Visions in the Dark

This dream take place somewhere in a middle eastern country but I do not know which one. The area was very poor and all the buildings were made of local materials, like mud bricks.


I am about quarter of a kilometer outside of a small poor city. It is about midday and very hot. The atmosphere is arid and no vegetation of any kind can be seen. Clusters of people in varying degrees of Islamic or Western clothing surround me. Some people are sitting, some laying down, some standing, but no one moves very much or talks loudly. Everyone is of Middle Eastern decent except for a small group of people with whom I am following. I do not recognize anyone at first and they slowly make their way towards the city in the distance.

Several men from outside the group are staring at me with angry or contemptuous expressions and I uncomfortably look around to try an figure out why. I soon realize that all the women I see are covered up with burkas or hijabs, save for the two or three non-Middle Eastern women in the group I am with. I get the impression that I am the only one being stared at and I lower my gaze though I am angry and frustrated that people are staring at me.

When the group of people I am with are nearing the small city, someone from behind me says that we should avoid going there because American soldiers are about to initiate a fight with some insurgents. I cannot see who said that and the group of people continue on their way, even when I hesitate. Some tall building near the center of the city suddenly explode and sand and debris flys everywhere. I can hear bombs and gunfire but am not scared. I remember feeling more annoyed then anything.

I head back out into the desert where the dream started and suddenly it is nighttime and I am back with the group of people I had been following before. This time however, my mom and dad are with the group and we are being lead by a tour guide somewhere. The group stops for a moment under a large wooden frame, on the egde of what looks like a dry creek bed. There is a wooden billboard that is half standing and half collapsed and a young boy in a white shirt and red baseball cap that is climbing over it. Tangled barbed wire fence separates the group I am with from the creek bed, but I find a spot that I can jump over without getting caught or cut on the barbs.

I start toward whats left of the billboard because I want to climb too, but my mom stops me and tells me that I have to stop acting out and behave or I am going to get kicked out of the group. I reluctantly and begrudgingly rejoin them just as the tour guide leads us between some more indescernable wooden structures until we reached a tall, elaborate building with a large tower in the center. I get the impression that it was a mosque or something but I am not sure.

The tour is stopped and everyone is interrogated one by one by several men in clerics robes. I cannot remember why we were being questioned or what the questions were, but if we answered "correctly" then we were allowed to continue on with the tour. When I was being questioned I kept my head down and did not make eye contact with anyone. I figured that there was no way these men would allow me to continue on because my face was uncovered and every man in the room was staring at me because of it.

They did let me go on, however, and I immediately led up the narrow spiralling staircase of the central tower. The stair went up about six or seven stories and the entire way was intricately handpainted with natural scenes. At the very top of the stairs was a circular room that looked like an art store. There were display cases containing paintbrushes all around the outside and a Middle Eastern woman in the center giving away free art supplies. She was uncovered, dressed in blue, very pleasant and greeted my parents warmly. I noticed at this point that no one else in the group had been let into the tower. I was intrigued with an elaborate painting that encircled the entire room and studied it intently as my parents and the woman in blue talked. When the woman tried to offer my father some paintbrushes, he told her to give them to me because I was the artist in the family.


I do not remember anymore because I woke up.