My baby is born

My baby is born.

When I wake up, I hear someone say: it’s a boy! He weights 6.5 pounds!

“What a perfect weight!” I hear my mom says somewhere in the room.

I have a look at my baby. He is such a beautiful little thing! He has thick black hair and full teeth. I am surprised however, that he is dark skinned – Indianish kind of dark. I wonder where he got that colour from as I am Asian and hubby is white.

I try to remember what has happened during the labour. Unfortunately I can’t remember a thing. Apparently I’ve just had a caesarean birth. The whole thing just seems weird. No labour, no pain, no drama, no ordeal. I can’t even remember how I went to the hospital in the first place and what happened prior to the caesarean. As a matter of fact, I feel cheated. It’s like my memory on the whole birthing experience which is a holy and glorious experience to a mother is totally wiped out as if it has never happened. Instinctively I raise my upper body and want to know what happened on my tummy. To my great surprise, I can hardly see any scar! The cut was at the low end and on top of a scar I had from a surgery 17 months ago but was done in a way that it is almost unnoticeable. Mostly amazingly, my old scar seems to have vanished. Although I don’t understand, I am rather pleased with how the operation was done.

The next scene is at the beach. It is still the same day but my baby somehow looks like a two year old. He loves the beach too much and enjoys playing on the hot sand. I am a little worried about my new born baby and feel that we shouldn’t expose him in the hot sun for so long. Nevertheless we let him play for hours since he wouldn’t let us take him away from the beach.

I woke up the next morning with a sudden panic. “Oh my ….” I screamed. I realise that I haven’t fed my baby yet since he was born yesterday! “Where is my baby?” I become hysterical. I am soon relieved as my mom walks in the room and hands him over to me! I sit up in my bed and try to position him in a way so that I can breast feed him. I put him to my left nipple to encourage him to suck. I am quite anxious as I am not sure if I have any milk at all let alone if he would connect to it.

I feel hopeless for a minute. Despite his hard effort nothing seems to come out. But after a few seconds I start to feel the milk coming. But my baby spills his first taste of milk out as if he is protesting. “He doesn’t like my milk!” I feel so rejected and disappointed. But I am soon relieved and happy again as he continues to suck my nipples this time he is really enjoying the taste of it. I feel wonderful that my baby and I have established our first bonding so soon and so easy.

A drama play - Hamlett

(I had this dream exactly a year ago - 8 December 2004!)

There is going to be a drama play. The drama is Shakespeare’s Hamlett, the place is in a park, and the players are students from two universities - Guangzhou Institute of Foreign Language and Guangzhou Institute of Foreign Trade. I am a representative from the latter and my university is the host for this show.

Hundreds people - both players and audiences are marching towards the park where the show takes place.

I find it hard to find my place. I mean, I am not sure if I will be just watching, or I will be playing. If I have to play, I certainly am not prepared or feel confident about this whole thing.

The show starts. It is a supposed to be a real life show as possible hence the venue is in a park instead of a stage. There are many characters, changing places and story lines. It is very grand.

Somehow I realise that I must be in the show and am playing one of the characters. Strange enough, I can’t understand any of what other players are saying. What language is it that they use?

I have only a few lines to say in my character. I manage to do my part. I find that I am the only one who speaks English and I can only understand my lines.

I suspect that they are using French. I must have asked other people and confirmed it. I also learn that the students from Guangzhou Institute of Foreign Language are required to master 18 languages, compared to my university where we are only required to learn English and can opt to learn Japanese.

I feel a little ripped off for not going to the other university and have lost the opportunities to learn so many languages.

"There are too many Gods!"

My dream takes me back to ancient China, a time before a united kingdom was formed.

Our tribe lives in a village which looks like a big open market. I notice that we all wear robes and the city square is where everyone hangs out.

To prepare from an attack from another tribe, our tribe selected ten people as warriors and I am one of them. From the beginning I do not have faith in defeating our enemies as I have serious doubt as to why we only choose ten people to defend ourselves apparently common sense tells me we need a bigger defence force.

I am assigned to be the rocket carrier. (In those days guns and bullets had not yet been invented.) The rocket is a very long piece of gadget and is relatively light. I point it to the ground and fire it to test if it works. The first three shots nothing happens to the ground. Just when I begin to think this rocket is faulty, from the fourth shot on it causes explosion. I fire another two shots which also end with explosion.

The invaders - another tribe duly arrive. They come in hordes and with weapons. I shoot my rocket at them for several times which cause big explosion. However, the numbers of the invaders don’t appear to have decreased and they are making their way further and further into our village aggressively. I decide to flee as I see no point in direct confrontation any more.

At the back of the city square there is a temple which usually is full of worshippers. As I enter the temple, I see Dennis Cook (the National Manager for my current company) standing there with his daughter and a few other family members. I can hear her daughter’s praying. She is praying for good luck in her car purchase. In her prayers she names the brand, model, specifications and ideal price of the car she is going to buy. I feel strange about this scene as to me her praying doesn’t sound like a genuine worship to the God which is what the temple is for.

As they are about to finish and I can tell from Dennis’ impatient look that he can’t wait for everyone to leave so he can shut the door, I hurriedly left the temple.

Back again in the city square, there is a some kind of surrender ceremony. Obviously the attack is over and our tribe has been defeated. People are marching towards the city square for the ceremony, amongst them include my sister, my mother and my girlfriend and colleague Christina.

I am having a conversation with Christina and mention to her what I saw in the temple earlier. I tell her that I don’t understand why the attack should happen and peace interrupted.

“It’s because there are too many Gods!” She says. “Can’t you see already that all wars start with obsession of their individual God?”

Suddenly, everything starts to make sense.

............................

There are a number of symbols in this dream, namely: war/attack, warrior, weapon, temple, God, family, friends and authority figures. I am yet to string these pieces together to interpret this dream, here are what the dream dictionaries say about these symbols:

Temple
Represents your spiritual thinking, meditation and growth. It is also symbolic of your physical body and the attention you give it.

Attack
Being attacked by someone, signifies questions on your character and the need for you to defend yourself. You are feeling stressed, vulnerable and helpless. You may also be faced with difficult changed in your waking life.

Warrior
Represents life's challenges and your ability to confront them.

God
To dream that you are worshipping God, signifies repentance of your actions and errors.

Weapons
To see or hold a weapon in your dream, indicates a need to defend and protect yourself emotionally and/or physically. You are experiencing some conflict in your waking life. Alternatively, it suggests a fear of sexuality.

Family
To see your own family in high spirits in your dream, symbolizes harmony and happiness. To see them gloomy, foretells of disappointment and sadness.

Friend
To see your friends in your dream, signifies aspects of your personality that you have rejected, but are ready to integrate these rejected part of yourself. The relationships you have with those around you are important in learning about yourself. Additionally, this symbol foretells of happy tidings from them and the arrival of good news.

Dare to interpret this dream for me?