On a German Mountain

I am on a tour bus going up a mountain. It is autumn with the air slightly cool outside. We alight at a small town whose houses are all of modern design circa the 1970s. They cluster together and are linked by cobbled alleyways.

I walk through one and pass by a white building whose ground floor home is adorned with wide glass panel doors that reminds me both of a Spanish hacienda home and a car garage. The walls are sandblasted and rough to the touch, a wall treatment popular with condos in Sg built in the late 80s.

Into this white building I enter. It is a home.

We are in fact in a small kitchen, an utilitarian one that is so common in UK flats from the 70s. The table is red formica and its edges are trimmed with a strip of aluminum.

We are going to have some kind of German cake with white cream.

I look out of the kitchen window. Forested ridges and valleys lay below. It is a magnificent view.

Outside, there is a commotion. I go out and discover that evening has fallen.

There seems to be a religious festival going on. Opera face masks - both large and regular size - float in the air. People are following them and wondering at their magical presence. I too wonder how they manage to float in the air without seeming to be attached to with strings or other method..

A teenager is seen marshaling the masks forward. He is doing his job and using a handphone at the same time. Typical, I mumble, and go "tsk-tsk" at his split attention.

When we reach the lookout point at the top, a giant moon in the sky greets us there. The moon is huge and covers almost the whole sky. I think Old Man Moon is smiling back at me but only fleetingly. The bright moonlight feels warm and inviting though.

In the crowd, I am with two of my former GFs. One is with her hubby; the other, well, she is her usual quiet, smiley self.

Around a corner, I find myself alone in an alley once more. In the short distance ahead, I can see a watch repair shop. Jurgen Procknow the actor is the watch repairman. He is wearing a watchmaker's magnifying monocle and leather apron. Or is that man Robert De Niro? In any case, I am thinking of a character actor.

I revisit the kitchen a couple of times. The owner couple is there as well as a much younger lady. We seem to be in a discussion over something. Perhaps the development of the mountain region or something else entirely. Not long after, I wake, feeling I've been to the highlands and watched someone carry on a traditional craft.

The end.

A Haunted House

We are in a place not too dissimilar to Cameron Highlands. Cool, scenic, ancient.

At the moment, we are in a nice wooden kampung house, the kind that comes with a corrugated zinc roof. It is painted green and I am looking through a window grilled up with square wire mesh.

Outside, folks are engaged in some sort of a commotion. It seems the transport  that is supposed to take us out of town has been delayed.

I am wondering when I can get my family (apparently I am married with two kids and a wife) safely away from this house that we are in. It is haunted and the spirits are getting more malevolent as each minute passes.

At any moment, I am expecting one of them to crawl out from under the bed or step out from the walls. What are they going to do? I have no idea. My 'kids' are scared but they are not panicking.

I sit on the narrow bed and ponder what to do next. I try to recall the spirits I have seen earlier in the other half of the house. A double door is all that separates us.

Remember, this is a wooden house commonly found in a Southeast Asian village. It is a kampung house - something traditionally found in a place like, say, Pulau Ubin, Singapore.

Earlier, when we were put into this house for temporary accommodation, I had checked the place out. It didn't take me long. The house was square and parted in the middle by that double-door.

I had gone in to check and noticed the change in air quality immediately - the proverbial "thick air" that harbors more than just atmospheric molecules. As I walked in, the air visibly resisted. I knew something wasn't quite right. It's as if there was some sort of plasma thickening; it just didn't feel right and friendly. Definitely something evil or poltergeistic in the air.

It was at that moment that the spirits started to slowly appear one by one. The first one manifested from a far window grinning as it grew larger and flew towards me. It disappeared as soon as it touched me. The other two came out from the other wall but just hovered in mid-air looking on in silence. I couldn't tell if they were just bystanding or scheming worse things to inflict upon us.

I retreated back into our bedroom and closed the door. "What the f...?" I said to myself, more alarmed than scared. It was certainly not a place to linger about for long.

Back to the present, the commotion outside rages on. A crowd has gathered, which makes our own spooky situation look kind of odd and out of dimension.

Next, I am talking to a lady and comparing notes with her as to who has seen the more hauntings. It's not exactly the right thing to be discussing now but at least it is taking my mind off worrying. In any case, it is good to know more.

This lady has actually come into the house to analyse the going-ons and concluded that the place was indeed very haunted.

So we are now stuck.

All of a sudden, things in the other side of the room starts to clang about, raising themselves up and down. A few bang against the double door, making us on the other side nervous.

I should be scared but I am not. Perhaps because they are spirits -beings with no substance- that makes it illogical for me to be unafraid of them. I would be more frightened of a big sized, rampaging serial killer.

I hold my kids to console them more out of instinct then anything else. They appear to have fallen asleep from fatigue.

The 'wife' has her legs curled up as if sheltering from a storm. When will this pass? she seems to question with those large frightened eyes of hers.

I am wondering the same as no one wishes anything paranormal to happen.

I've never met an evil spirit and would love to see one; now there are three to contend with.

Things continue to fly in the other room. The double doors occasionally being slammed at. Outside, the commotion continues.

I wake up to a knock on my window. There's a woodpecker outside. It stares at me with its ringed eye. It looks quite like that spirit in the dream. Has it come to haunt me as a flying thing? I would roast you like a pigeon, you know, and throws a pillow at it.

A Conjuring

It's been a while since I wrote up another dream. Lately they have come in bits and pieces without much significance. Or it could be that they vanish quickly from my memory come wakey time. It is difficult when you wake and find the neck stiff for no apparent reason. You try to get back to sleep hoping it would go away but then the dreams would either jitter to a stop or a short sequence of something unrelated would pop up. At times, the morning sunlight plays up and makes you dream of stuff in the sun.

So, in this next dream, I am a TCM doctor standing behind my TCM shop counter contemplating a certain illness. Which cure, which cure, I seem to ponder over and over again.

The room is quiet and uncluttered. I see myself as I would from the vantage point of a CCTV camera affixed at a corner in the ceiling. I am still (not moving), head downcast on the counter. The aisle is empty. Time seem to stand still like for an eternity and moving in some kind of time-lapsed sequence. The whole scene looks positively spooky.

My friend David pops up. He is asking when I would like to go to Taiping, his hometown. Apparently that town is quite well-known for its infestation of snakes. Would I go there to make snake wine?

In my mind I am wondering what kind of snake. Cobra? Coral?

I see David's mouth move as he talks, all in slow motion. I am not paying attention. I turn my head to the patient behind me. She is suddenly there and wanting my attention. She is about 11.

I ask her, What is the matter, love. She replies with a doleful look and silence. I look her up and down. She's shoe-less in a white nightgown that reminds be of the countless girls in evil-spirit possession-type movies (e.g. The Exorcist, Carrie, etc....) Her hair is somewhat disheveled too. Oh crap! Am I in a horror movie?