Home invaders
(I had this dream
whilst staying in my childhood home in Shanghai)
Two of my Canadian
friends came to visit on our street, getting off at a bus stop that
does not exist in real life. I am puzzled in the dream because our
street is so narrow it doesn’t really accommodate buses, but
nevertheless there they are.
They are excited by
the old colonial style buildings in the French concession and snap
pics of roofs and walls, doors and windows. Actually in real life
many tourists do come to the neighbourhood for exactly this reason.
They are so engrossed in this exploration that we almost miss the
entrance to our place.
We walk inside and I
know immediately that something is wrong. The door is slightly ajar,
definitely not the way I would have left it when I was locking up.
The hallway is dark and I push it open. Inside it looks completely
still, and my friends follow me inside still happily chattering away.
Then I cast my eyes
to the right and see the television has been smashed face down on the
ground with little bits of glass everywhere. My friends fall silent
and the general silence in the apartment is suffocatingly
overwhelming.
Suddenly two guys
dash out of the room to our left and run across the living room. The
three of us are blocking the front door so they dash into the kitchen
(on our right). I run after them and slam the door shut. There is an
external lock on the door that does not exist in real life, but I
lock it with some relief. They bang on the door to no avail. By then
the neighbours have arrived and said they called the police.
We sit down on the
couch, feeling shaken up but temporarily safe. The invaders have
stopped banging on the door and it is all quiet again. The police
arrive and we explain what has happened. They step gingerly around
all the broken glass and one of them says, you girls really know
how to enjoy life, drinking tea while the invaders are just a few
metres away?
I
look down at the tea, a deep murky brown, and wake up.
--------------------------------------------------
Marble steps to another world
This
is a really strange dream, because I never confirm who the other
person is.
I
am standing on a street in front of a large window. The shutters are
wooden and look sort of European. It is dark inside and impossible to
see from the street level what is inside. I open the window and the
shutter clang clumsily. I climb onto the windowsill and dangle my
legs over the other side, just barely touching the ground.
The
ground feels totally cool and smooth, perhaps some sort of marble. I
jump off the windowsill and both my feet are on the ground now –
I’m not wearing socks or shoes. My eyes adjust to the room slightly
and the dark feels less dark, but it is still quite overwhelming. The
air feels still and musty.
I
take a step forward and realise that there is a step there. I hold
instinctively onto the windowsill, not wanting to lose touch with it.
I take the step down and it is extremely steep. My feet reach the
bottom of the step and I realise there are even more steps. I
reluctantly let go of the windowsill, keeping the pale wedge of light
within sight, my connection with the outside world. Then I take a few
more steps down.
The
window is so small now that it looks like a comical moon. I feel
afraid, but then I am aware that someone
is ahead of me in the stairwell. I cannot see them or feel them, but
I know they are there. The steps curve to the left, and with this
curve I lose sight of the window.
My
heart races and I go back up one step, to the exact point where the
curve is. I can still see the outside world and I calm down a little.
Descending further into the darkness feels scary, and I cannot will
myself to do it.
Eventually
I catch my breath and ascend
the smooth marble steps again, till I am gripping the wooden
windowsill. I open the window and step out. Outside it’s Belmore
Rd, Randwick,
something that occurred to me only as I emerged (not as I went into
the window). I re-arrange the shutters so that they are slightly
ajar, just in case the other person actually wants to come out as
well?
I
have a strong sense that some time has been lost, but I am not sure
how much.
I
walk down Belmore Rd and realise all the shops are in Chinese. It
must be a Shanghai version of Belmore Rd, I think to myself. I go
into a shop and ask for sticky rice cakes with deep fried pork chop
and sweet sauce, something I ate in Shanghai recently. The lady says
that they are all sold out and the door is closed. I am indeed unable
to get out of the shop until a security guard lets me out.
Back
in the sunshine, I have another wave of feeling that some time has
been lost. I feel lost now, in this strange world that I do not
recognise, and then I wake up.
