Dancing With Hugh Grant

(My dream journal dated 20 December 2004)

There is a dancing party. However, the venue looks like a race course. People are standing behind the bars, which are used to divide the race course and the spectators.

I also stand behind the bars. Beside me are a childhood mate and her sister. We wait for guys to come over and invite us.

There is a guy coming to us. My childhood friend thinks he is going to invite her. She looks at him in anticipation. However, he comes to me instead, smiling at me with his right arm wide open with a tiny bow - a gesture to invite me for a dance. I take a glance at him. Somehow from that glance I find that I do not like him very much. He looks okay and has a slightly tall and thin figure. The smile in his face has a hint of slyness and lacking of genuineness. I make up my mind that he is not the kind of person I would trust easily, a person with honesty and solid substance. Well, at least that's my first impression.

I step across the bar to get to the dancing floor. We start to dance together. Not surprisingly, I cannot find any tune with him. He does not follow the rhythm of the music and his steps are faster than should be. There is no communication between him and me. Those of you who have dancing experiences would know that, dancing is a silent communication. You can feel the connection between the two of you if you are both in tune. You can tap into something deeper. Apparently he is not that type of dancing partner. He is a lousy dancer. I can’t wait for the music to stop.

Thank goodness the dance is over with him. I return to my spot. “Never mind!” I say to myself. You just have to try to know.

Waltz is on now. My mind and imagination start to race with the music. Waltz is my favourite dance and music. In my opinion it is the most beautiful and elegant dance of all ball room dances. Even just listening to the music alone is so satisfying. My eyes are closed, absorbed in the music and mind dancing.

“Shall we dance?”

I open my eyes. Oh my God, it is Hugh Grant! He wears a very fine dancing suit. He looks so damn good! Although I don’t normally like him (perhaps because of the characters he plays in the movies), at this moment, I am instantly attracted to him.

There is only one problem - I am not wearing skirt. What a bugger! I am wearing a business suit - a business jacket on top of a shirt, and matching pants - the kind I wear at work. How am I going to dance Waltz with him without wearing skirt? I feel a little awkward. I frantically take my jacket off and throw it away. At least shirt plus pants is better than a business suit on the dance floor!

He takes me with him. Not to the dance floor,though. I am puzzled as where we are going. We are now out of the race course, and seem to follow a group of people who are going on their skiing holiday and they all have their skiing equipments with them, about twenty of them.

I am thinking: I hope he is not taking me to ski! All I want is a dance! When the skiing group take a left turn, we carry on. I am relieved: we are not going to ski! Yay!

We are in an empty place. And the dance starts, naturally. I am amazed that he is such a good dancer. I follow him effortless, feeling like I am flying, or ice skating, despite there is no music. The tune is easily found in one’s mind when the partner is right.

Grandparents' old house, Jennifer & Unicorn

(This is my dream journal dated 7 November 2004)

Grandparents (My father’s side) have died for years. However, their house is still there, vacant. No one has come up with a good idea as to what to do with this house. It is very old and the current condition is not good enough for anyone to live in.

One morning, a group of people turn up at Grandparents’ old house. Who are they?

They are from the United States. They are Jennifer and her parents. Jennifer is my husband’s deceased brother’s American fiancée. He died seven years ago in the United States one year after they got engaged.

Jennifer’s parents have brought with them a group of about thirty people, most of whom are architects and builders. They have great plans on what to do with grandparents’ house. After careful examination, they have come up with a solution as to what to do with this site.

The land is in a good location but the house is hardly worth anything. They’ve decided to put the house down and build a Karaoke bar and movie theatre. They waste no time at all. By the end of the day, all work has been completed! I come in to have a look: Wow, amazing! It looks really nice inside and it is very spacious. While they are celebrating and having dinner (dinner is split up into three round tables), I ask Jennifer who is going to manage this business.

She says she is going to move here (at this point the site seems to be a site in New Zealand although it’s supposed to be in China). She has been thinking for a while of moving to New Zealand so she can be with Scott all the time (Scott was buried in New Zealand).

I walk out of the building, and realise that it is sort of isolated in the middle of a pasture. Suddenly I see a strange moving object from a distance heading towards this way. A few seconds later as it moves closer, I realise it is a Qi Ling (Chinese unicorn). It is a very colourful creature with four legs. However, its face has some certain human feature and I am not sure why.

I am scared of it at first. I see not just one, but two, three, and hordes of them emerging from both sides of the far distance, and rapidly approaching us. What are they going to do? Are they going to attack us?

I quickly run in and tell everyone to come out and have a look. People generally seem to be scared like me at first. However there is no sign of panic as parts of us seem to know that these creatures could be our guardian angel. There is a belief that they may come to protect us.

The Qi Lings have run past us, disappearing into the far distance. Then they come back. They have done this several rounds. Ah, we realise that they are checking if there is any danger that could come to us. We are relieved and feel blessed. In a few minutes the Qi Lings have all disappeared.

The party and celebration goes on.

Climax, in a kiss

I am in a group of six people: three male and three female. We are actors for blue movies. The costumes and stage settings are old fashioned style - similar to those in the movie ‘Moulin Rouge’.

Two of my male colleagues are from Bei Jing. They are both very tall (about 178 - 182cm), and very handsome. They are both very young (no more than 25-year old by the looks of it). ‘What’s in for them to be a gigolo? They are wasting their youth in this business!’ I think to my self.

As to my two female colleagues, one has short black hair with fringes and big eyes. She is not the best looking girl in our group. But her acting is very daring and engaging. In other words, she is full on. The other girl is thin, and has long hair. She is a beauty in the traditional sense. However, she is like the ‘Lin Dai Yu’ type - shy, fragile and sad looking.

The girl with short black hair is whinging about something. She says that her acting is the best in the group and we all know that. Yet she doesn’t get treated like a best actress deserves. Everyone hears her, and know that what she said is true. But no one makes any comment to show sympathy and support. Maybe it has something to do with her attitude.

I’ve had enough of this and decide to go home. It’s midnight. I have to walk home. I am a bit scared about walking in the darkness but I know that there is no point to hang around in this environment.

When I get home - a studio apartment, I realise that the 3rd male colleague has followed me. He is my boyfriend. I am not interested or in the mood to see him. I expect him to do some explanation as to why he follows me.

Without saying a word, he wrapped me up with his arms, and lie me down in bed. I let him. He starts licking my eye lid, very gently. All my resentment and bad mood disappears magically in that kiss. His tongue is like the most teasing and arousing massage in the world, I feel a sense of intimacy, security and his dedicatedness. His tongue says it all. His kiss is deep like an ocean. I feel wonderful and blissful. In that kiss I am his captive. In that moment I know he belongs to me, and I belong to him. Tears start to well up. He licks my tears dry. My soul is shaking. Oh, what a heavenly experience...

--------------------------

The radio suddenly went off, and I woke up. Damn!!!!! I realised that last night before going to bed, I habitually set the timer for the radio. Today is Sunday. I was supposed to sleep in!

‘You were funny!’ seeing me awake, hubby commented. I noticed that we were all wrapped together. My arm is around him and his leg is between mine.

‘Why?’ I asked, reluctant to leave my wonderful dream.

‘You held me so tight. Your fingers tapped my back. Your legs squeezed mine. And I could feel the pulsing of your pussy! ’

I laughed out loud.

‘Can you lick my eye lid?’ I requested.

Making A TV Commercial

(My dream journal dated 2 July 2005)

Nicholas Tse is a pop singer in Hong Kong. He's got a contract worth $1.8 million to make a TV commercial for a famous brand of business suits.

He is told that the shooting should take no more than two hours. I think that’s easy money for such contracts. I am curious as to how this soon to be TV commercial is made.

I arrive at the studio. There are about ten to twenty crew. A small number of his fans (about fifty) are also present. Among the crew, I only remember the camera man. His gear lies on the ground - a small-sized camera and a couple of tripods.

I look at Nicholas. He is wearing a business jacket with a shirt underneath. He is not wearing a matching pair of pants and shoes. Hence a very casual and smart looking. I can hear him mumble, something like he is used to being surrounded with his fans at his work scene. He doesn’t seem to mind at all and appears very relaxed.

As the shooting goes, he walks along the CBD in Tokyo, as if he is window shopping. At one point, he sees a business suit on display through one of the shop windows and his eyes begin to shine. He says to himself something like “wow, that looks very smart!” and appears that he wants it very much.

He searches his pockets to see if he has enough money to buy this business suit. To his disappointment he can only find some loose changes and a few coins.

At this point, I begin to think what a boring and slow-paced TV commercial this is going to be. However, the next scene changes dramatically:

It is all action now! I see skyscrapers everywhere. A few huge nets have been set up underneath some of the skyscrapers for the ‘chase and escape’ movie shots. At some point Nicholas will have to jump from one of the skyscrapers.

...

Nicholas has now earned some decent money from being a stun man. He is happy now as he can finally go back to the shop where he can buy that favourite business suit of his. His punch line is:

“It’s worth it!”

Commuting Between Japan and China

Ingrid is my girlfriend. Somehow through her I get to know a Japanese friend of hers who works in Zhen Zhou, China. (Zhen Zhou is the main city of He Nan Province. It’s in central China). He is a small, middle aged man.

I am not sure if the company he works for is a Chinese or a Japanese company. It is an Export Company and has a few Japanese management staff. There is something strange about this Japanese man. He commutes from Japan to China to work everyday.

I run a calculation in my mind as to how he can manage to do it: Even if he lives near the airport in Japan say Tokyo, it would take him at least an hour to fly to Shang Hai. From Shang Hai to Zhen Zhou, it would take another hour and a half. From the Zhen Zhou airport to his work, it must take at least half an hour. Plus all the time spent in checking in, waiting, going through customs etc he probably needs at least six hours. To arrive at work at say 9 AM in Zhen Zhou, he needs to get up at 3 AM. Of course, the same happens after work and by the time he gets home it would be somewhat midnight.

That’s why I don’t understand why he commutes everyday. I wonder what kind of family circumstances makes him take such trouble every day. He could live in China during the week and go back to Japan during the weekend if he needs to.

The company has a vacancy for an Export Documentation Officer. I am quite keen in this position because I believe if I work amongst Japanese staff, I will learn some Japanese quickly. I decide to talk to this Japanese man. He seems to be a senior management person in the firm.

I find him and introduce my self as a friend of Ingrid. I tell him that I am interested in this position. He then tells me that he has to advertise this position and invite applicants. I am more than welcome to apply for this position of course, but he can’t guarantee me that the position is mine.

I am a little disappointed, but I understand.

A Conversation About School

(This is my dream journal dated 11 February 2004)

My cousin Hugo, grandpa and I are having dinner together at Grandpa’s old tiny flat. Over dinner Hugo and I have some discussions about the schools and colleges in the United States. I am flicking through a thick catalogue of the Colleges and Universities in the United States (I must be looking for a school to go to and wishing Hugo could help me on this).

'How come I can’t find a single school that would suit me to go to, amongst hundreds of schools, Hugo?' I ask.

Hugo looks at me with a modest and a student-like smile in his face (that typical smile of his) and replies after giving a thought to my question:

'Why are you still worried about academic achievements, Xiaobo (my Chinese name)? Didn’t you graduate from one of the most privileged Universities in China?'

I am quite confused and puzzled. But I guess he is right.

'To be frank, Xiaobo, I don’t think you will find any school in this book that offers what you want to learn.' He goes on saying.

My Friend Hou

Hou and I are sitting in a 3-seater couch. The couch is just by the door. The room looks very low which suggests it is a flat. We’ve been chatting, catching up with things over the years. We haven’t seen each other for years.

Hou selects a book of mine. To my surprise, he starts to write things on the side of the book - the loose pages, without asking me. He has to bend/fold the book a little to make the side wider to give him more writing space. When he finishes I have a look at what he’s written. It says: From a lifelong friend Ella. I notice the book is one of my favourite self-help books. When you write things on the right side of the book, of course, each page is marked.

He has gifted himself a book of mine! Although a little surprised, I feel honoured. Not only it’s a privilege to be regarded as his lifelong friend, I am more than happy for him to keep that book as a gesture of our friendship.

I leave the couch to do something else. When I return, I notice that he has selected another book of mine and has done the same thing! The book is my English textbook and I need it for my final exam. Although I could do without this book, I feel safer to keep it in the mean time.

Strangely, I don’t mind at all with what he did to my books. I ask him why he chose my English book as his English is good enough while the book is very simple. He tells me that now he no longer lives in the United States his English has slumped. This book actually suits him very well.

I tell him that I am quite happy to give him the English book next time when I meet him, or mail him after I have finished my exam.

We also chat about his personal life. I find out that his wife still lives in the United States. I ask him when they see each other next time. He tells me that he plans to go to the States to see her next year.

‘That’s too long! How can you guys live a life like this?’ I ask.

He remains silent.

Somehow I feel I have tapped into a sensitive subject which triggered deep emotions. How is he supposed to answer me? Easy? Not a problem?

Of course not!

I feel I want to give him something, to fill a void in his life. I love him so much. I care about him so much. We’ve been rock-solid friends for many years, it hurts to know that he is on his own most of the time.

I lean towards him and kiss him in his lips. I am totally surprised by what I did!

He does not respond passionately. I guess he is surprised too and doesn’t know what to do. I feel a little awkward. We both do.

I begin to analysis why I did it. What drove me to kiss him was definitely not lust. It was love, only love. However, this love is not in its purest form as I did think about the possibility of becoming his lover if he needs me. I think the motivation to that kiss is my desire to want him to be happy. I feel ashamed of my thoughts on the prospect of being his lover.

Post-exam & school holiday in Shanghai

The school semester has just finished. We are on holiday.

Fuxiao, my sister’s girlfriend, comes to visit her at our home. I am in another room. However, I can hear their conversations in my room. Fuxiao says to my sister: ‘Do you know that your sister is the top student in her grade?’ (In China, a grade has several classes. There were 13 classes in my grade in high school, for example.)

Upon hearing this, I get curious. The final exam consists of two subjects: maths and English. I got 87.9% in my maths. I can hardly believe this kind of score is what the top students gets.

Suddenly I have an urge to find out if I am really the top student in my grade. I would feel better if I get the confirmation. However, it seems the school has a policy of not disclosing each student’s place in the grade so that they would not feel too proud for being on top or too ashamed for being at the bottom.

After learning this, I feel better and my urge for confirmation has gone.

...

Still as part of school holiday. We are all going to Shanghai. I get to pick if I want go there by train or by plane. After consideration I decide to go by train as not only it’s cheaper, it would offer me more experience. Besides, it’s not like I am in a hurry to get there.

I am staying at Zhangwenjun’s parents in Shanghai. (Zhang is my colleague in Shenzhen and she is from Shanghai.) Her parents live in a two bed-room apartment. I am in their living room. It feels a bit strange as their place is not as luxurious and comfortable as I have imagined. There is only one set of furniture in the living room – a wooden dining table with four chairs, nothing else. I’ve never been to anyone’s home that is so simple.

My cousin

We are having a family dinner in my childhood home. My uncle is there also together with some other relations. There are about seven or eight people all together. We are about to finish dinner.

My cousin turns up outside the door. He is the son from my uncle. He looks about twelve or thirteen but somehow I think that’s a mismatch as he should be an adult.

He looks untidy…. actually…very dirty. He carries with him a blue ball. The ball is slightly bigger than a basket ball. He says he is very hungry and wants to come in to have dinner with us.

My uncle is the first one to refuse his request. He then tells everyone not to give his son any food. I have a look on what’s left on the dinner table and can’t see anything decent. I feel a little uneasy because no food is left.

My cousin is begging now. He says he is really really hungry. Rice would just do. Eventually he is allowed to come in and given rice. He must be really hungry as he is really enjoying that rice I can tell.

After dinner everyone is relaxing in the back yard. My cousin starts to dance. He dances with his blue ball. No one seems interested in what he is doing. But I am amazed to see that he is a very good dancer. He throws the ball in the air, catches it, and do all sorts of the things with the ball while dancing. The ball leave his hand from time to time but never drops to the ground. I begin to wonder how he becomes such a natural dancer. In the meanwhile I feel pitiful that nobody seems to care about his talent, including my uncle. How sad! However, he seems to be enjoying himself in his dancing.

Dictionary

In the office.

Phil (my colleague) and my sister come to my desk. Phil asks if I have a dictionary.

‘Sure. I have two dictionaries actually. One is English – Chinese, the other is English - English.’ I reply, glad to be of help.

He flicks through the English-English dictionary, and says to me:

“You know, you need to have 1st Dictionary Ella! The dictionaries you have are no good. Do you know that your cousin, Hugo, also uses 1st Dictionary as it is more advanced than the ordinary dictionary?”

I actually don’t have a clue what dictionary Hugo uses. Phil and my sister decide to go to the local library. When they return from the library, they have 1st Dictionary with them.

Demonstration

A group of Samoan women approach me. They ask me if I want to participate their demonstration.

I ask them why they go on demonstration. They tell me that amongst all the ethnic groups in New Zealand, they are singled out by the government. They don’t receive equal benefits and treatments from the government as other ethnic groups do. They want equal treatments.

‘That’s fair enough!’ I think. I join them on the demonstration. Being a minority ethnic group myself, I have sympathy towards them.

I soon regret having participated the demonstration afterwards. I have had the chance to discover the reason as to why the government treat them differently: they contribute nothing to the society. In other words, they give nothing. As a result, the government believes that they’ve worked their own way towards expecting nothing in return.

Column Camps

I am at the beach, with hubby and his family. I am not sure if it’s Blackhead Beach where we used to holiday because it looks very different. The sea is flat and the beach is broad. People come here camping, like us.

There are not many campers on the camping ground. I am most amused to notice that apart from the ordinary camps and caravans, there are some round, column shaped camps. They look like fortress. I wonder what the inside looks like and how people sleep inside as they don’t seem to have a big ground space.

What’s even more amusing is, some of these column camps are floating in the air. Some have just taken off the ground and some are higher above the ground. Apparently they are still climbing, very slowly.

I know Kiwis have always been creative and adventurous. But I am still to figure out how these column camps work.

Women's Gathering

I can not tell if it’s a rest home, or someone’s residence.

I see a lot of women here. They are all above sixty years old and look perky. None of them looks frail. I notice that they are all very well dressed. It might not look like a party as such, but it certainly has a party atmosphere. It’s an open area with lots of gardens.

One of them is hubby's grandma. She is about eighty or at least in her late seventies. She looks extremely good in her age. Somehow the word ‘royal’ came to my mind as an appropriate word to describe how she looks. She is wearing a beautiful knee-length gown with a pair of high heel red sandals. I am very impressed that she looks so elegant and gorgeous. Somehow I get the feeling that this is how she looks every day. However, I can’t help but think: if she suffers from chronic back problem, then she shouldn’t wear those high heels. Does she know that?

Hubby’s mother turns up. She is also dressed up. But she doesn’t look as elegant as hubby’s grandma. Not only is she overweight (compared to grandma), her shoes look terrible which kind of ruin everything else. She must have realised that and felt a little embarrassed about her blue cotton shoes, as she took them off and threw them away, and says: ‘that feels better!’

Staffing shortage

I am at work.

Adrain is away sick today. He’s got the flu. John has been on and off in the last fee days. He’s had bad coughs lately but he thought it was just a cold.

I go to John’s desk in the morning to talk to him about a file and realise he is not in. There is a note on his desk saying ‘I won’t be in today…. I might not come back at all’.

Phil and I look at each day, stunned. Phil is the team leader. We both know from John’s note that he won’t come back. We realise that his bad coughs are not from cold. He’s got a terminal illness. He is dying.

We were short staffed but now the shortage of staff is even more severe.

When Kevin walks past me, he gives me a special look. Kevin is the Regional Sales Manager. I don’t understand what that look means. He senses that I am confused, and says to me: ‘have you not noticed that Phil has been checking your past employment history?’

I suddenly realise what’s happening: they are looking for a replacement for John! And the best candidate is me.

Children's Play Fight

I am at a street corner in a residential area. It’s like the end of a crescent as there is a big open ground at the end. My friend, Vanessa, and I are standing there chatting. Her son, Piggy (nick name) is playing with his cousin. (FYI – Vanessa was my friend when I lived in Shenzhen)

Piggy is about eight years old by the looks of it. His cousin is about two years older than him, and is slightly bigger than him. They are practising martial art fight, in a very casual way.

Both Piggy and his cousin have shoulder-length hair. Piggy’s hair is straight and black while his cousin’s hair obviously has been treated as it’s very wavy and brownish.

Vanessa and I carry on with our conversation while watching the children having their play fights. Their fights soom come to an end and I am surprised to find that Piggy has actually won as he is a smaller than his cousin! I must have expressed my surprise to Vanessa.

Vanessa appears very casual about it, not surprised at all by the result. She explains to me that kids don’t know the fact that physical size and age can be an advantage or otherwise. They are just being themselves. Piggy won only because he was staunch, not because of his technique or anything. She further tells me that kids have not yet developed the concept of fear, therefore they are not threatened by the bluff of another kid even the other kid is bigger and older. She says that only adults use measures such as size, weight, or age in fights. That’s why we are often defeated before the fight even starts. We lose so many battles in our minds!

I am amazed that Vanessa has turned into such a philosophical woman. Must be motherhood that did it, I think.

Old Friends & River

It’s summer. I have just graduated from university. All the students take this last summer holiday to go back to their respective hometown before embarking on their first jobs all over the country.

Ding is an old friend of mine in high school. She will be working in Beijing and I will be working in Zhongshan. We join together to visit one of our old girlfriend, Liu.

Liu lives in an apartment. Her place looks a little dark. I don’t see a man in the house which suggests she is on her own. She has a son who looks 7 or 8 years old. During the short stay while we are there, she has to constantly carry her son in her arms. I am surprised that a small and delicate woman like her can carry such a big boy in her arms as if she is carrying a baby. Apparently she must have been doing this for years. It appears that her son suffers from down syndrome because he looks far from an ordinary boy of that age.

There is no sparkle in Liu’s eyes. In fact, there is not a tinge of zest I can find in her. Yet she used to be the best-looking girl at high school and had a lot of boy admirers! I would have thought that she would be leading a better life than a rough deal like this. Perhaps it’s fate, I thought.

........


I am walking along a river in my hometown alone. In my childhood, I have walked along this river countless times.

I keep walking. I have never covered the full river length before. However after a certain point of the river, things start to look different, very different.

All the stones, boulders and rocks become animated. There seems to be a theme about these boulders and rocks, as they all become faces - faces from the ancient Chinese legendary tales ‘The Eight Fairies’. The heads are much larger than the real size. These animated heads all have friendly, funny and humorous looks.

I am amazed. I hadn’t known that if you walk the extra miles you will encounter nice surprises like this. I begin to wonder how come I have never walked this extra distance before to realise that there are amazing things like these.

There are quite a few food kiosks. In one food kiosk there is an old fairy-like man. He has long white hair and beard. He wears robes and he has a very gentle and affectionate face. When I walk past, he smiles at me and asks what food he can make for me.

‘Anything you like!’ I reply. He quickly does some stir fries in a big wok. After one lot he does another, and another…He must have done 5 or 6 lots of different stir-fries for me. I notice that all dishes have peanuts in them.

I am full of thanks for his kind offer. I look around, it’s dark. There are flickering lights from different houses in the far distance. It’s so peaceful. It’s the life of an ancient idyllic village.

I am now on my way back. Instead of taking the same path, I take a different one this time. I walk on the lotus leaves. The lotus leaves form a perfect labyrinth in the middle of the river. I see a few acquaintances on this beautiful labyrinth including my old professor in the University. He is doing some gentle stretches as a form of exercise.

Grandad II

(This journal was made on 31 March 2005)

My Grandad (my mum's dad) came to my dream last night and the night before.

In my first dream, I was visiting my old school. There was a building on the campus which was my old classroom but apparently had been converted to dormitories now. I walked along the long corridor in the building where both sides are dormitories. Guess who did I see? My uncle in the corridor! I asked him: “What are you doing here for, uncle?” He pointed to the room behind him. I looked through the window and saw Grandad lying in a bed. My uncle said that he had taken Grandad out for shopping for the day and apparently it was too much of a day for Grandad that he was very tired and needed a rest. He found this place for Grandad to have rest before he could take him home.

I hadn’t seen Grandad for years. I was surprised to see him so fragile and old this time. I wanted to greet him in person. But I was afraid. I thought he was dying (I meant, he was in his final years of life). I didn’t want to leave an image of a fragile and sickly old Grandad like that. I wanted to keep my old images about him when he was healthy, strong and tall. Grandad was the kindest person in the world. I loved him very much. Yet I couldn’t face him now.

In my second dream, Grandad was sitting in an armchair on a deck in front of a huge swimming pool (it was so huge that it almost felt like a pond). It was not the home he used to live in. He was not fragile and sickly this time. He was his usual self like the Grandad I had always known.

He dragged me over to him, and stood me in between his laps. I had no idea what he was going to do. He put his hands on my waist, and started to twist my waist to the right. “Ouch!” I yelled. It hurt. I wanted him to stop as I didn’t think my waist could keeping twisting like that. But I bit my mouth to stay silent because I realised that he was doing some healing about my troublesome back. By twisting my back, he was re-aligning my spine which was apparently out of alignment. My waist was tilted like that for ages although it would be only about a couple of minutes.

(Notes: Grandad died about seven years ago. He was bed-ridden in his final months. I always wondered that if he had a peaceful death and it was a pity that the last time I saw him was about 10 years ago when he was a healthy man. I wished I could have done more for him.)

Grandad

(This dream journal was recorded on 8 May 2005)

Grandad has just died.

He is lying in the bed. My uncle is standing at the far end of the room and mum is at the end of the bed near the door.

The door is open. I am standing outside. I have only allowed myself to have a very quick glance at Grandad from outside the door. I am a bit scared. I have never seen Grandad sick before, let alone death. I don’t want to leave a memory on whatever is there in that room. I treasure the memories of Grandad too much when he was alive and I don’t want to ruin it.

“Come on, Botzi!” Mum says to me.

“Your Grandad has been kind to you all his lifetime. I am sure he doesn’t want to frighten you even now he is dead.”

A fair comment indeed. I think I should face up this person who I loved so much. The fact that he is dead should not change anything.

Standing outside the door, I look inside. My heart is pumping fast and I feel a bit intense. Grandad lies there and looks as if he is just asleep. I allow myself to carefully examine his face. He looks gaunt and yellowish but other than that he looks quite calm and peaceful. Then something strange happens:

His face turns right (that is where the door is). As I walk in the room, his face follows my movement, as if he could sense my being there and wants a connection with me. Realising it’s definitely me (I presume), the muscle at the corner of his mouth pulls. Grandad is happy to see me and he gives me a smile! His eyes are still closed of course.

Mum was right! Grandad certainly is the kindest grandad in the world! I should’ve known this all along. I should’ve never doubted that a dead body there shouldn’t have made a difference to my feelings and memories to him.

In an European Office

(My husband told me an interesting dream this morning. I persuaded him to write a dream journal. Here goes)

I am in an office. The office building has the architecture of an European style. Inside the floors are wooden, and the walls of the building are made of stones.

Looking out of the window, I see trees lining the street. Those trees are very green and have loose leafs. It must be summer. Neighbouring building have ornate pillars and carvings of griffins and lions at the front.

In the office, my colleagues all sit in front of old styled wooden desks, which look like bigger versions of the ones at school when I was a child. None of the desks has a computer but there is a small table top narrow wooden cabinet.

A client of my company walked in. It’s Edgar. He is from South America. Without paying much attention to other colleagues, he walks straight towards me. We exchange greetings. He starts asking Telecommunication related questions about a problem he is having. I stop him half way through. I hand him a book, he looks inside ‘Is there any radio equipment in this book?’ He asks.

‘No. It has no radios. But it has a list of all the companies and it shows you which companies are doing good and which are not doing good.’ I replied. The side of the cover of the book actually prints ‘stock market‘ or something like that. I think he’s seen that. I then explain to him that I am now doing derivatives trading and am no longer in the radio business.

He seems interested and curious. ‘Can you look up for me if the ABC company (it’s a fictitious name for privacy reasons) is doing good?’ He asks.

ABC company is a company he says was started by one of my former colleagues, Alan, who left my old company several years back to go and work for a competitor. So Alan must have left that company and formed his own outfit. I am slightly surprised as he appeared to be a very conservative person in nature and not a person of the risk taking type.

Edgar wishes to check the stock price of Alan’s company. I think gee he has listed his company must be on the OTC market, how could a business grow so fast as to list on the main stock exchange, regardless he has outside investment, quite impressive in such a short time. I open the desk top cupboard on the inside is a small screen. You can use a hand held terminal like an EFTPOS terminal to key in the company name. I press a button and three companies’ names pop up on the screen. The company name starts with 'M'. There are three companies with names that start with 'Mann' and one of them says 'Mann Kost'. They are all German names strange for a kiwi company.

The dream ends there because my wife woke me up and asked me 'what were you dreaming? You were breathing fast and heavily!'

City In War

(This dream was recorded on 26 September 2004)

The city we live in is no longer a peaceful seaside city any more.

Invaders have launched attacks to destroy us. Hordes of plane fighters were hovering in the sky dropping bombs. Citizens were panicking. Old and young, men and women, adults and children were all running on the street like mad without knowing where they were going. Screams, cries, yelling which were mixed in the background bombing noises filled in the air.

I had a look in the sky. The bombs were dropped here and there from the plane fighters but somehow from a distance. I was amongst the running crowds, who eventually found a cave to hide.

The cave made me feel a little safer, but just a little. I was scared. I did not understand why this happened, and what I was supposed to do. The attack happened so abruptly that it was impossible for us to absorb it let alone assemble a strategy to protect our lives.

Something strange happened. We heard some noises outside the cave. It sounded like a choir singing. Out of curiosity, we all slowly but suspiciously walked out to see what was happening.

Hundreds of people were forming a circle on the street, hand in hand, chanting. They all wore robes (like those ancient Greeks). They did not look worried, or scared. They acted as if there was no attack at all and their lives were not in danger. They were totally oblivious that a war was happening.

More and more people (including myself) joined the circle and the chanting naturally, a little puzzled and confused first. As I was chanting, suddenly a surreal sense of peace came all over me and all I felt was me, peace and power. I was hardly aware of what was going on outside the chanting circle. Suddenly, I realised that this was a way of fighting. Instead of running around madly and clueless, this was the only way that could save my life – if I can remain calm, ignore the chaos in the outside world and have faith that this is all I need to do, nothing can destroy me.

Stock Market Frenzy

(This dream was recorded on 4 October 2004)

My dream took me to Shenzhen, China.

I was in Sichuan Securities, a stock brokerage house. It was very crowded and you could tell that the stock market was very flamboyant simply by the number of heads there.

I saw a lot of my old friends, amongst them were my childhood friends, college mates and general friends. Everyone was submitting purchase or sale orders to the counter so they could cash out their profit or buy in potential profit as soon as possible. However, I was just watching, wondering what the hell was causing this frantic madness in the share market.

A man stood out from the crowds as he was not one of the ‘action’ people. He was on his own and not placing any orders in. I recognised that it was Lao Bie, my alumnus in GuangZhou. He was a very good friend of my friend, and so became my friend as well. After graduation, he became a lecturer on Principles of Economics and International Trade for two years in the University where he studied.

I asked Lao Bie: 'It seems you are not sucked into this stock market madness. Isn’t it good time to buy? How can you stay so aloof while everyone else was busy making money?'

He told me that he had spent all his money in the stock market and now he lost all his original capital, which meant that he could not do anything even this was an once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Then I asked: 'But you are a lecturer on Economics. You are supposed to know everything about the market. You should know better than the rest of us.'

'You can learn a lot from books and grasp all the theories. But in reality, things rarely happen in the circumstances where you can apply the theories according to what you’ve learnt. No matter how much you’ve known, there is always more that you don’t know…'

An English Composition

I am at high school. We have just finished final exams. We are going to have the end of term school meeting to wrap the term off.

It’s going to be a special occasion for me. I am told that I am going to read my English composition at the meeting to over 2,000 students. The composition was done during my just finished English exam. My English teacher is very impressed with it and very proud of me. He believes that I should share my composition with all students.

I am at home, preparing for my speech at the meeting. My sister Joan is helping me to make up my face. My grandparents keep asking me what I wrote in my composition. They are going to attend the meeting together with my parents and my neighbour Elaine (Elaine is my neighbour while I lived in Wellington in the last four years).

The meeting has started. Somehow I don’t feel ready as I haven’t found my script. I am in a frantic rush, desperately looking for it, bearing in mind the composition was done during an exam in a tight time frame which makes it hard to recite from my mind.

I find my English teacher in the crowds. He tells me that he is gping to read my composition in Chinese before I start, so that those audiences who don’t know English can understand the excellence of my composition.

It is a good arrangement, I must admit. However, I still haven’t found my English script. The meeting has already started. I can hear that the headmaster has kicked off the opening speech. I go upstairs where the school broadcast studio is and ask them when my turn is. They tells me that my turn is next.

I realise that I don’t have time to muck around looking for my English script. I decide to borrow the Chinese script from my English teacher after he finishes and translate into English instantaneously. The only problem is: my original English composition, after being translated into Chinese, then being translated back into English, even I myself am not sure it’s going to be as good as my original composition.

Anyhow I am now on the stage in front of the audiences. I feel slightly nervous but I soon tell myself to calm down and read my composition as if I am talking to just one person. I learnt this technique from Suzanne Jeffers in her ‘Fear the fear and do it anyway’.

My opening speech is: ‘The composition I am going to share with you is dedicated to all the people I love, especially to my English teacher, Mr Zuo…’ Then I start translating the Chinese script as if I am reading the original English version. It goes well on the first page. However when I come to the middle of second page, I note that two sentences are poorly scribbled and very hard to read. I am annoyed with whoever wrote this down as apparently he/she is not a very responsible person. Fortunately there are only two sentences which I can make it up in my own imagination and words using my quick wit.