Totally Torino

Our next stop would be Torino, where I found friends in the most unlikely of places. Well, for me the places weren’t unlikely… but surely for the masses.

When I was living in Spain, I would always go to a Moroccan Barber. They do a fantastic job and do it for a super bargain. So during the walking tour of the city, I asked the tour guide where the ghetto was in the city, so I could go and find a nice barber shop.

When I went to the plaza he told me to go, I found a young Moroccan guy named Ismael, who I started up a conversation with. When I finally asked him where I could find a Moroccan barber shop, he hopped on his bike and told me to follow him. We went about half a mile, twisting and turning through the streets of Torino, until we get to a place that looked like it was closed. All of a sudden, Ismael lifts up the shutter and ushers me in.

Inside, I found about 10 Moroccan met in about 150 square feet, blasting Arabic music and drinking tea. The man who cut my hair had only been in Italy 3 months and barely even spoke a word of Italian… But what a fantastic job he ended up doing.

Over the course of the hour that it took him to leave me a masterpiece of a haircut, we laughed and joked and listened to music from all over the world. And not just with him, everyone else that was running in and out of the chaotic barber shop joined in too. When the cut was over, I knew most of the people in the barber shop. I had a great experience. Better than in the US even.

After that was over, I went back and thanked Ismael, who invited me to have some Moroccan mint tea with him. I sat with him and his friends for about an hour, just joking and laughing until I went back to the American box that was our hotel.

The other notable part of the trip was the tour of Lavazza that we did. Coffee has always been a big passion of mine, and so for me it was SUCH an interesting tour. The tour and presentation was led by Michele, who was extremely knowledgable about all things coffee. He answered SO many questions of mine and even left us with a little gift at the end of the tour.

29:Td5a,

Serendipity in Reggio Emilia

The first stop on our MBA class trip was Reggio Emilia, which for me would come to symbolize human connection and the beauty of coincidences that might not be coincidences. But more on that later…

I was excited to get to Reggio Emilia, because I was originally going to kill time in the city if I got to Europe early. You see, last summer my dad made a fantastic friend in this man named Giovanni, who owns a vineyard just outside of Rimini. Giovanni and my dad have even sent each other some items - my dad sent him some t-shirts and Giovanni sent my dad some fantastic balsamic vinegar. But Giovanni’s family owns a hotel in Reggio Emilia, which my dad told me I could stay in if I needed to. All this information is relevant for later.

The first day we went to a cheese production plant, where we learned about how parmigiano reggiano cheese is made. We were able to sample the cheese and learn what makes the cheese so special. It was really cool to see how much science goes into the cheese making process as well as how much the Italians honor tradition throughout the process.

Later that rainy afternoon we attended a balsamic vinegar factory, which belonged to the owner of the hotel we were staying in. Immediately, as I walked in I noticed that it was the same bottle as the bottle that my dad was gifted by Giovanni. I got so excited that I immediately sent my dad a picture and told him where I was. Towards the end of the hour-long presentation from the owner, a man comes and joins us in the cellar, who the owner introduces as his brother.

The balsamic vinegar tour, Giovanni and I in center photo.

The balsamic vinegar tour, Giovanni and I in center photo.

All of a sudden, this man says “Who is Mana?”, calling out to the entire group. Surprised and taken aback, I raised my hand. Apparently this man was none other than GIOVANNI, my dad’s friend from Rimini…

Giovanni’s family apparently owns the balsamic vinegar distillery and the hotel that his family owns was the hotel we were staying at. I had no idea about any of this prior to that moment. And the balsamic vinegar that Giovanni sent my dad was actually his brother’s. I just thought that it was a fancy balsamic vinegar from the region. I had no idea that it had a family connection. Also, Giovanni actually lives all of the year in Rimini, but he just had some business at their family home that he had to take care of on that day. And when my dad sent him the text that I was there, he was just finishing up and getting ready to leave!

Reggio Emilia will forever symbolize the wonder of human connection and the beauty of coincidence.

2a:Tfe2,

What a wonderful experience I had in Breda. What initially was going to be a short trip to visit Marlie and her family before heading to Italy for my class, turned into such an amazing opportunity to learn about the Breda University of Applied Sciences (BuaS), meet awesome humans, attend a research conference, tour the labs, and interact with the faculty and students.

One of the things that impressed me about the school was the camaraderie between the faculty and the fantastic environment of the school. Many organizations talk a lot about their efforts to create a great organizational culture, and I never really bought into it. Maybe it’s because I never really felt a sense of belonging anywhere that I went. But with BuaS, it was different. Maybe it was the hospitality that I received or maybe it was the air… but I felt almost felt a sense of belonging there.

Everyone that I met was awesome, but one of the coolest people that I met at BuaS (completely by coincidence) was Jeroen, who had a lot to say about energies and life philosophies. In fact, we chatted for a combined 8 hours of my time at BuaS. But we both agreed that maybe my energy found resonance with the energy at BuaS. I was so happy to wander around the campus, meeting different people and learning about the innovative things that they were doing.

I was able to tour the research labs of the university too. They have the number one game development program in Europe, where they are constantly developing new technologies that are pushing the boundaries of video games and finding new applications for artificial intelligence. I also met a fellow NC State alumnus in Ondrej Mitas, who is a principal researcher in the physiological research center at BuaS. They are doing really cool stuff that is really similar to what I have done with the sleep apnea project as well as the golf biometric data.

And finally, on the last day, I got to participate in the lab day of the Applied Data Science and AI program that was just created at BuaS. The university believes in a small-group-focused means of teaching data science, where students work in groups of 5 students and learn data science by working through a real-world problem. This is also in line with my current research in teaching data analytics to students who don’t know anything about math or statistics. I was able to actually help with the instruction of the class, as some of the students had really technical issues that I could work them through. It was so fun being able to share my knowledge with the students and connect with them.

On my last day when I had to leave Breda, I woke up and proudly put on my BuaS hoodie and went to the train station. I was actually sad to think that I wasn’t getting up and headed to the university. I can’t wait for the next time I can return.

2b:T6cd,

These past couple of months have had me running in so many different directions all at once. I have been involved in so many projects, events, and extracurriculars that I feel really burned out moving into summer.

But I am hoping that this trip will reinvigorate me.

I will be traveling to Europe for exactly one month, where all I will be living out of an extremely small backpack. This is because I will be flying the discount airlines all around Europe, which are even more strict than the likes of Frontier and Spirit. Normally, it wouldn’t be a challenge for me, but because part of my trip is business, I will have to dress professionally.

Because of that, I had to wear dress clothes while traveling… which were not exactly as comfortable as sweat pants might have been. But at least people treated me like an international businessman.

By the time I got on the train from Amsterdam to Breda, I was so tired that I was actually starting to doze off. It took everything in my power to keep myself awake so I wouldn’t miss the stop. Luckily, the landscape was absolutely beautiful.

I was so well-received my Marli and family. It’s funny, because I have only met them one time previously when I was about 10, but it feels like I have always been family and I have known them forever. I am seriously looking forward to spending time with them :)

2c:T74b,This is a working shell for the story of my research stay in Madrid: the work that brought me to Universidad Rey Juan Carlos, the people and ideas that shaped the visit, and the parts of life in Madrid that made the stay mean more than the research alone.

Mana Azizsoltani at Universidad Rey Juan Carlos in Madrid — At Universidad Rey Juan Carlos in Madrid.

How the stay came together

This section will introduce the path to URJC and what I hoped to accomplish during the research stay.

The work at URJC

This section will hold the substance of the visit: the research, conversations, collaborations, and ideas that developed while I was there.

Living in Madrid

The stay was also a period of living in Madrid, not simply working there. This section will connect the academic experience to the city and the everyday life around it.

What I brought home

This section will close with what remained after the stay: the work that continued, the relationships that mattered, and why Madrid still occupies such a distinct place in the story.2d:T7d7,This is a working shell for a reflection on my visit to the University of Macau: what brought me there, the conversations that stood out, and what I took home from the experience.

University of Macau campus landmark and university sign — University of Macau

Why I visited

The visit began with a chance to spend time inside the university and learn more about the work happening there.

Inside the conversation

Mana Azizsoltani with a University of Macau colleague inside a casino teaching and research lab — A conversation inside UMac's casino teaching and research environment.

What stayed with me

This section will hold the larger reflection: the ideas I kept thinking about after leaving campus and how the visit connects to my work across gaming, hospitality, research, and teaching.

Mana Azizsoltani at the University of Macau Faculty of Business Administration — At the University of Macau Faculty of Business Administration.

2e:T1818,

One of the things that amazed me most when I first got to Macau was how visible superstition was in the casinos. There was no fourth floor. But it was not just four: no 14, no 24, no 34, and always no 40 through 49. It just kept going.

In line with that superstition is the Chinese baccarat player's love for the trend board. The way people play according to baccarat trends, you might think that the hands were not random at all, but did in fact follow some trends.

They do not. The previous hand does not tell the cards what to do next. But that does not make the trend board meaningless. If a pattern changes what players believe, where they place their money, and how much they wager, then it is behaviorally very real.

So, we took a look at some of the trends and who agreed with them. I matched the visible history before each hand to the side implied by that trend, then checked whether the player's actual wager agreed. Across the five common trends with the strongest agreement, this is what the road was telling the table.

What players saw Five trends players agreed with most

Red is Banker, blue is Player, and the outlined final marker is the wager the trend points toward.

BBBBBB

Sixth Banker96.0%876,653 bets · $1,107 average

PPPPPP

Sixth Player94.5%636,922 bets · $1,067 average

BBBPBB

BBB-P-B → Banker81.6%457,259 bets · $1,023 average

PBBBBB

P-BBBB → Banker80.6%207,546 bets · $943 average

BBBB

Fourth Banker71.4%607,558 bets · $903 average

The two five-hand streaks were the clearest signals. After five Bankers, 96.0% of wagers were on Banker again. After five Players, 94.5% were on Player. Even the mixed patterns attracted substantial agreement. Players were not simply counting which side had appeared most often; they were reading shapes and sequences.

But the result that stood out to me was what happened around four.

The strange jump One more Banker changed almost everything.

BBB?

After three Bankers

71.4%bet Banker · $903 average wager

BBBB?

After four Bankers

98.0%bet Banker · $988 average wager

After three Bankers in a row, 71.4% of players bet Banker for the fourth hand, with an average wager of $903. Once the board already showed four Bankers, 98.0% bet Banker for the fifth, and the average wager rose to $988.

The Player side did almost the same thing: agreement jumped from 68.5% after three Players to 97.1% after four, while the average wager rose from $912 to $973. So this was not only the usual preference for Banker. Something about crossing that fourth result made the continuation feel much more convincing.

Are players hesitant to be the ones betting into the unlucky fourth result, but comfortable once four is safely behind them? Are they scared of four?

Maybe we should be.

That is the part I find most interesting. The cards are random, but the decisions around them are not. A trend board takes a sequence with no predictive power and gives it a shape, a name, and a story. And once the story looks convincing enough, nearly everyone at the table seems willing to agree with it.

2f:T171b,My recent consulting trip to Southeast Asia taught me a LOT about the way that the cage works at the casino, and also that saying "the lady in the cage" can sound weirdly sadistic out of context. The business is starting to pick up at the property and they are starting to run out of tables to be able to dedicate to a single rolling program, so they want to put Walker Digital chip attribution to the test to understand how to make sure that cash players are not able to cash out credit chips when they go to the cage after a day of playing and passing chips. The problem is that its not so easy to track, because we could have some convoluted chain of rolling value allocations, for example: For example, player X gives player Y a chip from their rolling program. Player Y wagers that chip and wins. Now Player Y has a chip that is a non-neg chip from Player X and a cashable chip that they won from the wager. Lets say now that Player Y colors down the non-neg chip and gives half of it to Player Z, who wants to go to the cage and cash out. I have to know that Player Z cannot cash out the value that was originally from Player X....

Player A Rolling program stack

Five non-negotiable $100 chips begin with Player A.

$100 $100 $100 $100 $100

Player B Cash player plus borrowed value

Player B already has cashable chips, then receives Player A's non-negotiable value.

$100 $100 $100 $100 $100 $100

Wager and win The inherited chip creates two kinds of value.

One part is still tied to Player A's program. The win is cashable value for Player B.

$100 $100

Player C The cage sees a blended pocket.

Player C arrives with cash chips, promotional chips, and two pieces of value that trace back to Player A.

$100 $100 PC PC $25 $25

All this, mixed with chips not having clean ownership due to some lacking operational SOPs, some peculiarities about the database, and the sheer number of the transactions, made things really difficult. But, we were able to figure it out with a little bit of t(h)inkering. And when I presented all of the information back to the person in charge, they told me "Just show me what you got, I dont need to know your love story". So I saved them my love story in the cage, and showed them the following:

Player C at the cage

Cashable $200 cashable

Clean value that belongs to Player C and can be cashed out.

Program value $50 from Player A

Value that traces back to Player A's rolling program.

The whole experience taught me a lot about rolling programs and non-negotiable chips, casino cage operations, and transactional databases as a whole.30:T853,One of the professors at UNLV in the Food and Beverage department left the department, which meant that they had to fill four courses for the Spring semester. I already work something like 70 hours per week, and I do research on the weekend when I am not working, but somehow I let my dad convince me that teaching a class in the spring semester would be a good idea. But a good idea it was, because I absolutely loved it. Mondays are already stressful because they are the start of the week, and somehow the weeks always start out a little crazy. But I could not wait to go to class every week. When the weeks got stressful, it was the one thing I looked forward to. I tried my hardest to strike the balance between fun and engaging, yet educational and informative. I spent a lot of time talking about different cultures, food, and travel, but I think what the students loved most were the hands-on pieces of the class. We did a wine tasting lesson, a lesson on dining etiquette, a tea tasting, a five tastes lab, and ate so many different types of food.

FAB 333 Culture and Cuisine class in Spring 2026 — Culture and Cuisine

FAB 333 tea tasting class moment — Tea tasting

FAB 333 moments

Wine tasting
Dining etiquette
Tea tasting
Five tastes lab
Food, culture, travel, and conversation

Based on some of the things that the students told me at the end of the semester, I think it is fair to say that I did a half-decent job. My favorite of the quotes:

Class almost felt like stand up comedy at times.

31:T4ab,One of the parts of my job that most interests me is casino marketing. It has to do with giving the right offer to the right player at the right time. We determine what "right" is through analytics. The way that most casinos, and honestly many other companies, have been thinking about marketing for the last 20 years or so is to determine different segments and market different things to them. But as segmentation shifted to microsegmentation, the `CASE WHEN` statements grew the segmentation trees into monstrosities.

But now, with the power of AI, we can take what we learn from the masses and the segments and tag it back to individuals. This personalization at scale is what I think marketing has to gain from the advent of AI. The personalization can come for the individual across various dimensions of the offer:

The amount
The composition
The terms and conditions
When the offer is delivered
How the offer is delivered

Each of these elements can be tailored to the individual in some way, and that personalization stands to be supercharged by AI.32:T73e,When I was working through my PhD, I fell into the wonderful community of gambling academics. I felt like I finally found my niche, since the gambling literature (and industry) seemed a lot further behind than hospitality, at least in terms of AI and data science. The first time I got to engage with these folks was three years ago at the 2023 International Conference on Gambling and Risk Taking. I was so nervous to be part of a presentation that I asked Kasra to present the whole paper for the two of us and I just sat there in the crowd and watched him crush the presentation.

International Conference on Gambling and Risk Taking in 2023 — 2023

International Conference on Gambling and Risk Taking in 2026 — 2026

Three years later, I returned to the conference. This time with a PhD, two years of consulting experience, 7 research publications, and too many work trips to Asia to be able to count. It was so nice to see everyone again. Some people were really astonished with how far I have come and how much I have learned about the industry. I was happy to be one of the few people that presented really industry-oriented research. That is something that I am super proud of - being one of the few black sheep in the gambling space doing industry focused research, not responsible gambling or problem gambling research. I can't wait until the next one, although who knows where I will be in three years' time...33:T2963,

I was chatting with Todd Fishon from Walker Digital Table Systems, who always seems to have one more casino story tucked away than I am expecting.

We were talking about baccarat, and specifically about how deeply players can believe in patterns. In Macau, players can be intensely loyal to the road, to the trend, and to the feeling that the shoe is trying to tell them something. That is part of what makes baccarat fascinating: the game is mathematically simple, but behaviorally rich.

Todd mentioned a belief he had heard from players around the "dragon tail." The idea, as I understood it, was that after a long Banker or Player run finally breaks, some players still expect the dragon to give one back. In other words, even after the streak ends, they may bet as if the streak has one last breath in it.

Table games behavior When a trend ends, does the table still chase the tail?

The analytic question is not whether the dragon tail is real. The question is whether players behave as though it is.

So I tried to quantify it. I treated the dragon tail as a behavioral moment around a long trend: a run forms, the run breaks, and then the next hand becomes the interesting one. If players believe the dragon will return, then the betting behavior after the break should show up in the data.

Todd's instinct was that, purely from the game, the returning side would come back only a little over half the time. The behavioral question was different: how often do players actually bet on that return?

Observed betting behavior 53.5%

Approximate rate at which players bet on the dragon return in the data I checked.

Directional texture Banker-heavy

The behavior appeared more often after Banker-side dragon tails than Player-side ones.

The result was interesting because it sits in that messy space between probability and belief. Is the dragon tail really a real thing? Mathematically, probably not in the way players mean it.

But I am pretty sure that for Todd and his group of friends, when they are standing at the table and the road has just turned, it feels extremely real.

And that is the part of casino analytics I keep coming back to. Sometimes the useful question is not whether a belief is true. Sometimes the useful question is whether the belief is real enough to shape decisions at the table.

34:Ta50,

Grapes Everywhere

I decided to head up to Bordeaux for a few days to hang out with my dad. The thing about Bordeaux is that it is THE city for wine. I mean, as you fly in if you look out the window you will see that vineyards hug the city all the way around and as far as you can see. Plus, when I this particular weekend was the Wine Festival of Bordeaux, so they entire industy was buzzing with wine enthusiast from all over. And the coolest thing is going with my dad, who know so much about Bordeaux wines.

The first stop on our trip was a tour of a Grand Cru Classeé winery, Chateaux Malartic-Lagraviere, in the Graves Region. Grand Cru Classeé is the highest designation of wines in Bordeaux. There are only 6 wineries in that particular region that have this classification. We had a fantastic tour of the winery and had a great chat with the business director of the winery. It was one of the most beautiful wineries I have ever seen, and believe me, I have seen more than I would like to admit LOL.

During the tasting, one of the really interesting things was that we actually tasted the red wine before the white wine. In general, this is frowned upon, but because of the unique characteristics of the white wine they produce, the red would have tasted completely different after tasting the white. I ended up spilling the wine all over the tasting table, which is extremely embarassing considering the level of winery that we were at (oops). But it was a great experience and a real privilege to have even gotten a tour of the winery.

We also went to Arcachon, which is a coastal town on the Atlantic. The attraction, apart from the beautiful beaches, is a huge sand dune that lies right between the ocean and the forest. It is really a spectacular creation of nature and in my opinion one of the wonders of the world. I had a fantastic time throwing myself off the edges of the dune and landing in the soft sand.

35:T803,

24 Hours in BCN

Barcelona has been good to me over the years. It was my home for many months of my life, and I am always happy to head home :). This time, however, I was just passing through. I only had 24 hours in my home away from home.

As soon as I got to town, I went to my old host family’s house. I have kept the contact over the years and truthfully, they are my family. Period. I got to hang out with my siblings there until me and junior went for a walk to talk and catch up. We ended up at the bar at his university, since that is always where the cheapest food and drinks are. When we came back, the rest of the family had arrived and we had a lovely dinner together - just like old times.

After that, I texted a couple of my friends that are still around and told them to meet me at a 100MON, the cheapest place to drink. After a few beers, we decided to go to Marina, my old stomping grounds. Marina is basically the area of the best shitty bars. In other words, where the broke young people go to drink and party. And as I do on a rare occasion in Marina, I found some trouble LOL. So much trouble that I ended up getting sucker punched in the head and jumped by a bunch of lowlife people. Thankfully, the police were right there and chased them all away before they could do real damage.

I have heard a lot of stories about how bad Barcelona has gotten over the past 3 years or so. The crime rate has skyrocketed and the conditions in the city have gotten a lot worse. I no longer feel safe walking around the streets of Barcelona, especially at night. It makes me really sad to see that it is not the same city that I fell in love with at 15.

36:Tec1,

Mahoudrizzz

Over the past few years, Madrid has really become a second home for me. Home is where the heart is, so they say… and in Madrid I have so many people that make me feel loved, even in some of the hardest moments.

The hardest part about being in Madrid is always having a super packed schedule. Arane and I are always out and about doing whatever fun and novel plan we can find around the city. And when we aren’t, we are sleeping, but never enough LOL. This trip, Arane bought us tickets to go and see an Aitana concert. I have been obsessed with Aitana for like 3 years now, so for me to be able to see her in concert was such an amazing experience. And it was at the Wanda Metropolitano, Atletico Madrid’s stadium. We sang and danced and cried and overall had a wonderful experience.

One of Arane and I’s favorite places in Madrid from last summer is the Patio Mahou, which is a really cool outdoor bar that often has live music or a DJ. The drinks are relatively cheap for us when we consider the amazing experience that we have there every time. This year, though, they offered us an opportunity to get a lesson on how to pour a draft beer the Mahou way. We learned all about what makes Mahou such a special beer as well as how to pour a perfect glass of beer - from the shape of the glass to the height of the “crema”. I ended up getting really into it and asked a ton of questions to the guy that was teaching. He was extremely knowledgable and knew the answer to all of them. And when it came time to actually pour the beer, I failed miserably LOL. It was a lot harder than it looked. Arane, on the other hand poured a perfect glass. I guess if the nurse thing doesn’t work out she can always be a bartender…

Lastly, I got to meet up with some people from different parts of my life. I met up with my friend Emma, who I had only met one time in person in 2017 on the beach in Santa Cruz. Over the years we kept in touch, texting every couple/few months for a little while and just keeping up. And she happened to be leaving Madrid the same day that I arrived and had some time to meet up for a coffee. I also got to see my friend Noa, who I met in Washington DC when I was working as intern there. I got to see him last year when I was in Madrid, and it was so awesome to see him and spend time with him wandering around the city. Finally, I met up with Jose Manuel and Paloma, two of my dad’s contacts in Madrid from when I was a kid. The last time I saw them I might have been 8 years old. It was really cool connecting with them and sharing a really nice lunch with them. The best part about having friends that live far away is getting to see them and have things be exactly the same as always.

37:Tdf3,

Cerdenya, Ens Veurem

My trip to Sardinia (in Catalan: Cerdenya) was characterized by the amazing people that helped me out, beautiful scenery, and great experiences. One interesting thing about Alghero (the town we were in) is that it was actually a Catalan colony back in the day. For this reason, I was extremely excited to speak Catalan with people on the street. But unfortunately I came to find out that virtually nobody speaks Catalan anymore - just the occasional centurion grandma.

I had an exit row seat on the airplane, and in total comfort I overheard the kid next to me speak in Italian with the old man next to him. I didn’t really understand very much, but I heard one word: “doctorado”. So I started talking to him. His name was Andrea and he is a PhD student in Sassoli, where he is studying sustainable agriculture yields, something that is actually right in line with the theme of our Italy class. We talked about all kinds of things, from the differences in the PhD experience between the US and Europe to the areas that our research overlap. When we landed, I asked him where I could find the bus. He said that his friends were coming to pick him up, and that they could just take the long way around and drop me off in Alghero. So we all hopped in the car, rolled the windows down, and BLASTED Italian indie music. We stopped by the beach and put our feet in the beautifully clear water of the Mediterranean Sea before he dropped me off in the city center where I met up with my dad and my aunt.

The next day, we attended a tour and tasting that I set up for us at the winery Sella & Mosca, one of the biggest estates in all of Europe. My dad was struggling to set an appointment in Sardinia (probably because people live a very “island” lifestyle). But I met this professor when we were in Verona who gave us a presentation about sustainable finance who actually lived in Sardinia. When I thanked him for giving such a great presentation, I mentioned that I was going to Sardinia with my dad who is a wine expert. He told me that the CEO of Sella & Mosca is a friend of a friend and that he would see if he could get us in. Five days later we were in, with a free tour and tasting that was incredibly well-done and educational. My dad was so happy with the tour and proud of me that he wouldn’t stop bragging about me to everyone in the tour group. Giving my dad (the wine expert) such an experience using my network was probably one of the most special accomplishments of my career thus far.

The next couple of days, we spent touring the old town of Alghero and enjoying the lovely weather, beaches, and views. I just wish I could have spent more time on the island. I just feel like it is so big and untouched by tourists that it is such an exciting place to explore! I am sure that I will be back. And I can’t wait.

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The Manalogue

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