Dream in Antigua: a decrepit house with rats

If I don't record the dreams or their "keywords" they float away completely leaving just a shadow, a reminder that they existed but giving no clues to their substance.

So here is the dream I had on my 5th night in Antigua.

Jag and I were detectives of some sort though we were not in uniform. We were in the office when we got a phone call tipping us off about a string of unsolved murders. There is a man who is an expert at concealing body parts, so we must follow this clue.

We drive in an old jeep to the house which is dark and crumbling. The second floor looks like it's about to fall off onto the street, thoroughly unsafe for habitation. There is a man standing out front shouting.

As we get closer I realise it's M but he is in his 60s with completely white hair and a deeply lined face. He is shouting at his neighbour - and you! you never help me with anything! I need to dig a hole and you just disappear!

We introduce ourselves and show our badges. He looks at us with hardened and murky eyes, as if all the soul has gone out of them. He asks us to excuse him for a moment while he gets changed as he is dressed inappropriately for talking to police.

Jag and I have a brief discussion as he heads into the house - we agree that I should follow him to see what he does. I creep into the house, trying to make little noise. It's not hard to hide as there are so many shadows everywhere. I see him looking under a bed (or is it a counter? everything is so crammed it's hard to tell) for something. He fetches a shoebox and puts it on the bed, then walks away.

Instead of following him I go to the shoebox and open the top. Inside it is a dead rat with a fetid smell. Shocked, I drop the lid and follow him up the stairs. He is rummaging through the cupboards, a small plastic bag of shiny crystalline white powder tied around his wrist. He hums and sings as he digs, seeming ridiculously jovial.

Ah-ha! He cries. I found it!
Hiding behind the door, I'm not sure if he knows I'm there, but he seems unperturbed and keeps talking to himself.

That stupid idiot, he wouldn't help me destroy the evidence, and now I have to do it myself.

With that he turns away from the cupboard and in his hand dangles a live rat, trying to struggle away.

I gasp and wake up.

Dream in Belize: psychosis at a party

This was a very strange dream. Maybe because of the time difference, usually when I wake up in Central America it is late night back home and I would have received some messages from various friends, so I got used to checking my phone when I wake up.

In the dream, I look at my phone exactly how I would have in real life. I see that I have several missed Whatsapp calls from P. At this point I can't really tell if this is a dream.

I call him back and after an interminably long time he picks up the phone.

It takes a few moments for me to realise that he is rambling and incoherent. He is saying various words which link together, but it is difficult to catch the meaning.

After a while I manage to piece the story together. He says he went to a party where some people were giving him pills. He didn't know what the pills were but he just took them anyway. Then he started to hallucinate and he was terrified by his own hallucinations. He didn't know how to leave the party and there were so many people there he began to feel afraid. Then he met a girl.

At this point the story becomes almost unintelligible as it is mixed with mutterings of apologies and a frenzy of paranoia - please don't leave me! I really didn't mean to kiss some random girl at a party where I was psychotic. He repeats his sorries again and again.

I feel perplexed, then I wake up.

Dreams in Mexico: a university reunion, spidermen feet and Jag's brown goats

Dream 1: A reunion

In this dream I have just finished night shift and have that unique feeling of grogginess mixed with mild nausea and disorientation. It is a rather woolly feeling, as if your soul has been replaced by an insensate cotton ball.

But I am on my way somewhere, and when I approach the giant hall I realise that it is our university reunion. I wonder in my dream - is it 10 years now?

Arriving at the gate, I am asked if I have my registration number by someone that I do not recognise.

Registration? I didn't know I had to register. I complain.

Never mind, you can have number 37. The other person says and gives me a badge.

I enter the hall and there are lots of people but no one I recognise. I feel even more tired than when I first arrive, and start contemplating leaving.

Then I see Neha, who I haven't thought about since we finished university - but her hair is cut extremely short. I say hi to her, but the sound is lost in the humdrum of all the conversation around u.

Then I see M and my heart skips a beat. He looks really different - lean and muscular as if he was some sort of fish. He doesn't see me and I keep walking away from him.

I get to the front of the room where a programme is displayed. The first lecture is how to re-attach a severed head. 

Someone comes up to me and asks if I would swap their number 45. Then Julie arrives with a huge platter of frozen strawberry and cucumber slices and announces it's a paleo party!

I take a slice of frozen strawberry. As I bite into it, I wake up.


Dream 2: Spidermen feet

In this dream I am driving along the Warringah freeway northbound. I'm not certain but I think I am in my own car. Looking towards the left, I see E driving a dark blue van and wonder why she is driving that sort of vehicle.

The car is able to read my mind and sends a text to her automatically. She replies asking me to pull over to a small street (which doesn't exist in real life). As we pull up I see a huge Kennard's storage.

What are you doing here? I ask her

I am delivering Que's baby clothes. She replies.

We get out of our cars and go to hug each other. She is wearing an extremely skimpy top which barely covers anything. As we put our arms around each other she suddenly says hey your pants are on backwards!

She starts trying to adjust my shorts (they are the dark green ones from Uniqlo) backwards but of course it doesn't work. As I start laughing at her attempts to do so, I look down and see spidermen feet. I jump and wake up.


Dream 3: Jag's goats
(Unfortunately most of this dream is lost)

It starts with me and Elsie discussing the size of the house she has just bought - she says its 45 square metres but I say that that is impossible.

The scene cuts to a beautiful farm. The hills are rolling and green, as if it has just rained. I pull up outside the farm gate and walk up the driveway. Far away Jag is waving at me. She is dressed simply in overalls and looks tanned and happy.

As I get closer I realise she is surrounded by goats. Lots of them, all brown goats. She is chasing them around trying to grab them by the front legs, with variable success.

Just hang on one moment! I have to find the right one to milk. She calls out to me. Then I wake up


 

Dream in LA: retirement soup in a supermarket

This dream starts in a non descript supermarket. B and I are shopping, and as we go around the aisles it becomes apparent that the supermarket is entirely vegan. We fill our baskets with mushrooms, fresh vegetables, rice vermicelli.. lots of goodies. B is really excited and almost skipping around the supermarket.

As we get to the counter we see a small display of lollies - we pick up a bag of luridly pink gummies and drop it into the basket. The checkout man scans all our items and asks us whether we want the luridly pink gummies in the same bag or separately.

Will you be eating in or taking out?

I look around me and realise that we are actually in a hotpot restaurant and the "supermarket" is the shopping part of the hotpot restaurant. We take our purchases to a table nearby where there is a gas stove built into the table.

Try as we may, we cannot start the stove. B suggests that we go back to ask the checkout man. When I get there he is busy on his phone and barely glances up. He says that we should be able to figure it out ourselves. I give up and tell him to bring the soup over.

He lifts a giant 5L (the reference came from how in the US milk comes in gallons) bottle over the counter - the stock for our soup. Though it's a huge bottle, it is surprisingly light in my hands. I unscrew the top and look at it - only a little grey fluid is lurking at the bottom and it looks extremely unappetising.

I read the bottle and it says in Chinese:
Essence of life!
For retirees! 
This product has multiple purposes to preserve life
including boosting your immune system
and preventing bone breakdown

I feel confused and wakeup

Dream: a non existent address in the forest

This dream starts in the carpark of my apartment. Being inside it’s hard to know what time of the day it is. Everything looks fairly unremarkable; P and I are standing next to my car, both wearing Miami J collars. My collar is bright red and his collar is the usual dark blue variety. We try to kiss goodbye but our collars clash and we cannot reach each other.

Drive carefully, you already have a broken neck. He touches my arm and I get into the car.

I drive alone for a long time, and eventually reach a very rural area. The road meanders down some green hills and I come to a rusty looking farm gate. The driveway is gravelly and there are no signs of life all around. I pull up at the farmhouse and get out of the car. The fibro cottage is quaint and surrounded by a few rosebushes.

Suddenly my mother rushes out of the house.

Hurry, we must go now. She grabs at my arm and pulls me down a side path leading away from the house. There is a man that is trying to kill me.

We get further and further away from the house until it is just a dot in the distance. Crossing a flat field, we come to a dense forest. As we are about to enter the forest I ask her whether we should tell someone where we are going.

If you want, but really we have to hurry. She says.

I take out my phone and open the Whatsapp conversation with P. I start typing the address 45a / 127 but the phone keeps erasing the address over and over again. I cannot even get to the street address (I never find out what it is) because it erases itself so many times.

Without noticing, we have gone further into the forest. The canopy becomes increasingly dense and the light fades gradually. I hardly realize how I am tripping on the roots of the old trees, so concentrated I am on trying to send the address.

But it is a futile task as the message keeps erasing itself. I look up and see just how dark it has become, but suddenly I see a clearing in the distance, a funnel of light peeking through the trees.

As we get closer, I am filled with anticipation at the thought of light.

Then I see a fat and balding middle aged man I do not recognise, standing in the middle of the clearing. He is holding a huge curved knife, not unlike the ones in the pirate movies.

I feel chilled to the core with the realisation I am going to die. Then I wake up.

Dream: the revolution, and two hands

P and I are sitting on a bus. It's hard to tell where we are - the bus is neither old nor new, and looks non descript enough that it could be anywhere in the world.

Looking out the window, it is clear that we are in the countryside. At first the fields look fairly normal - sort of green, lots of farmers milling about, the odd cow. Then I look closer and everything is weird. There is a windmill next to a farmhouse which has rainbow coloured blades, and when it whirs together the windmill looks like a technicolour extraordinaire. A group of farmers walk past, dressed as clowns with luridly white faces and strange wigs. Oddly shaped unidentifiable objects are sitting in the middle of fields, as if they were droppings from alien spaceships.

I need to show you something. P suddenly says. But I can't show you right now.

He punches the window and it shatters noiselessly. At that moment the bus tilts slightly to the left and he takes the opportunity to jump out the window before I can say anything to him. As the bus drives off I look out the window and he is running along a muddy track in the fields, wearing thick black-rimmed glasses. But he doesn't wear glasses, I thought to myself.

I move into his window seat and keep looking outside at the strange landscape. The bus meanders along and we come to a ricketty bridge. The bus groans its way onto the bridge and moves so slowly that we can feel every sway of the bridge. Suddenly there is an impossibly loud bang, and I hear the noise before I feel the motion of my body through the air. The bus has exploded and I am flying through the air, falling helplessly.

And then I am sitting perfectly still inside a boat. I don't remember the actual fall or how I came to be there, but I am sitting on a little stool in front of a table. Next to me is an old man wearing a broad rimmed hat, and next to him sits an old lady wearing a shawl, with her long grey hair in plaits. They talk to each other in a language that I don't understand. I look around and try to gather some clues, but aside from the green bobbing water, I can see very little. The riverbank is so high that I can no longer see the fields, so I don't even know if I am still in the strange land.

Suddenly, P appears from nowhere. The boat is so small that it just barely fits me and the old couple, so I wonder where he has come from. He sets down a few dishes on the small table and the old couple gestures for me to join their lunch, even though I don't understand what they are saying.

P whispers to me, this is the president and his wife. They are peering at us curiously and I wonder how such an old man could be the president. You have to distract them while the revolution is going on. 

I look at the dishes set out - fish stew with rice, and a pot of soup with the lid still on. The old lady is tucking in with gusto, picking out bones from the fish as she eats hungrily. The old man chews slowly, as if he is deep in thought. Everything is silent and the atmosphere feels thick and hostile.

They gesture again for me to eat.
No como pescado. I say to them.

They laugh and the lady sucks on a bone she has picked out from between her teeth. The old man gestures to the soup. I open the lid and it looks like lamb soup (I don't know how I come to this conclusion in the dream). There are speckly fatty bits floating on top of the soup and it looks highly unpalatable, but I think to myself that I should drink some soup to appear friendly.

I take my plate of rice and dip the soup ladle in to get some soup, trying to miss the chunks of lamb bones. My ladle brings up soup.. and a hand, a human hand cut off at the wrist. It can only be a human hand in that shape - perfectly shaped finger nails, a few hairs on the first phalanx - a man's hand. I gasp and drop the ladle with the hand in it back into the soup. The sound of the splash alerts the old man and he narrows his eyes at me. Shaking whilst pretending to be calm, I pick up the ladle and try again - this time I get the other hand - and there it is, a pair of hands, the left and right hands staring at me from the ladle.

My heart pounds wildly and I open my mouth to scream. I feel P's large warm palm clamp itself over my mouth, slightly damp (from sweat? from blood?). It stops my scream from forming. Then I wake up.

(The first vivid dream of 2016)

Cafe Paci

I have a never ending list of food places I want to eat at, and Cafe Paci has been on the list for quite some time since they opened a few years ago. Last year we tried to go for the end of RPA dinner, but it never happened. Once I heard it was closing, I had to go and try it out. It's also one of the few places in Sydney that do a full vegetarian degustation (with even a vegan modification for B!) We were in store for a treat. 

The space is modern and muted with all shades of grey. A collection of lanterns resembling inverse balloons welcomes you. 

Course 1 - Snacks

Pickled melon dusted with mustard seeds

Onion flavoured grissini

Sour cream, chives and capers

Rice cracker drizzled with some savoury dressing

(in the red dish) Rye taco with rice pudding and chives  

Bread: Potato caraway molasses bread

This had the most amazing dense caramelized crust dripping with sweetness, perfectly accentuating savoury foods. It was served with light-as-air whipped butter or olive oil for the vegan option.

Course 2:  Pickled carrot with pumpkin and caraway mayonnaise

This was a perfect artistic arrangement of pickled carrots forming delicate petals. The pumpkin puree it rests on has a soft texture interspersed with small chunks of pumpkin, the whole concoction even creamier with the mayo. The flavours were very well balanced

Course 3: Strawberries marinated in smoked capsicum, peas and goats curd

Who would have thought of such a replacement for veal tartare? The marinated strawberries had such depth and complexity, fooling the brain into thinking one is eating capsicum yet the sweetness and texture of strawberries are preserved well. This was particularly aesthetically pleasing with cute little dollops of goats curd.

Course 4:  Silverbeet, pomelo, traditional seaweed, smoked butter, porcini mushroom

Silverbeet doesn't usually grace restaurant menus, but I really love it fom the Vipassana days. Here the silverbeet stems are mixed with segments of pomelo and topped with a traditional Finnish topping that tastes almost Japanese - a scattering of crunchy flavour-intense seaweed bits. The porcini mushroom adds another dimension of umami, but is not really obvious amongst the seaweed. The contrast between the soft silverbeet and the crunchy topping was wonderful. 

Course 5:  Zucchini noodles with basil pesto, goats cheese curd, roasted hazelnuts

These zucchini noodles were perfectly formed, every single strand coated with rich pesto. The goats cheese curd was light and almost foamy. Again the textural contrast in layers, especially with the crunchy hazelnuts, was the highlight of the dish. 

Course 6:  Licorice cake, carrot sorbet and yoghurt mousse

I couldn't help but ooh-and-aah when this was set down. The delicate white orb is dusted with licorice dust which has a very subtle flavour. Once you dig your spoon in, the carrot sorbet peeks out like an egg yolk. Dig further and you find the base of licorice cake. Visually this was the most striking dish of the night. 

Course 7: Parsley and pear

What a fascinating combination. The candied parsley was picture-perfect beautiful, sitting atop an otherwise uninteresting slab of pear. The parsley sorbet was an intense green, so strong it was almost like grass. 

Course 8: Brown butter fairy floss with popcorn dust

I saw the table next to us tucking into this a few courses prior and all the (older) adults seemed to be really enjoy ripping it apart. Once we got ours it was easy to see why - the fairy floss is an undescribable soft and it was so much fun ripping it apart and tucking tendrils into your mouth. It melts incredibly fast upon contact, leaving just a hint of popcorn. Pure magic.

Extra: Eucalyptus flavoured dark chocolate koalas.
What better way to finish than a cheeky twist on the classic Caramello koala!

This was a lazy long dinner which was utterly enjoyable every bite of the way. The flavours were innovative and the textures ever so memorable. I was impressed he made such a well rounded vegetarian menu! It is a shame that the popup is closing its doors but whatever adventures Pasi gets up to, I'll be sure to follow...