shelf and said it was the ‘light’ version because my hair texture was fine, even though I have thick hair.  She proceeded to tell me to only use a very small amount of it or it would make my hair look oily.  The bottle she sold me was a travel size, which was very small and which she assured me would last a very long time.  From the first time I used it, it was the most fantastic product for my hair I have ever used.  And that is saying something.  It doesn’t completely keep my hair from waving in the heat and humidity, but it seriously diminishes the frizz, and makes it much more manageable when it does wave a bit.  It leaves no discernable residue on my hair, which nearly all other products do, and it has a very pleasant, very mild scent, and leaves my hair shiny. It works just as well now that I am home in a drier, cooler climate. Even using it every day for about 5 weeks now, I am not even halfway through the tiny little travel size bottle.

After the third day of using it, I threw the two heavy bottles of hair product I was lugging around into the rubbish bin, and now that I’m home I will do the same with all the other products taking up space in the cupboard.  I have found my hair’s holy grail.  The quest is over.  Peace at last.

If you choose to try it, consult with the hair salon who is selling it, and see which they recommend for you, the regular or the light version.  I would love to know what you think of it.  So often what is good for one person is not good for others, so I hope this is of some value to someone out there.

And now for the photo for the fellas….

Digger and jack hammer

Digger and jack hammer

At 7.35 this morning, the heavy equipment and jack hammer appeared to dig up our driveway.  My poor little Desert Pea is quaking in its roots.

X Ardys

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Oxford

06 Saturday Jul 2013

Posted by Ardys in gardening, People, Travel

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Alice, botanic garden, England, Oxford, white rabbit

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What do you suppose the chances are that there would be a place in both Oxford, Ohio, and Oxford, England by the name of The White Rabbit? Last week I would have guessed pretty long odds on that happening. But today I have learned that the author of Alice in Wonderland, Lewis Carroll, (whose real name was Charles Dodgson) was a prominent figure here, having lived for 47 years at the Christ Church college, first as an undergraduate and then as a maths ‘don’. He created the Alice stories for the daughter of the dean. I am now thinking his white rabbit character may be inextricably linked with the place name… Or not, I really don’t know.

The White Rabbit shop that I knew many years ago, in Oxford, Ohio, was a gift shop, whereas the one in Oxford, England is a pub. Still, it was a bit of a shock to look up and see that familiar name after all these years. I saw a rather large rabbit in the street and should have asked him but he seemed very busy at the time.

Just after I wrote the above paragraph I put on my tourist hat and headed for the Oxford University Botanic Gardens. On what day do you think I arrived? Well, besides July 6, that is… it was ‘Alice Day’. I’m not making this up! I know they are referring to Lewis Carroll’s Alice, but I mean really, what are the chances of someone from Alice Springs turning up on Alice day? Come to think of it, this whole Oxford experience is starting to feel a bit Alice in Wonderland-ish!

Some lovely specimens in the Botanic garden, it goes without saying, but the human specimens were really so varied and spectacular, I was pleased I was wandering the streets alone so I could study them all. I have few photographs to show you but the snapshots are mostly in my head. Seated on a bench early one morning was a very sad, battered and bruised homeless couple, holding on to each other, as if they had nothing else left. I witnessed another homeless woman eating from a discarded takeaway container as she stood over a rubbish bin. We see these scenes everywhere nowadays, sadly. Another lady walking down the High street lovingly cradled her frail, old, tiny Chihuahua in one arm, designer handbag on the other arm. People were in every fashion style, from every culture, speaking every language possible, and in varying stages of undress on a warm summer day. A crowd had gathered on Cornmarket Street to watch three young, very fit ladsperforming hip hop dance moves and gymnastics to appreciative onlookers. There were a number of student groups, but one took my notice in particular, a group of probably 14yr old Italian students. All must have been related to Sophia Loren as they were without exception the most gorgeous group of young people I have ever seen, like young gods and goddesses in training.

My most enduring memories will be the stunning college architecture steeped in hundreds of years of history, the green and peaceful gardens, the smell of locust trees in blossom shading the crosswalk outside our college, and the most idiosyncratic toilet I’ve ever used! And I will remember the cheers that went up around the campus when Andy Murray won Wimbledon! There is nothing like a University town for vitality and diversity. And there is nothing like Oxford, the original!

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(Forgive my somewhat erratic publishing and layouts, I’m learning on the ‘fly’ as the saying goes.)

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Bristol to Bridgend

06 Saturday Jul 2013

Posted by Ardys in Food, photography, Travel

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Bristol, England, Food, southern Wales, Travel, Wales

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The trip from Bristol to Bridgend in Wales took us about two hours. I knew our accommodation was on an estate that had formerly been a Large family house, but it certainly exceeded my expectations. The long driveway approach was tree-lined and majestic, especially in the misty rain. Once settled into the room we decided to fight off jet lag once again by taking a walk, even in the rain. It was gorgeous. Just what people who live in arid country in the heart of Australia long to see now and then. Toto we’re not in Oz any more!

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The gentlest of rain drops glistened like pink Argyle diamonds on the wild roses. Ivy vines enveloped the large chestnut trees as if they existed for that very purpose. It is so magical to feel you are in such a different place, so invigorating. I suppose that is the addiction I have that keeps me traveling.

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Later in the evening we had booked to eat dinner at the restaurant at Coed-Y-Mwstwr, (pronounced ‘coy de mester’), the name of the house. The service was impeccable and the food very good, tho the servings too large for me. However, I did manage to squeeze in a second try of clotted cream in the day! The clotted cream rice pudding may put me into an early grave but I will have a smile on my face!

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Our room had a gorgeous green view into a side yard with the tastefully discrete spa and gym facility as a backdrop. The mist settled in and so did we. A beautifully restful and quiet place to sleep.

On what turned out to be our only full day in Wales, we set out early the next morning and headed west. We took the motorway to save time, and motorways everywhere are much the same, but once we were into the more pastoral areas the countryside was lovely. There is something so peaceful about watching cows and sheep graze in verdant pastures, and the fields of ‘rape’ coming into blossom dotted the landscape brilliantly.

We drove to the farthest point west we thought we could comfortably return from and decided to see what we could as we worked our way back to Bridgend. On the way, to points west, we did stop at Porthcawl. The mist was very heavy and so I have no photo for you. The coast there was fairly flat with rocky beaches but a nice walk that extended along the foreshore. Next stop was Pembroke Dock which was rather industrial and didn’t hold much interest so we headed just south to Pembroke where there was supposed to be a well preserved castle. It was fantastic. It was the most intact castle of that type, we have seen and apparently the oldest tower (1200) in Britain. Beneath the fortress was an even more ancient cave dwelling that had been inhabited by cave men! Another first for us. (The odd photo of a cave with green lichen growing on the wall is the cave where the Neolithic relics were found)

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Next on the return journey was the coastal town of Tenby, heading east from Pembroke. It is a gorgeous seaside town in the tradition of scenes along the Amalfi Coast but with different light and more northern architecture. We spotted the Tenby Boatshed project that had been featured on the TV program Grand Designs. You can just make it out in my photo.

We returned to Coed-Y-Mwstwr via a slightly different route, stopping briefly for a light lunch to atone for our sins from the previous evening. Once ‘home’ again I washed my ‘smalls’, the penance for trying to travel lightly, and we retired to the comfort of the public bar and living room at the manor. After a day of atonement and penance, we couldn’t resist the allure of gluttony once again and we indulged in the delicious cider, a Guinness and those hand cut chips! What is a holiday for, after all!

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Back to Oxford for the first time

05 Friday Jul 2013

Posted by Ardys in gardening, Life, Travel

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

college days, England, gardens, lifestyle, Miami University, Oxford, university living

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I received my Bachelor of Fine Arts degree 38 years ago from Oxford… Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, that is. So it has been with great curiosity that I have come to the original Oxford. It is so named because oxen were used to pull loads across a low point of the Thames and ‘ford’ the river in this place, hundreds of years ago… ‘Oxenford’. And when I say hundreds, I mean over 800! Originally there was a Benedictine order here, mostly for the study of divinity and law. The first graduate was a monk in 1298. Humbling, isn’t it?

If one begins to reminisce very romantically about school or college days, may I suggest a brief stay in college housing from about the 1960’s to put some perspective back into the picture? Yesterday we made our way from Wales to Oxford, where my husband had been invited to present a paper based upon his recently finished doctoral thesis. We agreed to stay in Worcester college accommodation so he could be close to the conference venue and I would be close to the city and tourist destinations.

We dropped the car at the rental agency and once again we dragged our suitcases about five blocks to Worcester college… did the 60/60 check again (see previous post re: ’60/60 check’–link function is not working for me today), the old girl was struggling a bit with humidity and stairs. The entrance to the college was much like I was feeling at that exact moment, had been around a while but was holding its own. However, when we got inside the grounds I was besotted. The misty rain and grey skies had finally cleared so that the summer sun shone off, to great advantage, the English gardens and perfectly manicured lawn (which we were told ‘receives many hours of attention from gardeners; they are, therefore, to be admired rather than walked on’). That they were labour intensive, I had no doubt, for they were works of art and I had the relaxed pleasure of waiting with our cases and enjoying the main quad while Don was endowed with our keys, cards, and college instructions.

Our room was in a remote corner of the college accommodation, which was not a burdensome walk, even with suitcases, considering what we had just done. When we left the charm of the main quad, presumably the oldest buildings, we were immediately amongst the mid-20th century offerings which were not nearly so enchanting. As it turned out, however, they had something in common with their predecessors… the plumbing. It took the first 18 or so hours to figure out how our toilet was supposed to flush, but the shower was more straight forward, if not very level, so that it held water from one day to the next. And then there was the hot water tap that I was simply not strong enough to turn off, and if Don put some grunt behind turning it off, I could not turn it on again. We used the downstairs loo across the courtyard and near the laundry to avoid ‘undesirable consequences’ while we tried to unlock the secret of the never-flushing-loo. If ever I wax too lyrical about the joys of travel, will you remind me of this, please? The secret to the flush, in case you are ever in similar circumstances, was to lean heavily forward on the handle and with considerable assertiveness, push down, forcefully, and HOLD…2..3..4.. or until something happened! It was by total accident I discovered this, and it is times like this I marvel at the human capacity to improvise and adapt.

I must tell you, though, despite our challenge with the loo, in general, English public toilets are amazingly clean and available. I can’t think of another country that provides such good toilet facilities for travellers or the general public. High praise coming from someone who has had to sit, squat and hover on many a questionable toilet around the world, if I could even find one!

The college room held two single beds, which we have learned in recent years is preferable for a good night’s sleep,to a very bad double bed that dips in the middle so that you roll together all night long (newly weds excepted). There was a desk and study chair and two sitting chairs as well as a tiny bar fridge and a small built in wardrobe. Adequate but not salubrious, which, if I am honest, was about the standard of my first room at University, minus the personal fridge and bathroom. We had ‘gang showers’ and toilet cubicles that were prone to all sorts of pranks played by drunken freshman girls! Nuf said.

I confess that I was somewhat less than gracious those first few hours after arriving, and discovering we had no wireless internet except outside in the courtyard of the old ‘Buttery’, several minutes’ walk from the room. It was a charming location but nowhere near adequate for my blogging needs, or even at times for email. And to be fair, we had just left one of the most beautiful B & B’s I’ve ever stayed in, to come to a place with a non-useable loo, and I was seriously tired, and the city was seriously crowded. Where was my adventurous spirit, just when I needed it? Things were likely to look better after a night’s sleep. And never underestimate the therapeutic value of cider and a piece of homemade pecan pie and ice cream for dinner!

By the next morning, after finding a good cup of coffee, a cafe with wifi, and breakfasting in the Hall with other collegiate occupants, I’d regained my equilibrium. As my friend Joanna tweeted me, ‘plan C’ shall be ‘triumph through adversity’! Ah, yes, it brought back memories of those first awkward days and weeks at Uni all those years ago. Learning a new environment is not easy, but a good exercise, nevertheless.

For those of you wondering how the system at Oxford University works, here is what little I think I know… There are 38 individual colleges, where living as well as instruction take place. Each college must attain certain standards to have their degrees qualified by Oxford University. It seems this is done by examinations at the end of each term. One does not actually study at Oxford University, one studies at a college and the degree is conferred by Oxford University if the person attains the set standards.

The grounds of Worcester College are maintained in cooperation with the Royal Botanical Gardens at Kew and the Oxford University Botanical Gardens and are reputed to be among the finest gardens in Oxford.

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Sydney to Bristol

05 Friday Jul 2013

Posted by Ardys in Food, photography, Travel

≈ 7 Comments

Tags

Bristol, England, Food, photos, Travel

It took us 23 hours for the flights from Sydney to London, including a 90 minute transit through Dubai for me to eat a piece of Banoffe pie! (I’m kidding about the reason for the transit in Dubai, but the Banoffe pie at 1am was memorable!) We each slept about 7 hours of the trip, but of course we had been up for some 9 hours prior to flying, and I had used the hotel gym to wear myself out and compensate for the bum-numbing hours ahead.

We arrived at Heathrow about 20 minutes early, and to our shock were through immigration and customs in record time! I guess a person has to catch a break eventually, we’ve certainly had a couple of hideous transits through Heathrow in the past. We hot-footed to the central bus terminal in the Heathrow area, but trust me it is a bit of a hike. We chalked it up to our fitness for the day, or so we thought!

The bus ride to Oxford was 1.5 hours, and with available free wireless we could catch up on our media contacts during the ride. We walked five blocks in Oxford to the Avis car rental, only to find out on arrival they had moved about three or four blocks back the direction from which we had come. It left us wondering why their confirmation email the week prior had omitted this particular bit of information. Thank God for whoever invented suitcases with wheels!

Once we were in the rental car and out of Oxford on our way to Bristol, we thought the hard part was behind us. It turns out Bristol is probably the most difficult city in England to find one’s way around. No kidding. I mean to tell you this is one tough nut to crack. We had the address of our hotel but just could not reconcile the actual roads to those on the map. So we gave up and found a place to have lunch. Good lunch. Back to the task at hand.

Eventually we found the Avon Gorge Hotel, but you wouldn’t find it by accident. It is situated on the edge of a cliff overlooking the gorge of the Avon River. To the front is a narrow street that was filled with a wedding party spilling out of the hotel, when we arrived. To the back was a very steep driveway and the only parking space within coo-ee was at the very bottom. So up the very long and very steep driveway we once again trailed our suitcases to check into the hotel. I called this my 60/60 reality check. At the age of sixty and weighing sixty kilos, I was pulling a suitcase weighing 18.5kg plus a travel case carry on that must weigh at least a couple more kilos, easily a third of my body weight, up a very steep (San Francisco steep) incline. The old girl still has it.

Once checked in we took the cases down the hallway, up in the lift, down the stairs, down another hallway, down more stairs, through the fire door, down more stairs, down more stairs, and around a corner and there was our secluded, quiet little room on the garden… filled with cooking smells from the kitchen above! Neither of us had the energy to complain or move the bags further, we just hoped that the travel gods would look after us somehow.

I rang my blogging friend J who we had arranged to meet once we realised she lived exactly on our way to South Wales from Oxford. She graciously offered to come and be our guide for a walk with us to keep ourselves awake and have as much sunlight as possible so we could get over the jet lag. Once back at the hotel, we farewelled J, and slipped into the White Lion Bar and had a Guinness, a cider and a meal. The good Karma was with us and by the time we were ready for bed, most of the cooking smells in our room had dissipated. We slept well, and deservedly so, don’t you think?

Next morning we had a delicious breakfast highlighted by a decadent, gooey chocolate muffin in the Bridge Cafe at the Avon Gorge Hotel. Actually I made Don eat the muffin so I could have a taste. He didn’t argue. We checked out of the hotel and met friend J again and followed in our car to her home where she had prepared a lovely morning tea of berries and homemade cake. I tried clotted cream for the first time. Artery clogging goodness if ever there was some.

After a chatty visit and tour of the garden we bade our friends farewell and headed off West to start our adventure in Wales.
(Again I ask your indulgence as I am learning on the move. Am having problems placing my photos in the text using my iPad, which is why they are lined up at the end. And why they have not retained the captions I don’t know. If anyone has tips for me, I would appreciate it)

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