maboroshi

Good morning, everybody.

Dream #1

I was in some underground area, like a hallway between subway platforms. The hallway ramped upward and around to the right. The hallway was apparently the entrance to some water park.

It was Memorial Day, which was the last day of the summer (???). I thought this would be a perfect day for going to the water park. A lot of kids would be back in school already (?), so the park would be empty.

I was now out in the water park. I was walking along a narrow, winding, concrete path between some small, rolling hills, which may have been dotted by small, tree-shaped juniper shrubs.

The light was dim. It was like early morning, as if the sun had just risen. I wasn't sure that the water park was even open yet. I thought I'd have to wait to get in.

This was a pain in the neck. Right now the place was completely empty, and I would be able to ride the rides all by myself. If I had to wait until the place opened, other people would have time to arrive. Then I'd have to wait in long lines and deal with annoying people.

At some point, though, I saw a group of schoolboys. They were all white, kind of skinny, and pale. They were joking and having fun. So I figured if these kids were here, they must have started letting the school groups in. So obviously the place was open and I was okay.

I found a water slide. It seemed to be running alright. It was a big water slide, and it was made to look like a natural river. The water was rushing really rapidly. I had a red inner tube with me. So I was about to jump in.

Somehow the scene changed slightly. A lawn-type area was somewhere before me. A mother giraffe and a baby giraffe ran through the field. It was kind of surreal to see them.

After they ran past, a woman called out that animals had escaped from the zoo. It was like the woman was chasing the giraffes, trying to catch them. But I couldn't see the woman.

I was now (without noticing the transition) out on a lawn that was shaded by tall pine trees, which were spaced pretty widely apart.

I could hear other people's voices crying out in panic. Apparently a lot of people were panicked. Some people were trying to catch all the escaped animals. Others were running in fear, before the animals got out into this area.

I could now sense that the tigers were headed in my direction. I saw them in the distance. There were a few of them, but they were just baby tigers, less than a year old, and maybe 130cm long.

I jumped up into the air and began floating backwards. I figured that if I could get myself floating high enough, the tigers wouldn't be able to catch me, and that they'd just have to run past.

But one baby tiger climbed up into one of the pine trees. It ran out onto a limb. I was pretty sure that it was going to try to jump down on me. I thought I'd have to evade it somehow with a quick, mid-flight reflex. But the baby tiger climbed back down the tree trunk instead.

I now kind of wondered why I had been so afraid of the tigers and why I didn't just fight them directly -- if I'd even needed to fight them at all.

I was now out in some area like a concrete plaza that seemed to be surrounded by a lot of dusty areas fenced off by wood-poled fences. In the center of the plaza was a small, brick structure. It was now bright, sunny and hot.

A few women, including one who looked like a ranger from a national park I'd worked at about 10 years ago, ran into the building. They gestured for me to follow them. So I did.

The building was apparently something like an animal hospital. There were windows on all the walls. There were some stainless steel tables everywhere. Everything felt kind of dusty and abandoned. There was something like a red-leather-upholstered bed or chair, like a dentist's chair, in the center of the room. It was like the operating table.

We had all come into this room to shelter ourselves from the escaped zoo animals. We were all bracing ourselves, because apparently they were all going to converge here and attack this building, as if, for some reason, they were all out against us.

We now saw through one open door to my left the mother and baby giraffe running back. One of the women went out. I followed her. The giraffes were running back to their area, which was one of the dusty areas around the building.

The woman opened the gate for the giraffes. The giraffes went back inside. As they did, the woman cooed some kind of nice words to the giraffes about how they must have missed their home.

(I may have had another dream, right after this, that involved lions chasing me. I feel like a lot of parts of that dream may have been similar to parts of this dream. But I can't remember the dream.)

Dream #2

I was in some place like a big hallway with doors on either side. The place had a feeling like a college and a hospital. But it also felt like some kind of conference was going on. The place was full of people.

A Korean man, maybe in his mid-20s, wearing glasses and a big, puffy, grey jacket, was walking up behind me. He kept doing this weird, annoying thing where he'd walk up from behind me, edge slightly front of me, then edge back quickly, then walk up as if he were going to pass me again, then edge back again.

Finally I just threw an elbow at the man and knocked him behind me. He didn't bother me any more after that.

But now I was heading to a line for something. I saw that two Korean girls stood at the back of the line. They were really pretty. But I was afraid to walk past them. I knew they'd seen what I'd done to the guy. I thought they'd be ashamed of me for being mean to a Korean guy.

I think I walked past them, to get into the back of the line, which may now have been even longer. I walked past some thing like a tall whiteboard or length of paper or canvas stretched out on a wooden frame. I kind of had to squeeze through a small space between the canvas and the people in line.

(Side notes: I don't know why the people in my dream were Korean. I think it was because I was watching some Kim Bo Kyung videos on YouTube last night, right before I went to bed.

The annoying character of the guy kind of makes sense to me. Yesterday, I went to the Armory Show. On the walk down there, there was this girl who was following me and doing all kinds of annoying things.

I don't think she was trying to get my attention. I'm not even sure she was trying to be annoying. And she wasn't Korean. She was white. But her looks were kind of like the looks of the Korean guy in my dream.

At the show itself, there were a few groups of men and women who spoke Japanese with each other. They looked like artists, and I really wanted to talk with them. But I was way too shy. I get really shy in big crowds.

Also, the Armory Show got really crowded, which was slightly annoying. It wasn't terrible. I could deal with it. But it reminded me of the New York Anime Fest from last year, which was way overcrowded.

As I was walking back from the Armory Show, I wondered if there would be a time when the crowds at all these big events would be so overwhelming that I'd have to stop going. It made me a little upset that that was a possibility.)