2014 Spain / Portugal Day 9

Day 9 ... Leaving Portugal.

A bit more about day 8 in Lisbon.  We stayed at a Holiday Inn Express near the airport.  We arrived around 6:30 PM.  After settling in, we wanted to get something to eat.  We had asked the young lady at the front de ask if there were eateries nearby.  She said, yes, but we would need to walk a bit.  She also said at 7:00 PM a crew came into the hotel to prepare dinners in the hotel.  So we opted to do that.  We decided to share a meal.  We chose a veal dinner that came with a drink and dessert.  Our choice for dessert was chocolate cake or fruit.  That was a no brainer.  After we had sat down, a young man came out to us and told us that they had dropped the cake on the floor!  I thought...yea....right.  Nonetheless at the conclusion of our meal they brought us two apples and an orange.  I wanted cake for my 13 euros!  Oh well.....

We turned lights out at 9PM even though there were many English TV channels to watch (unlike Spain).   I slept great until 4AM.  But since it was a travel day, my mind would not let me go back to sleep.  So I read the newspaper (Deseret News) and quietly listened to the BYU basketball game.  At around 6:30 AM, We headed down for breakfast.  It was ok...lots of rolls, meats, cheeses, fruit juices and hot chocolate.  Nothing in the food that you would see on an American breakfast menu.  We ate, returned to our room to retrieve our bags, and then paid for a shuttle to the airport.

Our flight to Newark left at 10:15 AM on time.  The Lisbon airport was really nice, really clean.  Our process to get on was easy.  And there were a lot of seats.  We were assigned an exit row to share.  Tons of leg room.  Really quite comfortable. The flight to Newark took almost 9 hours.  And even though we left Lisbon early, we arrived 30 minutes late.  To give a perspective...flying to Madrid one week ago took 6.5 hours.  Flying home....9 hours.  The pilot said the head winds were so strong that they altered their course to take a more southern route to Lisbon, not their normal route.  

We arrived at 2:00 PM to the gate in Newark.  While taxing, I looked at the plane loads.  Our best option was to fly to SFO and then back to SLC.  More seats appeared to be available.  But we were not listed on that flight.  We were listed on a flight through Chicago and another through Houston.  All three flights (SFO, ORD, IAH) were gated right by each other...which was real fortunate.  The SFO flight was to leave at 2:45, the ORD flight at 3:05 and IAH at 3:20.  Now coming in internationally, you go through passport control, then baggage control, then because we were connecting to another flight, back through the whole TSA security check.  When we arrived at the SFO flight, the gate agent would not even consider putting us on.  We were too late even though the plane was still there and had seats.  So I walked down to the next gate where Chicago was gated to ask if stand by seats had been issued.  I was surprised to see that both of us had been issued seats.  So we got in line to board.  I went first and headed down the jetway.  As I walked down, I turned back to see if Denise was behind me.  She was not. I stopped.  In a minute or so, Denise came down and said that the agent wanted to check her bag.  She took her ticket thinking Denise would return.  I said come on....let's go see if there is overhead space...and there was.  So Denise boarded anyway without her ticket.  I kind of waited to see if the gate agent would be coming after her.  But she never appeared.  Whoooo.

I am writing this as we fly to Chicago.  One more flight.  If we get on, we will get into SLC at 8:30 PM.  If not, we stay the night in Chicago and try tomorrow once again.  No other options.  In Newark, the Chicago to SLC looked full.  But in standby flying...you just never know!

Yahoo...just got our tickets to SLC!  It will feel good to be home.

Sitting on a seat with a leg extender.  First time I had seen this I ban airport.

Looking back at the coast and beaches of Portugal.  We had a great trip.  And it was so nice to spend it with Kelly and Zella.

2014 Spain / Portugal Day 8

Day 8 ..... Hasta la vista Espana.  Bienvenidos a Portugal.

We are travelling on a train to Lisbon from Faro, Portugal as I write this.  It was sad to leave Espana.  We saw a ton of stuff Kelly and Zella.  Lots of old forts and castles that date even before Christ walked the earth.  Really cool.  Plus, we were on the Mediterranean Sea most of the time.  Amazingly beautiful.   We will remember our time in Southern Spain fondly.

We left our hotel today at 9 AM.  Instead of going southeast, we travelled southwest across the Spain / Portugal border.  It took, maybe, 1.5 hours to get to the border.  Portugal happens to be one hour earlier...which gave us one more hour touring around.  We first drove into Faro, a coastal town where many Northern Europeans fly down to vacation and hang out on the beaches.  Portugal appears to me to be much poorer than where we were in Spain.  But the people appear to be happy, more open to have a chat with you.  After finding the train station, to make sure we knew where it was, we headed west along the coast to a town called Silves ( pronounce Silvesh).  There, in the middle of town was a Moorish Castle.  The town was amazingly quaint, pretty small.  It was Saturday so the people were out and about.  We drove by a nice farmers market.  The castle was pretty awesome.  It gave you a  wonderful view of the lush hills that were farmed by the people.  We spent about an hour there then headed back to Faro.

One funny note....upon entering Portugal, the signs had tourist drivers pull off into a lane where a machine was located.  There you were asked to pay a toll but you could only use a credit card.  So Kelly put his in.  The receipt came back saying he had paid .60 euro.  Cheap.  So off we went.  Then about eveyr 10 miles or so, we would see signs indicating a new fee to be paid but you never had to pull up to a machine again.  So we did not think anything of it.  But then it occurred to us that at every sign tha indicated a new fee we drove under a bridge thing that probably had some kind of monitor that recognized your car.  The question was....do they recognize us?  That perked Kelly up to think his credit card was getting dinged every time we went under one of those.  I would say, "cha ching' every time we went under one of those bridges and Kelly would squirm in potential financial pain.  If his card got billed each time...I am guessing it was hit between 5 and 10 euros.  I can't wait to hear if he was being charged or not.  Needless to say, we did not take the major highway back to Faro!

We travelled back to Faro hoping to drive on coastal roads.  But we never could.  The secondary highway did not get close to the shoreline.  However, the ride was fun as we passed through one small town after another.  We eventually arrived back in Faro.  In the food category of the GPS it had Burgers.  So we selected that and up popped McDonalds and Burger King.  So we headed to Burger King.  Turns out that it was in a really cool food court in a really modern mall.  In the end, we ended up getting sandwiches, fries and drinks at a local chain called Pan.  The lunch was great.  But the Postres Denise bought were even better.

After lunch we headed to the train station.  The station is really old.  It only has a few tracks.  The trains in Portugal are not as modern as their counterparts in Spain.  Nor do the travel as fast.  However, the price was right compared to Spain.  We paid 22 euros per ticket in Portugal.  In Spain, we paid 68 euros.  The distance of travel was fairly equal.

Once we get to Oriente, the Lisbon main train station, we plan to grab a taxi to take us to our hotel.  More to come.  We leave Lisbon tomorrow at 10:15 AM putting us in Newark a few hours before the Super Bowl starts there.  Think we can get tickets?  We will then either go to SLC via Chicago or Houston.  Chicago is the best choice because we could get to SLC by 8:30 PM .  But as usual, seats are tighter going that route.  And who wants to get hung up in Chicago in subzero temps.  Been there done that!  If we go Houston, the earliest we can get home is 11:30PM.  Long day ahead!

We arrived right on time to the Lisbon train station.  We hailed a cab and arrived at the hotel real fast.  We are now in for the night.

Mormon Stake Center in the middle of Sevilla.  We passed this as we left Sevilla.

As we drove to Portugal we noticed these large bird nests on power poles.  Guess what kind of bird it is....Storks!

Sign entering Portugal and telling us foreigners about the electronic toll.

One of the high speed Portuguese vehicles.  I think grandma and grandpa were topped out at 40 km/h.

Denise and Zella in Selvis.

Denise with the protector of the Selvis Castle.....

The small town center of Selvis....

Kelly on the castle wall...

Some very good orange cake....

Faro train station on the sea...

She is ready to go to Lisbon!

Happy rail travelers!

2014 Spain Day 7

Day 7…. Malaga.

 

Today was another nice day touring around Spain.  From Sevilla, we drove about 2 hours down to Malaga, a coastal based city.  I drove today.  The drive was one a freeway system from Sevilla.  It was raining off and on throughout the trip.    I think we have mastered the GPS pretty good.  But still, when in these old part of these cities, the streets fly by quickly and you don’t get the right turn off.   But we are getting better.  Anyway, in Malaga sits an old Moor Castle and Spanish Fort.  They are on a hill that you have to climb…and it was a pretty good climb to get up to the Castillo de Gibralfaro (fort).  But boy what a view looking out over the Mediterranean Sea.  By the time we had reached the top, the sun was out and we had a spectacular view of Malaga.  We spent probably a good 3 hours touring the Castillo and the Alcazar.  Pretty amazing……pretty beautiful what these people (the Moors) built.

 

After we had visit the Castillo and Alcazar, we walked into an area of shops and stores.  There, we saw a cafeteria that offered another ‘Menu del Dia’ for 8.50 Euros per person.  I had Seafood Soup and a pork chop for my ‘primero and segundo’.  The pork chop came with French fries.   I also tried one of their sodas….the first in Spain.  It was Fanta Limon….and it was quite tart and good.  Kelly is not a fish lover and Zella gives it a go.  So we have been pushing them to try the ‘bottom of the ocean’ seafood that these folks want to share with us.  It has been fun to watch.  Denise ordered Paella…a common Spanish rice dish.  It was full of seafood…and good also.

 

After this late lunch, we took off on foot to find a Museum of Glass and Ceramics.  After Kelly stopped a number of people for directions, we finally made.  Upon entering, I saw a nice couch to sit on.  At that moment, I made the decision that  the couch was for me and Denise could go look at the fine china…or whatever they had to show.  Kelly agreed and sat down with me.  So the two ladies paid the 5 Euros and off they went.  We were there….maybe an hour.

 

After finding our car, we decided that we wanted to drive down the Mediterranean coast to see how the other half lives.  We saw some nice homes overlooking the beautiful sea.  But after having done that, we decided to take a road that took us into the mountains.  We thought it would be a bigger highway.  It was a two lane, EXTREMELY slow trip.  The road wound around the mountains and a car in front of us would only go about 25 miles an hour.  We went up the mountain and then as we came down the other side, we were in the clouds….fog and rain.  It was pretty treacherous.  I wanted to try and pass the slow person knowing that I could go a little bit faster.  But no real opportunity presented itself to do this.  So it took about an hour plus to go, maybe, 30 to 40 miles.  Very frustrating.  The last time I drove, we had a similar mountain driving experience.  Bottom line, we were in the mountains for the majority of our trip back to Sevilla arriving at the hotel around 9:15 PM.  We were just glad to be here.

 

Malaga is beautiful….well worth the drive and trip.  I would love to come back to these coastal cities one day in the future when it was warmer and you could get into the sea.

 

Tomorrow we are off to Faro, Portugal.  There we will tour a bit then catch a 3:00 PM train to Lisbon.  Our trip with Kelly and Zella will conclude.  It has been a TON of fun meandering our way in our little car throughout Southern Spain.  It will be a memory to be cherished in our lives.  My thanks goes to them for planning and preparing the sites to see.  We have seen so much…so much good stuff. 

 

Hasta la manana….

 

Another beautiful parking job!  This is a parking garage in Malaga.

Some beautiful flowers on our hike up to the Castillo (fort).

Looking out across the port in Malaga.  You can see that it was a bit cloudy.

This looking down into the cities bull ring.  This is the biggest one that we saw on the entire trip.

This was one of the MANY walls that we walked on.

I showed you the old sport(bull fighting).  In this photo you can see the stadium for their new sport (futbol).

Part of Malaga tucked in the hills.

One of the fountains in a garden area in the Alcazar.

Our lunch stop....

Objects in the glass museum...

Still kicking.....

It has been a great trip!  

2014 Spain Day 6

Day 6….Cadiz.

 

I am starting my writing a bit early today.  It is 4:30 AM and insomnia has be by the throat again.   So I thought I’d get up and unload some thoughts about many things into this blog.  We plan to travel to Cadiz today.  It is a coastal town that has a number of castles and things to see that look over the sea.  I look forward to our visit there today.

 

I thought I’d give a shout out to Ed Goggins (and Kami).  You know, Denise and I would never have been motivated to travel as much as we have done in the past year if it were not for Ed and his offering to us these flight benefits.  At first glance, one would think that flying free (stand-by) is just that…free.  From a United airline point of view…yea…it is free and they make no money on us travelling on them.  But to us, there is a cost.  Travelling is expensive.  And when you travel standby, you cannot book things in advance as you may not get there as you would have liked to plan.  For example…on this trip Kelly and Zella were able to plan ahead and book trains and hotels in advance.  We could not do that.  The rate Kelly got for our stay in Sevilla this whole time was 38 Euros per night.  When I booked this same hotel on the airplane as we taxied away from the gate at Newark, the best rate I could get was 61 Euros.  It is almost double.  The same with the train trip down to Sevilla.  I think Kelly and Zella paid about 28 Euros each for their one way tickets here.  Denise and I paid 68 Euros.  So there is a cost associated with stand by travelling….not to mention the years of life I’m losing as you are turned away flight after flight because of no seats available to and from Salt Lake City!  The other cost, when travelling internationally, are the taxes we pay to leave a country and its airport.  They usually run between $50 to $100 per ticket to leave on a plane from a foreign country.  My point is this…although it is not free to travel stand by….Ed’s gift to us has motivated Denise and I to see parts of the world we thought we would never see.  And it has been really fun and exciting.  Thank you Mr. Goggins for this nice gift.

 

Another thought I’m having is about my family.  I love them dearly.  Starts with our parents, who have always supported Denise and I in many ways.  I personally wish they could be along with us on every trip enjoying the sites and experiences we are having.  I think these trips would kill them due to all the transportation maneuvering and walking that we do.  We hope they are experiencing it through the blog’s pictures that are posted.   Another important part of our family is our brothers and sisters.  The week before we left, Denise’s only brother was broad sided in an automobile crash while on a work assignment here in SLC (he lives in Buffalo, NY).  The result could have been much worse and it made us both think of our siblings and how much we care about each of them.  They are all really, really good people doing their very best with their families and lives.  We are proud of each of them.  Next is our immediate family…to which I will write an individual note.

 

To Ashley…she has always been my little girl that has so much energy for the fun things in life.  She has brought two wonderful gifts into our life…two beautiful grandchildren whom we adore.  And…announcement, announcement…is expecting her third baby.  This process for her is not an easy one.  But we stand ready to help her and Brent get through this challenging time.  Her last pregnancy was while they were in Lincoln, NB while Brent finished his PHD in History there.  Lots of bed rest…lots of pressure on Brent.  This time…they have lots of family around.  We love you guys…Ashley, Brent and Kids.

 

To Dustin…he has always been the child who wants to wander and experience life.  And he is.  His love for people actually drives my son.  And people reciprocate that love back to him.  He has proudly served his country in the US Coast Guard for 4 years.  He has many certificates in Emergency Medicine (and works in that field).  He is currently in Fire Fighter training…and yet…he still is not clear on his career of choice.  But…Dustin will find that and he will do so well.  I have never met a person that does so well with things when he truly puts his mind to it (with the exception of college mathematics!).  There has yet to be an employer that has not loved Dustin and the work he provides.  What an amazing personality and skill that he has.  The lucky young lady that receives his offer to be his companion in life will be greatly blessed to have him.  We love you Dustin.

 

To Cassidy…she has always been like her mother…strongly committed to that which she believes to be right and good.  Cassidy has an inner determination to do things right and get them done.  But I think little Lucas is bringing a new focus into Cassidy’s life.  Her focus is now on teaching her young son these same, cherished principles and developing homemaking skills that I think she did not think she was skilled for.  We have been impressed with her ‘crafts’ that she has been making and such.  It is going to be fun to watch the ‘other’ skills evolve from Cassidy.  I look forward to other children in their family.  They will come when the time is right.   We love you Cassidy, Mike and Luke!

 

To Karlie…the one in our family who has empathy for so much in this world.  She loves little children and has finally moved her career aspirations from feeding others (Culinary degree) to Early Education.  She will do so well in this field…just like her mother.  Karlie has always impressed me with her ability to love the undervalued and has acted in trying to lift those up.  She has a kind and loving heart and a strong commitment to do good and excel in life.  She and Neza will always do well if both of them seek to do right always.  We love you Karlita (and Neza).

 

To Travis…the driven one.  My wonderful, youngest child, what a blessing you have been in our lives.  Someone has to be the caboose and endure the older age of their parents.  You have and are doing this wonderfully.  We have always been impressed at your drive to do  your very best.  And you, as a result, have excelled in many things. And, Travis, you will excel in many more things.  It has been strangely fun, lately, to see life throw you some curve balls.  Some you have just fouled off…some you have hit back strongly….and some there have been swings and misses.  Yet…you continue to stand at the plate with a will to hit everyone out of the park.  That desire will take you far in life if you keep it focused on doing the right thing always….and we know that you will.  You are a wonderful son who has an amazing future in front of you.  We love you tons Travis…keep up the good work at BYU!

 

Well…I cannot end here.  I do have to give a shout out to my dear wife.  I thank God daily for the choice we made to be together so many years ago.  She has and continues to be a wonderful friend and companion.  I cannot think of a better person to have taken this mortal journey with.  We have had some really great times…some fairly low times…but together we just keep plugging along.  As a mother, my kids have the best.  A minute does not go by wherein my dear wife is not thinking…even talking…with her children.  They are the reason she lives.  And now to have grandchildren…she is really consumed.  And she is the best mother and grandmother out there.  I love you tons Denise!!!

 

I guess the heart has grown fonder while being away and I needed to drop some of those thoughts on to digital paper.  Well….back to our Spain adventure. 

 

Kelly and Zella have been super to travel with.  They both have prepared so much for this trip and Denise and I are such beneficiaries!  We are having a grand time and owe lots of our gratitude to them.  We hope they continue to enjoy their stay in Madrid these final months of their mission service here.

Today, we traveled down to Cadiz.  It is a city on the coast that sits on a peninsula.  It has a couple of 'castle' like fort structures that sit out in the ocean.  We walked out to both.  After we did that, we went looking for some food.  We found a small local eatery that had a menu del dia.  We saw these all over the place for lunches so we thought we would try it.  It starts with a first course (salad or soup) followed by a second (main course) followed by a postre...a desert.  You also got a drink....all for the price of 8.90 euro.  Since we were by the sea....almost all of the food had something from the sea in it. We had calamari, fried sardines, shrimp fritter, pork, chicken, and a couple of other fried seafood.  I liked it.

After eating lunch we set out to find some Roman ruins...which we found.  They were behind glass.  So we could not get close.  But it was cool.  We then walked over to the central square where a large old cathedral was located.  It was a pretty cool square with pigeons all around.  Kelly then scoped out a nice bakery where sat outside and ate some wonderful paste rise.  After that we headed to the car to leave Cadiz.  Upon leaving Cadiz, we set out to find some other Roman ruins on the coast.  We had a hard time finding them using the GPS....but we got close!  The ruins happened to be a fort like structure about 200 yards or more out in the ocean with no way to get to them unless you swim or have a boat.  We laughed that the GPS did not get us there.  From there, we started back to Sevilla but went through Jerez de la Frontera to see an old Moorish castle.  That we found easily.  And...it was quite nice.

I am writing this as Kelly drives us back to our hotel in Sevills.  It has been another great day in Spain.

Monument to Pad Locks in Cadiz.  Who knows why such a monument exists!

The wall that circles the city of Cadiz.  We walked almost 7 miles today in Cadiz.

Wild parrots were playing in the trees above us.

A fountain with water!  Yea!  The tree behind it was pretty cool.

Looking out towards one of the forts.  We walked out to this one.

Kelly and Zella...

A cool sand castle....the guy who created this was asleep in a tent right by it.  I think he lives there.

A beautiful port and beach....

Still kicking along.  It was a cooler but beautiful day!

One of the squares....

A Spainiard who went to the market.....

One of the many pretty churches we passes today.

A good looking pastery...and it was good!

Cathedral in Jerez de la Frontera....

Tower at the Moor Castle in Jerez de la Frontera.  The castle was closed...only open until 2:30 PM each day.  We had no idea....

2014 Spain Day 5

Day 5….Sevilla and more Seville.

We are used to calling this place Seville.  But over here it is called Sevilla.  We decided this morning to ‘get out of the car’ and stay in the Sevilla area touring places here.  We have had a wonderful time doing a lot of walking.  Denise and I both slept in late.  I woke up at 8:30 AM and Denise was still howling at the moon.  She has a nasty cold and really struggled last night with it keeping us both up longer than we had planned.  Anyway…we were out the door by 10:00 AM catching a bus to the center of Sevilla.  The center sits on a river and you can see across the river where the Olympic Village was.  Along the river you can see where the rowing events were held.  I would have liked to have toured the Olympic Park.  But Zella thinks it has been turned into an Amusement Park with rides and stuff.  It looked like part of it might be that way.  And it looked closed from a far.

 

We ended up touring, in great detail, the Alcazar.  This is a huge ‘castle’ that is occupied by the Spanish Royal Family.  Apparently it is one of 14 palaces that the Royals own and use.  They must have a hard life you know!?  The architecture and grounds of this place was pretty amazing.  Although the Spanish hate to remember the fact that the Moors had a significant place in their history, many of the architectures have an Arabic look to them.  The building is full of stamped, colored, pressed…you name it…tiles and more tiles.  They are extremely beautiful as you will be some of the pictures we took.  Within the walls of the palace are large ‘gardens’.  This place (Sevilla) is full of orange trees!  They are everywhere.  But their gardens had trees of all kinds.  Very lush.  Very green.  And very beautiful.  The one unfortunate thing is that they have many, many fountains and pools through out the complex but the fountains have no water flowing.  Thus the little water found in the bottom of the fountains or pools was quite dirty and not pretty.  Having water flowing would have brought an even greater beauty to this place.  Nonetheless, it was a couple of hours well spent seeing how the other half lives in Spain!

 

After the Alcazar visit, we meandered down some streets to find a Tapas eatery.  We found a low cost one for the area and stepped inside.  None of us had ever ordered Tapas.  Tapas are small plates of food that you just order  a la carte.  So all of us ordered a couple of Tapas each and then shared with each other.  I had a ham sandwich, a shrimp fritter and a plate of Baby Squids (deep fried).  Pretty good.  I forget what Denise ordered.  But her plates were yummy also.  The odd thing around here is all the shanks of pork hanging from the ceilings with the pig hoof still on.  They don’t cook these meats over here.  The cure them.  It looks odd.  I have a picture that you will see below of one where it is set up to be carved.  But it tastes pretty good on sandwiches and stuff.

 

After lunch, Zella had a Rick Seves Tour book.  In it there was a walking tour that we did for the next hour or so.  It was really fun.  While walking we came to the area where the real ‘Don Juan’ lived.   There was a statue of the atheist, sex addict dude.  Denise snuggled up to it for a picture.  Made us smile.  We also saw some wonderful Spanish architecture among the many plazas that we passed by.

 

To end our touring for the day, we went to the Plaza de Espana.  This is a huge plaza and building that was built in 1929 to bring all the Spanish speaking nations together for a huge celebration for Spanish speaking nations.  I would assume that it was a magnificent site in its day.  And it still is.  But due to economics over here, it is starting to get run down.  Flags from nations and Spanish provinces are torn and not kept up.  You can see the building starting to deteriorate.  I hope the Spanish government gets it together and keeps this place up as it is pretty cool to look at.

 

After we had spent a good while there, we needed to get on a bus to our hotel.  No banos publicos!   Plus we were all tired of walking.  But the weather was sunny and cool, unlike the forecast of rain from the day previous.  So it turned out REALLY nice.

This evening, we jumped in the car to go to dinner.  The Grieve's do not eat out much and really miss American food.  So we ended up at an American restaurant in a mall.  Denise and I had a plate of nachos to share and a bottle of water each.  Price?  14 euros....about $20!  Pretty expensive.  Such is life over here.  

Well, we are going to Cadiz tomorrow to visit this coastal town.  Early start for over here 8:00 AM.  I had better get to bed based upon this mornings experience!  

Adios.....

Alcazar entrance....

One of the MANY Alcazar's courtyard....

One of many garden pathways...

A new friend of mine....lots of peacocks on the grounds....

One of the nice pools in Alcazar....

You can see the Moor's design in the architecture of Alcazar....

These ham shanks were hanging by our table where we ate lunch.  The little bowls underneath some of the shanks catches fluids still dripping.  Yum!

The ham shank on the carving table.  It is an art here to carve really thin slices for meals.

One of the little alley ways as we did our Zella led walking tour.  She did a great job!

Denise with Don Juan.  She was swept off her feet!

The Plaza de Espana.  The camera cannot capture it all.  It would take two more camera shots to capture it all.  The building is oval shaped with a mote in front of ot.  You can rent boats to paddle in the mote.  The plaza is huge.

Two tired and weary travelers....but still smiling.