Lifelong Guilt

For those of us who are familiar with the partaking of late evening snacks served up by a seemingly endless row of hawkers, a scene of chaotic sounds, smells and billows of smoke should come flooding back to you. I can’t quite place what city this was in, and I suppose it doesn’t matter entirely, but the scene was one of a behind-the-scenes life of one of the vendors of delectable wares. Enter me. I’m one of the vendors, the eldest of two sons, helping my father out at his trusty chat stall. It’s the usual night of madness after sunset, hordes of people descending on our little stall because we happen to make the best chat for miles around.

Late into the night, as all of us vendors are packing up and at various stages of heading home for some well earned rest, our stall-neighbors call out to us. Theirs is a large family, eight children large, all of them younger than twelve years of age. The kids’ father asks if one of us can help out with getting the kids and their mother back home. My father volunteers me proudly, and I set out to do a good job, making up my mind to fulfill the mission I have been asked to carry out with aplomb. Our neighbors own a cycle rickshaw that seats the whole family comfortably; the reason they can’t all travel together is that the father decides to stay back late to make some extra money catering to the “midnight crowd”. Having been thrust the responsibility of transporting these kids safely, and after getting them to sit down without creating too much of a ruckus, we begin our journey home. SCREEEECH!!! BLAM!!!

A lorry comes out of nowhere and sends us all flying in different directions. The aftermath? All eight children and their mother perish in the accident. But I, well, I emerge without a scratch. Their father, obviously distraught, blames me for the entire thing. The guilt is almost unbearable, especially when you add to it the constant stream of invective that the grieving father continues to hurl at me.

The last scene, with a quick sort of cinematographic flash-forward, begins with me, looking very old. I seem to have retired happily, and I’m standing in front of what I recognize as my father’s ancestral home in Mahe. I’m standing out front having a casual conversation with a friend, on a beautifully sunny day. Suddenly, from out of the blue, the vendor - father to the family that perished in the accident for which I was responsible - bursts onto the scene, pointing a finger at me and cursing at the top of his lungs. He still blames me for his loss, and is not willing to hear reason after so many years. This goes on for a couple of minutes, and my consistent efforts to dissipate his rage prove futile. Finally, in a moment of anger, regret, helplessness and sheer, all-out frustration, I snap. I start to yell over his shouting. I tell him that I’ve had enough, that I can’t stand to be continuously berated for something that happened many, many years ago. I offer him an ultimatum: Shut up and move on, or kill me. I tell him that this ceaseless badgering is not something I wish to endure for a minute longer. I’m sorry for what happened, but this haunting reminder,, particularly this in-the-flesh kind, has plagued me for long enough. If it will make him happy, in terms of providing some sense of retribution, I tell him to go ahead and put me out of this imposed misery. The dream ends with me waking up, not knowing if the aggrieved gentleman took me up on my offer.

This was rather intense, as far as dreams go, and I woke up panting and wiping sweat from my brow. Wow!

Inconsistent Dream Sequence

In the last couple of months, I’ve been dreaming quite a lot. There was a period of time, about a decade and a half ago, when I seemed to have lost the ability entirely. However, it’s back with a veritable vengeance, and that can only mean one of a couple of things. First up, It could mean that I’ve been getting a lot more time to slip into REM sleep, or that I have perfected the ability to do so at a moment’s notice. Or, it probably means I’ve got a lot on my mind that my conscious self is having trouble dealing with, which is why my subconscious keeps whipping up some seriously startling and demented stuff. Either way, however, it’s been fun. I’ve tried to remember as many of them as I could, and even went to the extent of writing a couple down as soon as I awoke. Here is my story of the images which have flowed through my head during my deepest slumber, this past month. Consider yourself forewarned of the madness.

Underwater Alma Mater

I’m in math class, and there’s one of my most favorite teachers from High school doing his thing on the whiteboard. I glance around the class, and it’s most of my friends from high school. Things seem pretty normal, with the serious students paying close attention, and the “jokers” horsing around in the back. Then, I’m at lunch with a bunch of friends, at the school cafeteria. It looks nothing like the cafeteria at Kodai School, resembling more of a from-one-of-those-Hollywood-movies type of high school cafeterias. I don’t notice anything particular yet, until the dream suddenly cuts to the end of the school day, and we’re all standing outside the building. Again, it resembles a scene from some movie, where parents come to pick some kids up while others go by bus, in typical Hollywood fashion. The only difference? We’re “under the sea“, like from the Little Mermaid. There are old VW Beetles zooming off in a flurry of bubbles, in every direction. And finally, the camera inside my head seems to zoom out and fade into reality as I open my eyes.

Tele-Mission Vietnam

This dream starts off with a plane hurtling towards the ground. It’s a two-seater, Cessna-type of aircraft, and my trusty partner in crime is my good friend Oz. We were shot down over enemy territory, which happens to be Vietnam. Ejecting ourselves from the aircraft, with parachutes on, thank God, we float gently down to the ground, right in the middle of a vast stretch of paddy fields. We manage to evade detection, for we are no ordinary parachuting folk. No sir! We are journalists, on a mission to provide video evidence of atrocities being carried out against the local population by the dictatorial regime in the country. Managing to reach a village, we find our way into a small hut where an old couple agree to provide us shelter. As it turns out, the gentleman of the house is a motorbike aficionado and happens to have a well-maintained, almost mint condition US Army motorbike behind the hut. He offers it to us on our mission, and we spend the next couple of days making short but useful forays into the surrounding, inhabited countryside, trying to get the footage we want. As these things tend to go, however, there is no sign of these “atrocities” anywhere in the country. Then, the dream takes a bizarre, yet seamless twist.

We begin to interview people in the village where we are currently holed up, about food and culture. It’s all happening in English, and the locals seem to suddenly be an urban, IT bunch of people. They start telling us about the latest trendy places to grab a quick bite, and it turns into one of those regular TV shows about a presenter who visits some place and tells us what’s hot and what’s not. Then, we move from the village to a bustling metropolis, rife with malls and endless swarms of people everywhere. I can’t remember what it said exactly, but there is a bit of a background narrative with this scene. We find ourselves behind-the-scenes with a dance troupe that’s putting together a major performance on some special day. It’s the usual trials and tribulations of the members of this troupe as they approach d-day, pardon the expression. Finally, the whole show turns out to be some kind of parade with fabulous costumes and extravagant fireworks displays, and the whole world is watching it on TV.


“I would like to purchase your furniture”

The dream starts out with me back in my old dormitory, in Kodai school. Well, that’s what it appears to be at first, but I soon realize that it’s a posh apartment block, or hotel, that’s shaped kind of like my old dormitory. I chit-chatting to this girl who is actually a Malayalam movie actor, and we seem to take this conversations to all parts of the building. After chatting for what is obviously a dream-eternity, we start getting a little closer to each other, and a little, how shall I say, “frisky“. Not taking things too far, we both feel the urge to go rushing back to my room/apartment, and so we do.

When I open the door, however, I’m surprised to meet an old schoolmate and her brother, who is several years my senior, both sitting on facing single sofas in white bathrobes. They’ve come to buy my furniture, and contrary to my wondering if I’d ever offered to sell my furniture to them, I find myself agreeing to help out with transporting the stuff down to their waiting truck. All through the moving, me and this girl-who-resembles-a-Malayalam-movie-star keep cracking inside jokes and shooting each other wistful glances. And then, sadly, I wake up…wondering what the hell made people I haven’t seen or heard of in years, show up at my place in their bathrobes!

ATM Trouble

On my way to an ATM, at some ungodly hour before dawn, I find myself in mid-stride as the curtains are raised on this dream. I know which ATM I want to go to because it’s near my house. When I get there, I’m surprised to find a crowd of people standing around the ATM with pensive yet slightly frustrated looks on their faces. Not wanting to wait outside on what seems to be a cold night, I let myself in and offer to help. The ATM, as I should point out at this stage, seems to be an ATM-cum-arcade, so there’s a huge area behind this machine with lots of arcade game machines, switched off for the night. Not a particularly important detail, but I just thought I’d paint the complete picture for you.

As I begin to speak to the people in the ATM enclosure, I learn that they are from France, and they’ve come here - wherever “here” is - on some kind of educational exchange. They were trying to withdraw some money, but something seems to be the matter with the ATM and they’ve been struggling with it for a long time now. In an attempt to save the day and leave these visitors to our shores with a good impression of the “locals,” I offer to help. However, it seems to be a real problem and I spend another hour or two figuring it out. Finally, the ATM starts spitting out cash when instructed to do so, and all is well in the world again. It’s at this point, after the first successful withdrawal is made, that all of the arcade machines suddenly switch on and the hole place is a melee of lights and MIDI music from all the games. Overcome with joy, amidst the cacophony, the French students and I shake hands and decide to meet up later that evening for a drink somewhere. They seem to have found a pub/bar that they really like, and it’s going to be a celebration of and on their last night in town, wherever this town is.

I meet up with the group of students at a really chilled out lounge bar kind of place, with mellow lights and a very natural, eco-friendly angle to the theme. There’s a large tree on the premises, and it’s been neatly and effortlessly incorporated into the building, which fuses together the indoors and the outdoors. We sit down at a table under one of the tree’s majestic branches, and the dream ends with us making a toast to the place, our chance meeting, and la vie en generale. Salut.

Retired Substitute

This is a short and sweet dream that was almost a bit of a sports highlights show. The dream opens with England one goal down. The opponents, who appear to not be from any country that I know of, have conceded a penalty. Phil Neville steps up to take it, and anxiety of the crowd is palpable as the game seems to be in its dying minutes. He lines himself up, looks down for an instant with his eyes tightly shut, as if in prayer, and begins his short run up. Wham! He misses a sitter of a chance, sending it sailing over the crossbar. Now, England are in dire straits! They continue to press on, and finally get a corner kick in their favor. This one is a must-get, and if the tension was already palpable, now it’s suffocating.

Just then, almost like a sneaky substitution in basketball, Pele subs himself on for England. The opposition don’t seem to notice, being far too focused on the corner kick being taken, but Pele slips into the box undetected, weaving through the scattered bits of defense and dives at full stretch to put the ball in the back of the net in the far corner. It’s one of the most magical goals the world has seen, and for the next five minutes there’s replay upon replay, from every perceivable angle, of this amazing header by Pele, who, funnily enough, doesn’t seem to be a day over 25 years old. The excitement on and off the field is so hard to take in all at once, that I wake up wondering if I’d seen that on TV before. Not, the sneaky substitution, of course, but the goal being scored by a fabulous header.


And, there you have it. An assortment of dreams from select nights this past month. I hope it was well worth the read.


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Amit bro, I owed you this big time. I’ve been meaning to post this for a while now, but never got around to putting it all together. Blog on, eh? :-)