> I have tuples in the format shown below: > > (u('2','3','4'),u('5','6','7')........u('20','21','22')) Um, this is not valid Python which might explain the errors you're getting. Are you sure you don't mean to write: ((u'2', u'3', u'4'), (u'5', u'6', u'7')...) because "u" prefixing a tuple is invalid. -tkc