Signals from Eric & Andrea

Kerala

2008-09-13T12:02:00.000-07:00

Formally known as Malabar, this beautiful state is full of water, rich dance traditions, cocconut trees, has the highest literacy rate and the only state communist government in India.

Kanyakumari

2008-09-13T11:45:00.001-07:00

The southern tip of India. The Bay of Bengal, Arabian Sea and the Indian Ocean blend together as you watch both the sunrise and the sunset from one ledge of rock.

The Indian Elephant in the Corner

2008-09-13T11:26:00.000-07:00

In Indian rooms, classrooms and even churches, I saw elephants in the corner. The elephant sits there placidly starring at everyone with its gentle monstrosity. It carefully crosses and uncrosses its podded feet to gently touch the floor. As it often goes, no one notices or speak of the beasts lurking in corners- those looming and obvious issues. Pachyderms of injustice, hierarchy, fear and even solutions stare out to those who notice.
Elephants in India are a presence; their image inhabits temple carvings, graces bedsheets, pottery vessels, choztkys and enshrined as the hindu god Ganesh. They are bulldozers to move logs or are gilded with gold and admired in the outdoor temple festival. They walk the festival streets and people glaze over this four-podded giant tip-toing beside them as an ordinary dog out for a walk.
In India, heated discussions swirl in a tiny office while an elephant sits in the corner, when momentarily, the discussion pauses and all bronze eyes glance in the corner, for a glimpse and to make sure to not get stepped on. At the train station, trash is thrown on the tracks, and a lone 8 yr old sifts it, with the elephant staring at her through the hurrying legs of the crowd.
In America, elephants in the corner are briefly noticed as a joke that we wave at, chuckle at its rubber satellite ears, and titter at its tiny switching tail that emanates from the hulking form. We sit in our large offices, safely away from Dumbo, and read in awe of an Indian elephant who rampaged at a temple Pooram festival, killing four. A chill runs down your back as the cause of the rampage was a man who touched the tusk of an elephant, sending it off. You wonder why he wanted to touch a presence, something better left unsaid, or unnoticed. Your blue eyes dart to the corner, and sense that the tiny switching tail leads to no joke, but an issue left unchecked.

Photo glimpses

2008-09-13T10:17:00.001-07:00

Christian Medical Center in Vellore, where Andrea spent two packed weeks doctoring at one of the best hospitals in India, and being amazed at the range of people and health coming through.

The street outside of a temple festival.

A typical meal, served on a banana leaf- no waste!

How babies get to sleep on the train.

Tea fields in Ooty

Directing Midsummers in India

2008-09-13T09:33:00.000-07:00

When initially talking about the project, where I directed the college drama club, I wanted all of the show to be based in India- the lovers, the workman, etc. An objection arose because if the lovers in the play were Indian characters, then the character's decisions about love would be condoned. Namely the fact that the lovers run away from the will of the parents and chose for themselves who they wanted to love. This is, as they say in India, a western love marriage. In southern India, arraigned marriages are still the norm, where the man and wife meet maybe once, and it is set up by the parents. There are variations of how much the parents set up, but predominately the parents have a strong role in the decision.
When we talked to people about their arraigned marriages, we never met one who was bitter. A common phrase was that you learn to love, no matter what. One lady described how good it was to trust her parents, for them to make the decision, rather than have the pressure on themselves to make the right decision. A couple of times Indians would make jokes about how complicated western style of love becomes. The love in Shakespeare's Midsummers is complex, layered and poetically dances back and forth. So I guess it is true. A point to debate is if our culture and art make our understanding of love more complex, layered, or if love is truly that way. Anyways, the decision for the production was that the lovers and parents would be westerners on a holiday in India. So the rude mechanicals and fairies were in Indian style of dress, which did make them more fanciful and important.

Backwards

2008-03-21T04:28:00.000-07:00

Today I sit on a train facing backwards.
Every once in awhile I must resist the urge
to turn my neck to discover what lies ahead.
The climbing rocks of the Western Ghats,
the fluorescent green leaves of rice patties,
the man riding his bike on a narrow dirt path
with no village in sight for kilometers,
the dancing field of sunflowers,
the lush coconut fields,
the rising tree with no green leaves
but gorgeous flowers like orchids
gracefully resting on each of its dainty branches,
the cow with its rope tied through its nose
exchanging glances with me,
the sporadic Hindu temple
claiming ownership of a rocky pyramid shaped hill.
All these things I see contentedly looking backwards
resting my eyes on what has already past.

The people keep coming.

2008-03-18T22:06:00.000-07:00

The second-class train car is full when Chandran, Prabath and I get on in Coimbatore. All seats are over occupied with sleeping babies strewn across laps, holy men sleeping in luggage racks and steel food containers rolling about on the floor. More people have followed us on, so standing room only has turned into merely space available. The train creeps from platform one and a few brave stragglers jump into the open doors, which are protruding with bodies. Chandran leaps into the luggage rack to create a seat and Prabath and I cling to the rail. The arms of the standing passengers cling tree-like to the rail of a forest that I look through. People stare curiously at me. In my narrow space I read in my newspaper about Cricket, Pakistan’s new coalition government and the Obama-Clinton race. I look up and yes, many are staring, some smile.
The first and only stop on this express train before we reach our destination is Tirrupur. A few people get off but dozens more get on. Silly me, I thought the train was full already. I decide to seek my fortune in sitting in the luggage rack with a small space created by Chandran. I take off my sandals, and pull myself and sit, yes, Indian style. This bird’s eye view sees that space available has turned into wherever a human body will fit. The holy man in the luggage rack behind me has awoken and is now chanting. He is wrapped in brilliant yellow and orange. His soft chants are the delicate chorus to the harmony of cell phone ringing, the ping twang of Indian music, crying babies and a hundred people speaking Tamil.
My western idea of personal space now fully challenged, I now hear the delicate cry of coffeeeey, coffeeeeeeey. This familiar cry peppers every train stop. The coffee man carries a bag of paper cups and a large, hot metal tub of coffee and plys his way forcefully through the crowd. Where there was no space, enough is found for the coffee to make it through. I sip coffee for 5 rupee (about 13 cents). Meeting the coffee man from the other end of the compartment is the sound of Modigaal, Modigaaaaal- roasted peanuts in small cones of newspaper selling for 2 rupee. The peanuts sell well to the thick crowd and the frail woman selling them has a large grin on her face. As I munch on peanuts the air is soon full of peanut shell chaff, floating about from the wind rushing in from the windows. The chaff swirls like snow through the forest of arms and lands gently on the sleeping babies’ faces. I look around and perhaps now the train is full, at least for a few minutes.

The Banyan Tree

2008-03-18T21:48:00.001-07:00

The Banyan tree is by far the most fascinating tree we have seen in India. It is considered a holy tree and wherever a Banyan tree grows there is often a temple right next to it. Or the tree becomes the center of a village where people live amongst the branches. As the branches of the tree grows, it shoots down tendrils to the ground which then take root. This system of growth allows it to take on immense size and live to 500 years, as the tree below has lived to. The tree is mentioned a lot in Indian literature- Salman Rushdie, Arudhati Roy and R.K Narayan all use it as a metaphor of growth, human possibility and as a centering agent.

Andrea drinking tender cocunut juice- very good to prevent dehydration.

The Tomb of St. Thomas

2008-03-18T21:30:00.000-07:00

The apostle Thomas was martyred in roughly 70 A.D. around the south Indian city of Chennai and his remains are supposed to now reside in Chennai. Though apparently they had been moved at least four times to different parts of the world. The most interesting thing about the tomb was that the electricity was off and it made for an evocative environment. I tend to think only of Thomas as a doubter, a skeptic and not as a strong believer who went to South India to spread the gospel. So a brief candle in a large room seemed quite apt.

Mahabilapuram- Temples of Living Rock

2008-03-14T20:58:00.000-07:00

So I stole that term- temples of living rock from a magazine, but I it has struck me as a very apt description. We visited this place in half a day- two main sites and at the time it was very cool, but later, a week or so, it struck me how profound that place was. The fact that around 600 A.D. a group of individuals carved these temples out of giant granite boulders that were lying near the ocean, and that they are still intricately composed- that speaks volumes to me. The Pallavas people, connected to the early Dravidian culture of India carved these in honor to the Hindu gods Vishnu and Shiva.

Mita and Nittan, our host Mrs. Williams' grandchildren
striking a pose.

The shore temple. There are seven more of these submerged beneath the ocean. Apparently, when the tsunami struck here and then receeded, some of them were visible.

An interesting sequence in that all the animals have come to witness the Ganges river being poured down from heavan.

Kodaikanal- the "Alps of India"

2008-02-24T05:02:00.000-08:00

Today, I can fly.

Our host- Ms. Bueller J.C. and her mother
Andrea rockin the Saree

Eucalyptus leaves make your hands smell like cough drops.

Hating and Loving India

2008-02-24T04:56:00.000-08:00

My sister recently asked me-Do you love India or do you hate it? My impulse immediately was “both.” But the more I reflected on my reasons for both I realized that the reasons I dislike it are perhaps because I feel insignificant—insignificant in a land of over a billion, insignificant in a hospital that has a pretty good doctor:patient ratio without me. The drive to be significant—is it me? Is it American? Human?
It seems like the lesson of “be” not “do” is a lesson that I have to relearn yet another time here in India. Maybe significance is just being, or listening to stories of peoples’ lives, or guessing how many rupees a women made for her daily labors selling coconuts, or quietly reflecting on the best way deal with the problems of prostitution, or HIV, or female infanticide.
Here are a couple significant people that have given me much to think about—and maybe you too.
1) Sueha-a 20-year-old female who came to gynecology clinic with complaints of missing her period for the last 3 months. She had been married just 6 months ago in an arranged marriage. As the story unfolded, we discovered that her husband had left her because he believed she wouldn’t be able to bear him any children. Sueha most likely could never marry again because her parents would not be able to afford a 2nd dowry and she now had the reputation of being barren, even though this most likely was not the cause for her missed periods.
2) Hannah-a 2-year-old female who I met in an orphanage for children who are victims of infanticide. When a family has a 2nd or 3rd baby girl (or a handicapped child), it is not uncommon for them to poison her, suffocate her, or leave her in sewage gutters because they cannot afford another dowry for their daughter’s marriage.
3) Sarang-a 65-year-old male with beautiful snow-white hair that came to surgery clinic for a dressing change of a chronic ulcer on his foot. He had leprosy. As I bent down to examine his foot which already had 2 missing toes, I noticed a stream of tears traveling down his left cheek, disappearing quickly into his unkempt beard. These were not tears of physical pain, since clearly he had no sensation in his foot. Perhaps these were tears of loneliness, rejection, or embarrassment; I’m not sure. It was the first time I had seen tears in India.
India—a land of a billion. Slowly I am realizing that each woman I see carrying a pile of 5 foot sticks gracefully on her head, 10 year olds shoveling piles of gravel on the roadside (even though child labor is outlawed), and a man shepherding 15 goats in the middle of the road all have a beautiful story with some mixture of joy and sorrow in their life.
And I realize I love India.

On being naked and listening to birds

2008-02-24T04:52:00.000-08:00

I met a man today who has been walking for 18 years straight. He started in Goa (on the western edge of India) and made his way north on one side of the country to Kashmir and then back south all the way to Tamil Nadu (the state we live in). His goal is to visit every tribe in India, which he will accomplish in three months. He has spend roughly 10 weeks with each tribe, and by walking with people he got to know them and their patterns of life. He spoke of a tribe in Bihar who state that they work very hard, in that they very forcefully relieve people of their valuables. There is a tribe in Andhar Pradesh who is very devout and holy to the hindu god Shiva, bathes once every 12 years and feeds on the dead bodies of a nearby tribe. Another tribe prizes the meat of dogs, with the meat of a black dog going as much as 2,000 rupee per kilogram, roughly $5 a pound.
One of the most interesting stories was a primitive tribe in the Andaman/Nicobar Island chain, which is situated west of India in the Arabian Sea. This tribe believed in wearing no clothing and would shoot arrows at clothed people who approached. The government deemed that they must be clothed, what an outrage! So once a month, for three days, they would visit the tribe and present them with clothes. In order to get them to wear the clothes, they would bribe them with bananas and cocunut, which they would get for free only if they had the clothes on. As soon as the gov’t workers would leave, the clothes would come off. So this chirade continued for some months. I imagined how funny this scene began to look on the beach; a bunch of naked people, a stack of disregarded clothing surrounded by stacks of coconut shells and banana peels, and arrows flying in the air chasing a government car.
In 2004 the tsunami struck here and about 100 people died on the Andaman/Nicobar Islands, but not one of them was from this naked primitive tribe. Apparently, the day the tsunami struck, this tribe noticed that all of the birds were flying away, inland, up into the hills. So this tribe followed the birds- they knew something was wrong, these birds normally never fly inland. The tsunami struck. This tribe was safe because they listened to the birds. The man confirmed my thought, which is if this tribe is civilized and clothed, would they still listen to the birds? Would they understand them in such a thorough way?

Waking Up

2008-02-07T01:09:00.000-08:00

As I wake, my ears are touched lightly by the roosting lovebirds, the crow of the rooster and the chareeeeeep! of something blue with wings outside of our window. I roll over to the epic sounding call of the mosque trumpeting into my ear, followed soon by the organ swaying praising church voices.
I get up and itch an abhorredly sneaky mosquito bite. Cool waters soothe the heat from the night. My nose warms to the distant smell of spicy vegetables being cooked and the ever lingering smell of wood burning stoves. Milky strong chai (tea) rolls over my tongue, speaking of earthiness and distant hills.
I step outside, my eyes nodding to the gecko guarding our door and to the doorman at the gate, who salutes me like a soldier going to war, not merely going to the bus. My nose first swings at the stands of fresh flowers, fresh fried dosa and then to the upturning smell of garbage, urine and stale water in the drain near the street. My nose then embraces the harmonious smells of squashed lemons, burning incense and strewn flowers that bedeck the local temple.
My eyes take control, feasting on more suculent flowers tied into garlands and then swept away by bicycles rolling by mounded with multi-colored buckets, young cocunuts and stacks of colorful hand woven towels. My eyes settle on a silver whisped bronze woman robed in tattered purple silk. Her cracked, weathered hands arrange small monuments of baby eggplants, towers of tomatoes and crowns of yellow green bananas as tenderly as if they were newborn chicks. She places this martydom of vegetables upon a checkered cloth, lovingly smoothed down at the edges. This delicate still life repeats all over on the roads to Coimbatore, my view from the bus the perfect visage.
The bus stand assaults all senses with waves of exhaust, urine, incense, sweat, fresh garlic, orange stacks, floating tobacco clouds, suspended bananas, blaring horns, torn sandals, sleeping dirty figures, smiles, elegant sarees of silk that float, beeps of mopeds, strong coffee with chicory and chiming cell phones.
My hand and foot barely find a place on my final bus ride, with packed bodies filling the insides of the bus, the occasional arm or leg protubing from its metal block frame. One half of my body is immersed in the bodies of the bus grabbing a pole, the other hanging free, drinking in the cool breeze slowly brushing past. The figure entwined next to me reeks of bryllcreme, moth balls and cough drops. He turns and gives me a toothy grin, says hello. I say hello back. Now I realize, I am fully awake.

Thurachengadu Temple

2008-02-06T08:02:00.002-08:00

Walking barefoot up the 1000 granite steps to the temple.

A stone Cobra carved into the mountain.

Carrying one of the gods around the temple,
presenting to all corners of the earth.

The Temple

A 3 armed monkey.

Being taught how to make Chipatis

A typical bike vendor on the street

The Kodiveri dam- circular reed boats.

Us enjoying the boat ride.

A pilgrim.

Old and New

Our abode and work places.

2008-02-05T00:51:00.000-08:00

CSI Bishop Appasamy Our Apartment compound

(Eric's college) (2nd floor is ours)

The apartment- cozy and airy.

The CSI Hospital in Erode- 100 years old,

where Andrea works.

A family on the compound.

(being) Americans in India

2008-01-17T22:12:00.000-08:00

We were recently guests in a village outside Coimbatore of a Tamil Nadu (the geographic state we live in) Hindu festival called Pongal. It is a harvest festival to thank God for the sun and the rain. Central to the festival is rice with milk and sugar cane that is boiled so that the froth flows over the clay pot. (hmmm….”you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows.” psm 23) The final night of the festival we were the dog and pony paraded out. Part of this is the amazing hospitality that overflows from the people here through gifts, handshakes and the utmost care taken to guests. Part also is the introduction that goes before us; Americans Mr. Eric and Dr. Andrea. This celebration and promotion of being Americans is uncomfortable to us; attention that we struggle to be in the center of. This experience I am sure is not unique to us, but to many who have traveled abroad to developing nations.
But hey! I am just an artist wanting to stand in a corner and draw the beautiful colors. An American here is Tom n Jerry Coca Cola Jay Leno Brad Pitt Billy Graham Bill Clinton The Dollar Barrack Obama McDonalds Michael Jordan Happiness. Which, I bring with me every time someone says American. The speaker at the festival said Americans were second happiest in the world, behind the Australians (would that make Americans happy to know that they are happy ?:) According to the speaker, our visit to the festival as Americans brought happiness to the festival. Is there an anthropological label to the cultural identity we unknowingly embody as we enter a new culture? For instance, an Op-Ed piece in The Hindu discussed America’s current economic status and finished with saying that he hopes America may soon again be exporters of hope to the world, that the world is in fact relying upon it; hope. At the festival, the bright bronze eyes of the children follow us and I can see that, though it baffles me.
In the airport in Delhi, Andrea and I talked awhile with a British couple who talked a lot about the global village, our world. As semi-isolationist Americans we use that term infrequently at best and so the global village term stuck in my head for a number of days. This point hit home when Andrea and I were discussing our colds we brought with us and she mentioned that US researchers study the flu strains in Japan to know what strain of flu will be coming to the US in 6 months time. The global village seems small to me then, and this particular village seems closer.

2008-01-17T21:26:00.000-08:00

Pongal Festival

"Rangoli" sand decorations

Pongal Festival for the Dalits

Horn Painting

Andrea's new friend

Henna

Hindu temple

visiting a waterfall

colors of an Indian neighborhood

traveling Jesus shrine

Law vs. Reality

2008-01-17T21:17:00.000-08:00

“Whoever is least among you should be the greatest”—Luke 22:26

Nearly every societal group has a way of establishing a pecking order, but never have I seen it as vividly as yesterday. When one looks to the books, the caste system in India has been abolished, but if one looks to the villages, where nearly 75% of the one billion Indians reside, one will be surrounded by the desperate reality of the caste system. The caste system is essential to the social structure of Hinduism. The four castes arise from the four body parts of lord Brahma in creation. The Brahmin caste is the teachers and priests which arose from the mouth; the Kshatriya are the warriers and arose from the arms; the Vaishyas are the merchants and traders and arose from the thighs; the Shudras are the laborers and arose from the feet. Below all of these castes are the Dalits, the Untouchables, which Mahatma Gandhi renamed, “children of God.” The Dalits have lowly jobs such as latrine cleaners. Within many castes, there are subcastes. One is born into a particular caste, one marries (usually arranged by parents) within the caste, and one behaves according to the caste’s expectations. If one lives an upright life, one has the hope of being reincarnated into a higher caste.

My tour of the caste system took place in a village outside of Coimbatore where we spent the last several days. Alongside us was Anish, a former PhD student of computer science who felt called to study social work at the college Eric is teaching at. Since Anish and his family currently live in the village and Anish speaks fluent English and Tamil, he served as the “ideal” guide. We first met a middle class woman, or rather several women. One can never tell how many men, women, and children live in one home. After an adorable 10 month old baby with a colorful jeweled mark separating her eyes and jasmine flowers decorating her hair came willingly into my arms, all the women joined forces in trying unsuccessfully to get the child to kiss me on the cheek. We were soon invited past the festival colored rice powder chalk decorations called “rangoli” on the green cow-dung ground up the stairs to the living room of their home. Here we were greeted with more smiles, tea, Pongal festival treats, and simple conversations translated through our guide. We sat in white plastic lawn chairs--the lazy boys of India. We met the grandfather lying sick on a bed in the living room and were told that there was no need for nursing homes in India, since sons live with the parents and daughters move to the in-laws families after their arranged marriage. After we had our last sip of tea, one woman emerged from the kitchen with a small bag to take the remaining festival Jalebis (orange colored whorls of deep-fried batter) for a snack later.

We said our goodbyes and continued our stroll through the winding roads bordered by gutters of stale urine and plastic bags and came across the family that was the head of the village. Again we were invited inside their home for tea, conversation, and Pongal festival treats. Their daughter was privileged enough to be one of the 50% of children to attend school rather than the 50% who took part in child labor, a practice that is banned in India but continues to exist especially in villages like this one, which is located near a brick-making factory. I was anointed with two roses that were weaved in my hair, and when we were outside by the temple adjacent to their home, the woman showed me the leaves of the henna plant that were used to dye and decorate the skin. She tore off numerous leaves, ground them to a paste, and then applied the wet green paste to the tips of my fingers and the center of my palm. As she meticulously applied it, she spoke in a soothing voice with broken English, “good for the blood pressure”, “good for hair color” and “hot weather too.” I’ve been continuously amazed at how every village person knows the numerous uses, both medical and non, for the roots, stems, leaves, and flowers of every local plant. When I joined the women for a village version of musical chairs during the Pongal festivities later that evening (everything is segregated between men and women) they were all pleased to see my dyed, decorated hand and eagerly showed me their designs as well.

Our village tour concluded by crossing the deep ditch to the homes of the Dalits. Here, we experienced the Pongal tradition of painting the horns of bulls. We were introduced to one of the women who very graciously included us in her families’ festivities. We learned that this woman was living back with her daughter and her father, who was a drunk, after being abandoned by her husband who ran off with another woman. This family was in the process of carefully bathing their goats and bulls (which they do annually during Pongal). At our arrival, they pulled out their paintbrushes: one was manufactured, and one was made before our eyes out of grass and twine. They invited us to join in the painting of the bull-horns. I graciously declined being the less-gifted artist of the two of us, and being a bit hesitant to step near the bulls, even though they had ropes tied around their necks and through their nostrils. Eric took up the challenge while I painted the goats’ horns. Eric received many congratulations from the family who observed his brush-strokes, and eventually a crowd had gathered. This was a crowd of only dalits, since they were not allowed to attend the main village festival just hundreds of meters away. But the dalit children proudly showed us their own “festival” as they joyously gathered their traditional drums hidden away in their own temple, cracked some sticks in half from the brush-pile nearby for drum-sticks, and began to sing and dance. These were the same children that, if lucky enough to attend school, had to sit separately and not interact with the “normal” village children. We continued our walk down the main narrow road, which doubled for sleeping grounds by all the dalits at night, since their small one-room grass thatched homes could not accommodate sleeping quarters. During our goodbyes, we were graciously given a whole liter of cows’ milk from the family that had invited us to their bull painting. They insisted on an entire liter saying “good milk, good milk” even though we said a cup for each of us would have been wonderful.

“Hospitality” is the word that comes closest to what we experienced by all of the castes of this village; at the same time, the word “hospitality” doesn’t do justice to what we experienced. I am reminded again of Jesus words’ to the poor woman who gave her last pennies as an offering, “This poor widow has put in more than all the others. All these people gave their gifts out of their wealth, but she out of her poverty put in all she had to live on.”

An Ode to Raymond Carver

2008-01-17T21:11:00.000-08:00

Why should the devil get the blues, the hot jazz Saturday nite?
Why does American pork, beef and chicken get the spice?
the pepper, jerk, chilles, salty gravy and the garnish?
Why not the cucumber, onion, carrot and the rutabaga
get the tang, whizz, the lip-smack flavah?

Why should the devil get the blues, the hot jazz Saturday nite?
Why not like in India where the cucumber, cocunut, and celery
get the masala, curry, tumeric, cardamon and the briyani?
Why here the vegeterian sensually dances with heaven and earth
the smooth cheese masala spice on tongue, needs no forth?

Arrival

2008-01-09T01:13:00.000-08:00

Bleary eyed, two nights spent on a plane, sitting in a Starbucks in Amman with women in Burkas walking through, they like Popeyes here? Flew over Israel with the land seeming to be like bronze... The air is the first thing we notice in India...essence of diesel, fruity, fresh cut grass mixed with something burning. The mist lay thick around the plane, smog actually. People coming up close to you, as bright as the colors they wear, pushing us gently on the backs to get into the quieu, just being polite. Big smiles greet us, hands close on ours, rush to show us that we know you through others, through grace.
Controlled chaos on the roads. Little three-wheeled auto-rickshaws, buzzing like chainsaws weave between cars that weave between eachother and all weave between relaxed rusty bicycles and trance like pedestrians carrying bundles. The cacophony is mesmerizing.
The silence of a bed interspersed with the cackle of a dot matrix printer nearby and a dog in the alley. Sleep with the punctuation of a mosquito.