I had a dream, oh well, to be exact, I dream every night, I had a weirdly pleasant, and pleasantly weird dream last night. It was like a complete movie with an open-ended ending.
So, I planned to work on the last stage of the website upgrading over the weekend, which turned out that the plan got unplanned, by another unplanned plan. See, the website upgrading work is taking longer than I wished for, and I spent a big fraction of last week live-chatting with various technical support from various web hosts, and email chasing the local ISP when I wasn’t able to access the website.
This might be a familiar scenario for some of the Singapore buyers as I have received several emails informing that the images were not loading on the website. By far, this only happens to Singapore’s network. Rigorous tests were conducted by the technical support from the hosting provider, and concluded that the Singapore ISP might have set some filtering rules that forbade certain websites to load properly.
It is a recurring problem that is wearing my patience thin.
Anyway, circling back to the dream. I had a dream that I was helping to resolve someone’s family problem – aside from my counseling background, for some reasons, I was always approached with personal, relationship, and misc. conflicts of others, so it seemed reasonable to dream of that, to trail back to who I have always been. Then, when I was leaving the mansion, one of the family members offered to give me a lift to the where I wished to go. I declined the kind offer as I hate to impose on others.
The light hint of nagging fear crept up on me when I took the first step out, with the tall heavy gate closed behind me. It looked like a jungle out there! What was I thinking? Braced myself, I continued to walk. I thought, I would be fine once I walked to the main street and hail a taxi to transport me to the Singapore General hospital. A light impression that I had an appointment at the hospital – it had to do with my upcoming appointment at the Specialist Center, which for some reasons, I thought it was within SGH’s compound, clearly, I couldn’t be more wrong.
I walked into a maze-like jungle, organized, yet endless. I wasn’t particularly afraid, although a tiny worry bug was hanging over my head. I didn’t want to be late for my appointment.
The maze looked like an arts exhibition trail. Every section had a different and interesting theme. The backdrop changed intermittently with a familiar scene that reminded me of Outram Park (one of the Singapore estates that is near to SGH) neighborhood. I was walking along the sheltered walkway, yet in split second, it turned into a mysterious mazy green.
There were tourists taking photos of the walls, full of different images and symbols. Every section was different. I tried to reach for my DSLR camera, but it was not there, so I took some photos with my iPad.
At this point, a matured woman appeared. She looked like she came from the Victorian era. She wore a Victorian style dress matched with a pretty hat. She was well-mannered and pleasant. The tourists walked away very quickly when she attempted to explain the history of the wall to them. She appeared to be disappointed. I stayed to listen, not just to make her happy, but I truly adore history.
She then told me about her encounter with Juliet – yes, that Juliet! Thoughts raced through my dreamy mind. How did she meet Juliet? I mean, Juliet, Juliet? By this time, I knew I was dreaming – see, for a person who dreams every night, the conscious mind comes to realization at some point of the dream, this would be when the dreamer knew she was dreaming, at which point, the conscious mind has a higher control over how things go from here – but it was an interesting dream, so I let it continue.
She told me that it was the “Maze of Wonders” that I just passed. At this point, we reached a fancy gate with floral decoration. I thanked her for the tour and company, and that I would love to visit again. That was as far as she could go, and said goodbye. I thought to myself (again, I was partially aware that it was a dream), no wonder people love visiting Singapore, we do have very cool places!
The gate opened to another platform of interestingness. I was on a platform of trains, very old trains. I was reminded of the realistic train ride that I took at the Universal Studios in LA. One of the trains was exposed on one side, I was able to see the passengers. This was a “Trains from the Past” exhibition. This cabin sat a stretch of old women. On their wrinkled faces, were mixes of expressions. A hint of sadness, joy of reminisce, happiness of revisiting down the memory lane.
As I walked, I understood the mixed emotions. As they reminisced, they remembered the people whom they loved so dearly, and had passed. They missed the lost youth. They laughed at their silliness of the crazy things they did when they were young. They were thankful for this amazing life. This, was their final journey.
I was on a moving train, that looked like an old bus from the 60s or 70s. I spent enough time appreciating the restoration works done on the old vehicle. The staffs were dressed in retro fashion to recreate the scenes as though we were reliving the 60s – a generation that I never knew in person.
It was an amazing journey, quite a lengthy one, if I were to start telling you the first part of the dream about the family conflict, that evolved into crime solving, family disputes over the estates, and the dark secret of an abused wife who was thought to be the vicious woman of the house.
I didn’t get to where I needed to. Yet, it was a spectacular dream, knitted with rich multi-layered cultures and meticulous details of the otherwise neglected.
Dreams, are manifestation of our waking reality. I didn’t get to where I needed to, because in my waking reality, I have not finished the upgrading work for the website. I always have dreams of getting lost – which is mirrored truth in reality, I have unexplained fear of getting lost, because of my poor orientation and lack of sense in direction – when a project takes longer than I planned. The emotion of anxiety begins to build up when a project drags.
It has a lot to do with my personality and heightened sensitivity towards emotions and sensory input. I don’t disappoint, not if I can help it. For the same reason, I don’t over-promise, because I don’t disappoint. This crafting business is not just a job for me, it started as an option for me to live a passionate lifestyle, to do what I enjoy immensely and still put food on the table.
Dreams have always been a huge part of my life. When you sleep a dreamless night; I sleep a dreamful night of messages.
I enjoyed the company of the matured woman in the Maze of Wonders, because of her good manners and keen attitude to share her passion of knowledge to the public. I empathized with the passengers on the train as I analyse and over-think everything in life, and I understand the old ladies’ feelings about the past, the present, and the ending future, because I have a family (blood related or not) made up of members with terminal, incurable and chronic diseases. I don’t and won’t change my lifestyle for them, because with or without a terminal illness, we will all come to the common spot someday, and when that day comes, I know I have lived my brief life to the fullest; so I hope for the same for them. Similarly, I don’t wish to have anyone changed their lifestyles for me, for the same reasoning.
So, with such big dream of epiphany, I feel somewhat liberated from the strict self-expectation. I will finish what I started. I will continue to create because I want and love to. I will continue to live a life that brings a smile to my face, everyday.
With that, yeah, I made myself a big lunch, hence the photo – grilled salmon with fries. If you had followed this blog or my other blogs, you will know that I am no cook, but just because I can now cook a decent soup that the Master Chef Mum (right, mum cooks and bakes superbly, when we were small, we had advanced orders up to a year, for her cookies. Some begged to have their orders taken when the super chef decided to stop accepting more orders) loves. Maybe she thought I had taken a magical pill to become Super Cook! She bought me a fat chunk of salmon, and she thinks I can cook? Oh well, thankfully, it doesn’t take a genius to cook a fresh salmon!
This is a rare post that is heavily weighted on my personal life, blogged on the craftblog. I decide to blog it up here instead of my personal blog, because it all begins with work, and I’d like to share this side of me with you.
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