Escape Logistics

February 28th, 2020 – Lakatoro

So the last few days have been a bit bipolar. Either everything is going terrifically well, or everything is going disastrously. Tonight, all is terrific, and I’ll explain why in a moment. Firstly, let me go back to Tuesday; a French company had been in touch with the province, as they are hoping to commence a petroleum storage operation on the South side of the island. With tales and dreams of untold wealth, the province had decided to assist these investors in every way possible, and had managed to negotiate with three tribal landowners to sign a contract effectively granting the investors’ company eternal use of their land (according to the Vanuatu constitution, all land of Vanuatu belongs to the people of Vanuatu, so an outright sale isn’t possible). They were to fly in on a charter plane on Tuesday, sign a memorandum of understanding with the province officials and then fly out again, flying down to the South side of the island the following day to sign the contract with the tribal landowners and then fly out again. Their arrival and signing on Tuesday went swimmingly.

After the investors departed, the landowners and the province officials wanted to celebrate with a kava session, so we all went to a nakamal (kava bar), and started consuming the stuff in a big way. For those who aren’t aware, kava is an intoxicating drink made from stewing a locally-grown root of some sort. It is the colour of grey clay, and tastes a bit like liquorice boiled in mud and then watered down. Its effect is somewhere between marijuana and alcohol. It is an anti-stress analgesic, and makes your mouth go a bit numb after drinking. All in all, I don’t enjoy the feeling so much, but it does get you very intoxicated for not much money (as opposed to beer, which is relatively expensive). The norm is to have around 3 shells (traditionally half coconut shells, now Chinese melamine noodle bowls for reasons unknown) in an evening, but that night everyone was celebrating the first appearance of the French investors, so we had more than 5 and I started to lose count, as well as the ability to use my tongue. You will have seen my blog post from that night.

The following day, we were supposed to depart very early indeed to drive down to the South for the contract signing with the landowners. Apparently it’s a 3-4 hour drive, depending on the roads, so I was told to be ready at 4am, and a truck would come and pick me up. 3:45, I awoke, still slightly under a kava haze, and got dressed and ready to depart at 4. By 4:30, I was still waiting, and trying to figure out a way to top up the credit on my phone so that I could call Kevin. By 5:30, I figured they weren’t going to come, and gave up using the top-up system (it involves scratching codes off scraps of paper), and tried ringing Kevin using my Skype account instead. Got through, but was instantly cut off. By 6:30, I went back to bed, pretty hacked off.

Spent most of the day recovering from lack of sleep, and still pretty upset that they hadn’t picked me up. To make matters worse, it was Hunter’s Birthday, and I experienced a full-on bout of homesickness. Rather than celebrating my boy’s fifth birthday, I was sweltering in a cockroach infested dive where the people I’m supposed to be helping couldn’t even be bothered to pick me up in a truck. I was not happy at all. The following day, still no contact with Kevin, he was nowhere to be found, although I did find another councilman who explained that they realised about 2 hours into the drive that they had forgotten to pick me up. Not cool.

I was told once again that my Hep B jab would be put on a plane in the afternoon, so I hitched a ride to the airstrip, and was excited to see 2 planes arrive at the same time! Both flying the same route apparently, within 5 minutes of each other, which seems pretty nonsensical. After a few hours faff, it was determined that my vaccination was not on either plane.

So, forgotten about, uncontacted, and once again defeated by the logistics of getting my vaccination, Thursday was also a pretty poor day for me. Started wondering whether I should just throw the towel and fly to be with Jen and Hunter. A call with the VSA programme manager, Trevor, put me in a slightly better frame of mind, but I was still pretty miserable.

Then this morning, I’d be damned if I was going to traipse up the hill just to find Kevin not in his office again, so I started to plan a hike as something for me to do during the day. Just as I was about to depart, I got a call from the council President (Kevin was previously the only one who knew my number, so he must have been too embarrassed to call me directly, and asked the president to do it) asking my whereabouts. When I told him I was at home, he said not to move, he was coming with Kevin to see me. Kevin showed up at my front door deeply apologetic, and even gave me half an orange to say sorry (sharing food is a ni-Van expression of friendship). He said we should sit down that afternoon and make a schedule so mishaps like forgetting me don’t reoccur. Apology accepted, I went to the office in the afternoon, and we actually achieved a decent bit of work together on the investment policy. I’m not certain the momentum will last, but while he was apologetic today, he was at his most willing to please, which helped cooperation greatly. It was a good day, and as I headed back to my house in the afternoon, I figured I needed to make some more friends here, so ventured to a local nakamal. They were nice people, but it was pretty hard work trying to strike up a friendship with my shaky Bislama. Just as I was attempting to ask one of the locals how many children they had (a decent cross-culture conversation point), the council President drove past and asked me if I’d like to join him for a shell at his preferred nakamal. I went along, and had a good conversation with the nakamal owner who is standing for election next month. He was frankly pretty lame on policy, repeating over and over how honest he was and not much else, but honesty being the big issue in Vanuatu politics right now (the exiting prime minister and 5 cronies have just received a jail sentence for criminal behaviour while in office, although they are intending to appeal and stand for election again anyway), maybe this guy was on to something.

In conversation with the council President earlier in the week, I had mentioned I hadn’t yet had a chance to eat a coconut crab (local delicacy, similar to lobster). Apparently today, he had tracked down a huge one and given he wasn’t returning to his home on the other side of the island till tomorrow, he was looking for someone with whom to share it. He wanted to know if he could come round to my place, and we could cook it on my hob. I was very willing, and it was a pretty amazing experience to sit down with the provincial council President, and get stuck into kitchen duty together.

All in all, it was a great evening, and it was a unique experience. Can’t even do the washing up tonight, as the water is off until the morning. Filled with delicious crab and quite content. Goodnight all.

February 26th, 2020 – Hunter’s 5th Birthday!

No island news in this post, I just want to celebrate my boy’s birthday by sharing some of the photos I have of him. I love him so much, I wish I were with him today to gather him in my arms and tell him how special he is. Days like these are the toughest for homesickness, but the thought of him keeps me going strong.

Sausage, everyday we are thankful for having you in our lives. You are a truly special boy and my love for you defines me. Keep being you, and especially… have a HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

February 25th, 2020 – Norsup

Wggdsetyivsryhvddrhb mnnnbhy ffgjjmm. “Wan moa sel”… Ffyobftusdvjkvcffbh jjjh kophgrdhk jjftjbgh hddssssd ggfdffc objji “Las wan”.776_&+hjklllllllgtfdgjjj ugddt ugff edfiofbkr. “Yu toktok Bislama gud tumas”…6ghkkjgyfduof ddsddd uhgf tff “wan long em rod” hgfrdfff. Jhffd uhfddoott ggddd gggssddesttt fffrt. “Yumi gudfala friend” ghjltfsa frddd jhg kkj jjhgss. “Las wan nomo” gfssssuuhfr kkllutewqqq “Gud Naet!”

Gud naet!

February 24th, 2020 – Lakatoro

Today was a day full of promise, but it started going wrong pretty much as I woke up and headed to the shower, only to find the largest cockroach I have ever seen crawling along the wall at head height. So large, I thought it was a mouse at first. A giant among cockroaches. He wasn’t hanging around either, so no photo, but I was able to grab the bug spray and get him with a direct sustained hit. Didn’t do a thing, apart from make him seem a bit more agitated, and dash between my legs in an attempt to escape. So I found the best use for the bug spray was to try to squash him with the base of the can, which at first just seemed to tick him off a little, and he kept right on going the moment I lifted the can. After a few squashes, however, he lost whatever demon was in him, and finally yielded.

Now I figured that a possible source of this cockroach (although there are many possibilities) could well be the uncovered shower drain, a 10cm brown hole in the floor which does wonders for water conservation on Malekula, as it makes a shower a thoroughly unpleasant experience which the sooner ended, the better. I would definitely buy a drain cover for this repulsive hole given the chance, only this being Malekula, there aren’t any.

Cockroach eliminated, I headed up the hill to my office. We were supposed to have had an important meeting with some potential investors today, but apparently one of their team couldn’t make it, so they postponed till tomorrow. Kevin still had to prepare paperwork for them to sign tomorrow, though, and was busy doing that, and couldn’t really spend time looking at the investment policy with me. Fair enough, I figured I’d use the morning to investigate the library that I’d heard from other volunteers existed on the island, and rumour is that it is surprisingly plentiful for a library on a remote island in Vanuatu, even though nobody seems to know of its existence. I eventually found the building that houses it, only to find it locked. Asking at province HQ, they said the cleaning ladies might have a key, but nobody had seen the cleaning ladies today, and there was no way of contacting them.

So giving up on that idea, I headed to market. There is often a portion problem with the market produce, in that you cannot buy say one single avocado, you must buy them by the dozen. Or not a handful of limes, you need to buy 30. If you ask the market sellers if you can just have a few, they stare at you with blank incomprehension. Well today, the only kumala (the Bislama name for sweet potato) was being sold wrapped in a woven coconut basket weighing about 5kg. I like sweet potato, but I’m not sure I like it that much. I bought it anyway, and have hung it from the rafters on the verandah in the hope that the rats won’t be able to get to it there.

Then in the afternoon, I had mentioned to Kevin that I needed to go and meet the airplane from Santo, as it was hopefully going to be bringing my final dose of Hep-B vaccination, and from the airport I could cross the road to the clinic and have it injected into me. This plan was going to work out nicely, as the Secretary General (SG) needed to get the same plane off the island, so I was able to travel in the official province truck with the government driver. Arrived at the airfield, and as I was waiting for the plane to arrive, I received a message from Brigitte saying she wasn’t going to be able to get my jab onto the plane after all, as it was locked in the VSA office, and she didn’t have a key at the moment. So I wished the SG a safe onward voyage, and headed back to the province office with the driver. When we got there, though, Kevin had finished his paperwork for tomorrow, and wanted to get the SG’s signature on it before he left. So we raced back to the airport only to find the plane had already left.

All was not lost, however. On the way back, I asked the driver to leave me at one of the island shops, as I had had enough of sitting in the sweltering truck and needed to pick up some eggs for dinner. As I was buying my eggs, I had a peek at some of the goods for sale, and my gaze alighted on something in the hardware section. There, tucked under some old plumbing bits and bobs, for the bargain price of 1,860 vatu, was a cellophane wrapped, stainless steel, 10cm-diameter SHOWER DRAIN COVER! It was the only one in the shop, and I pounced on it like Gollum on his ring. I carefully carried it home, feeling much more protective of it than of the eggs I had bought. Once home, I unwrapped it with awe and hope, not daring to get too excited in case it didn’t fit and my hopes were dashed. And indeed, when I tried to fit it at first, it seemed just too wide by a couple of millimetres. I went and had my supper, staring at it dejectedly, wondering if I could knock the extra millimetres in with a hammer or something, and noticed that it was actually comprised of two pieces, an inner ring and an outer ring. Excitedly, I unscrewed the outer ring, and was left with a drain cover just a bit smaller than the original – I went to the shower and tried it, and it fitted absolutely perfectly!

Very chuffed with that, I had a shower and retired for the evening on a high.

February 23rd, 2020 – Lakatoro

Went to church this morning, due to a desire for human contact rather than any religious fervour. It was an unusual service today, led entirely by women from the congregation. It is quite funny that in any Christian church, in any language, the reading of church notices are the dullest five minutes you will have to listen to all week. I’m glad I went, as my counterpart Kevin was there, and although we were supposed to have a meeting in Lamap (a village which is a three hour drive away) on Monday morning, for which I was getting ready to be picked up at silly o’clock in the morning, he told me the meeting has been cancelled, and so he would buy me a fish instead – I didn’t understand the segue either, but hey, free fish!

Then after a long siesta in the stifling heat of the afternoon, once things started to cool down a bit, I decided to go for a walk to explore a bit further down the road and to stretch my legs.

Wishing you all a great week ahead.

Oh, and for those of you concerned, apparently H is finally on the mend, having polished off five pancakes at breakfast.

February 22nd, 2020 – Lakatoro

Just a brief blog post today, as it’s the weekend and so with everything closed, and with my sunburn from yesterday still feeling a bit raw, I spent most of the day reading.

However, I am very proud of my evening meal. I made a curry using spring onion, red peppers, yesterday’s corn (stripped from the cob), some home-made coconut cream and a mashed banana to sweeten, curried with local turmeric, ginger and pepper. Accompanied by roasted spiced kumala cubes and an avocado, ripe at last and dressed with lime juice. 100% vegan, 100% gluten-free and 100% made in Malekula! To celebrate, I had a Tusker beer alongside (made in Port Vila, albeit not with local ingredients). Really chuffed with how it turned out!

I write this as one of the nearby churches (possibly the Adventists, it being Saturday night) blasts out worship music through the jungle. Speaking of which, please spare a prayer for my son, he is really not very well at all, and needs all the support he can get. Photo of him looking miserable in a clinic here:

Goodnight all.

February 21st, 2020 – Lakatoro

Today marks one week since I’ve been on Malekula. It feels a lot longer. As if to make sure that my first week wasn’t too intense, today was a public holiday. Father Lini Day, in remembrance of one of the champions of independence. I was hoping for parades and festivities of some sort, but on Malekula it just meant everything closed.

Yesterday the council held its first tri-annual cabinet meeting, and as my counterpart Kevin was giving a presentation about some potential investors visiting the island next week to the council, and my assignment goal of writing the province’s investment policy was an agenda item, we were both invited to observe the cabinet meeting.

It was conducted in Bislama, the only common language of all the councilmen (a couple are francophones, most are anglophones). Shortly before lunch, we left the room to discover my office had been turned into a refreshment zone. I was pleased to see the refreshments were all local produce, not an Oreo in sight!

Unfortunately after lunch, it appeared that the refreshment ladies hadn’t cleaned much of the refreshment mess and then gone home, so my office was covered in fruit peels and fruit juice stains which had brought the ants back again (I had managed to get rid of them during the week with a liberal application of bug spray). Nonetheless I got a bit of work done and then called it a day. Walking back home, about a 10 minute walk from the office, I decided to go for a walk to see some new surroundings and stretch my legs, as I hadn’t had any exercise all week. I walked a couple of km only to Litslits wharf, hoping there might be a bit more to Lakatoro then I’d seen so far, but nope, that’s pretty much it, the rest is dense jungle.

This morning, after a few household chores – had to do my laundry in the sink – still feeling the urge for both exercise and exploration, I decided to try to get to the beach – it is back near the airport, about 7km away. I figured I’d wave down a passing truck, which is the way public transport works here, but it being a public holiday, there weren’t any trucks out and about on Malekula’s one road. So I ended up walking in the hot hot sun, and was very glad to finally get to the beach when I did. It was pretty spectacular, and I had my reef shoes (good tip, Brendan), and snorkel, so I went out snorkeling along the reef. Wonderful snorkeling, comparable to the Red Sea reef where I learned to scuba dive. My phone isn’t waterproof, so no underwater photos, I’m afraid.

On the way back, I was fortunate enough to not have to wait too long before a truck came, which I flagged down. Being the old man I was, I had to lower the rear tailgate to get in – the locals just vault over the side!

Once home, I decided to try to prepare some corn I bought at the market a few days back. Vanuatu corn is not like sweetcorn – it looks the same, but even if boiled for hours it remains hard and not especially pleasant. I had looked online and some suggested soaking it for a few hours with a spoonful of sugar might help. I didn’t have any sugar (only imported sugar can be bought here, despite cane apparently growing plentifully), so decided to crush a banana into the water instead. It didn’t soften the corn, but I don’t think sugar would’ve done either. Whilst threshing the corn, though, and removing it from the stems, I thought I might be able to use the stems and the husks to fashion coathangers. There is a long hanger rail along one wall of my bedroom, but I’ve checked every shop in the village, and none sell coathangers, so I am unable to hang my shirts.

I made three of them, and then ran out of corn stems. Have about 8 shirts to hang altogether, so might need to buy some more corn, although I wish it wasn’t so nasty to eat. The worst is that it looks like the most delicious sweetcorn – the disappointment reminds me of when they served us liver at boarding school, which looked like a delicious well-cooked steak but tasted instead like institutionally cooked liver.

Although I used sunscreen when snorkeling, I wasn’t able to reach down to my lower back, and forgot to cover the backs of my legs, so have a mild bit of sunburn. But I was able to lift my spirits with a long phone call with Mother, so that was a good end to the day, even if it does hurt a bit to lie down.

February 19th, 2020 – Lakatoro

Today, as I arrived at work, I was told that a council meeting was about to take place in the large room across the road, and I asked if I could join.

It turns out that it was a meeting which had been called by the tribal chiefs of a particular tribe who were disputing the precise boundary of their land with the state land of the village, land currently leased out to some villagers of another tribe. The council meeting was preceded and closed with a prayer session, led by my counterpart Kevin. I think Kevin gets invited to these council meetings even though he is an investment officer (so nothing to do with land disputes), by virtue of his religious seniority. The council President explained to the tribesmen that land boundary decisions are matters for the national courts, not the council, but that pending any judgement received from the courts, the council would inform both sides of the boundary that the land was in dispute and therefore it couldn’t be used for daily activity. The tribesmen were happy, and after the closing prayer, filed out. Then the provincial government officials, myself included, hopped into the back of a truck and sped down the hill to inform the neighbouring tribe of the council’s decision. These second tribesmen said it was unacceptable as the first tribe had been trying to claim the land for three years now, and pressured one of the councilmen to put a time limit on hearing back from the courts. The councilman crumbled, and said he would give the first tribe one month to produce a valid legal judgement that the land belongs to them, otherwise after a month the second tribe could continue to use it. This was a mistake, if you ask me, as to try to get a judgment out of a Vanuatu court in under a month is about as likely as finding a cheesemonger at the local market (no dairy produced in Vanuatu). I asked Kevin later whether either tribe would turn violent if the land dispute didn’t go their way, and he laughed and said they would likely both get violent, yes.

During the meeting in the village with the second tribe, I had one of those moments whereby I was able to observe myself and the scene where we were all (about 20 people in total, me being the only white guy) sat under the shade of a Nangai tree, getting eaten by mozzies, discussing a tribal boundary dispute in Bislama, and I just thought “Wow. This is one of those moments that are completely unique. Nobody else will share this experience with me, ever. All the events that have occurred in my life have led me to this moment”. It was an amazing privilege to be there.

Anyway, it wouldn’t have been appropriate to take photos, so I thought I’d just illustrate this blog post instead with various signs I’ve found on Malekula.

February 18th, 2020 – Lakatoro

…make peanut butter!

Continuing my efforts to only eat produce made in Vanuatu, I shelled some raw peanuts, roasted them in the oven, and crushed them with my blender.

I took most of the advice from the internet of how to do it, but I think there maybe a problem with the variety of peanut used. The peanuts don’t even taste like peanuts, they’re more like dried peas. Putting them in the oven and then blending just resulted in roasted and mashed dried peas. They didn’t seem to have a very high oil content, so while the internet said you don’t have to add oil, the peanuts will contain enough, that definitely was not the case with these ones, and to get them to blend properly I had to add about three quarters of a cup of coconut oil. The final nut butter doesn’t taste unpleasant, but tastes more like a pea and coconut paste than peanut butter.

In other culinary feats, tonight I made myself a tomato and spring onion curry, served on a bed of mashed kumala (the Vanuatu name for kumera).

Today started out quite badly, with my counterpart Kevin dumping some pretty dissatisfying work (work that isn’t part of my assignment, and that he could’ve done himself, but clearly didn’t want to) on my desk, and then disappearing for much of the day.

But the free time (I did a rush job of the work he left me, on the basis that if you do a job badly enough, you don’t get asked to do it again) allowed me to meet with the council president – a francophone ni-Vanuatu guy. He has a name, but everyone just calls him Pres. He is very charismatic, apparently a shrewd businessman, and compared to everyone else I’ve met here seems to have a much more Western mentality. He was educated in Nouméa, and his French education visibly outstrips that of his fellow countrymen.

Speaking of charismatic elected officials, here in Vanuatu we are in prime campaign mode for the forthcoming national elections on March 17th. Coincidentally, I think this is when the mayoral elections for Cotignac are happening. The same type of campaigning for both locations (Cotignac and Vanuatu) is creating an election buzz on my Facebook page, and amusingly, the same cynical remarks from the locals (e.g. the only reason the water system is working this month is because elections are next month, etc…). Down by the market today, Ralph Regenvanu, a longstanding ni-Vanuatu MP was campaigning with a loudspeaker. Those of you back in Cotignac who watched my pre-departure presentation may remember him from the video clip I played. I think he sounds very convincing, but word on the street is that he is all talk, and he hasn’t been able to resolve the problems he initially set out to, despite two terms in office already.

The day ended better than it had begun, with Kevin returning, apologising profusely for his sudden departure, and explaining there had been a death in his wife’s family (his nephew-in-law). Only 19 years old, apparently. Tragic, and the family still very unclear as to the precise circumstances surrounding the death. Kevin was very keen for me to go out today and have a traditional kava welcoming ceremony. We hadn’t had it last week, as Kevin doesn’t actually drink the stuff, and the Pres was away. We drove out to a nakamal (kava bar), words of welcome were pronounced, and I had a couple of shells of kava. It was a bit of a sacred moment, and I didn’t want to spoil it by taking photos, but on the way back I asked Pres to stop the truck so that I could take a photo of the sunset through the coconut plantation.

I go to bed now remembering how even days that start off poorly can come good.

Feb 16th, 2020 – Lakatoro

Even though I’ve spent much of the weekend sleeping, it has nonetheless been quite eventful. The heat, the bugs and the unfamiliar make even simple tasks become endeavours.

Sticking with my “made in Vanuatu” only challenge, on Saturday morning I cracked open a coconut I had put in the freezer the night before (a tip I’d read on the internet – only average results, don’t think I’ll bother next time), and put its milk and flesh into the blender along with a few ripe bananas and a some squeezed limes to make a pretty delicious breakfast smoothie.

As I was throwing the coconut shell and fruit peels out in the garden compost pile, I espied a coconut which must have fallen from the tree during the night. I picked it up, and figured I would have a go at de-husking it using my machete. It turns out de-husking a coconut isn’t an especially simple task, so I was making quite a lot of noise hacking away at it and the neighbour, Kathleen, came over to see what I was doing. She laughed at my pitiful white man attempts, and instructed her 12 year-old daughter, Jennifer, to show me how it was done. I actually think I’d done most of the hard work, Jennifer just stole my glory by tidying it up a little. Anyway, I now have a coconut foraged from my own garden in the fridge, which is a win! Kathleen stayed for a couple of hours chatting (quick visits aren’t very Vanuatu), and invited me to go with her to church on Sunday.

Then Andrea and Dave, currently the only other white people in Lakatoro, dropped by to see how I was settling in. I fed them some iced lime juice, and they explained they are leaving on Tuesday for a couple of weeks to attend a wedding back in NZ, which leaves me as the only white man in Lakatoro. I mentioned how I’d been bitten by a giant centipede, and they were surprised, as they hadn’t seen one in the six months they’d been here. After they said farewell, I head back to the bedroom, and guess what I see crawling all over the mozzie net?

Having disposed of Monsieur Milpat (one of the few Bislama words taken from French rather than English), I cooked myself dinner of eggs, chips and beans, Lakatoro-style.

The following morning, after getting dressed for church, I found something had left a dead gecko on the front doorstep, and it was being consumed by ants. I don’t mind a dead gecko, but I can’t help be a little afraid that something pretty big must’ve done this guy in.

Then I went off to church, a block or so down the road. A Presbyterian church, which is apparently the majority religion here. The service started well, almost entirely in Bislama except for the readings, but I was more or less keeping up, and the singing was wonderful. Then at one point during his service, the elder (actually a young chap), put his forehead down on the pulpit. I figured he was praying, and nobody else seemed to react. After a minute or so, he looked up and continued his sermon, but only saying maybe a sentence each minute – again, I figured this was part of the prayer. He put his head on the pulpit a second time, and stayed down a bit longer before carrying on, even slower than before. The third time, there was a bit of a kerfuffle from the congregation, than somebody rushed to him with a bottle of water. One of the other elders at that point assisted him to a chair on the side, and he put his head down on a table while the other elder finished the service. At the end of the service, I was invited/told to stand next to the elder and to shake everyone’s hand as they departed. Everyone filed out, and I asked the elder if the young guy was ok. He looked and me and told me not to worry, he was “just stressed”. Nobody else seemed too concerned, so I suspect it has happened before. I hope he overcomes his stresses.

After all the stress of church, I came home and rested, before reheating some laplap (national dish) I’d bought at the market. Apparently it’s a mission to make laplap, involving peeling, pounding, grating mashing, wrapping in leaves and cooking in the fire. I can say with some certainty it’s not remotely worth the effort. Tastes a bit like a very dense polenta cake wrapped in cabbage leaves.

And then this evening, I’ve tried roasting the taro I had instead of boiling or frying it. Will let you know if it works out any better, but don’t hold your breath.