I have to blog about my odd dream last night (because if you love hearing other people's dreams as much as I do, then you'll think this is fun). The dream is in regular text, and the real-life events that likely inspired elements in the dream are in italics.
So I had a dream last night that I was on a flight with some people from my guesthouse (some who do or did live here in real life, and some who I have only seen in Kabul but who don't live here) and we were alerted that the plane would have to make an emergency landing at an American military base.
- You might recall, when I first moved here, writing about these rather godly Arab Belgian guys (I blogged about one, who is known as Hassan Van Damme). Well sadly, even though we became platonically chummy, they moved out of my guesthouse while I was in Herat, and I didn't know what happened until I saw HVD's partner in the crime of scandalous hotness, yesterday, and he told me that their company moved them out to Jalalabad Road (which I have formerly blogged about), and they are here just to use the internet. Combine that with all the plane crashes on tv, my upcoming flight plans to Pakistan, and there you have people in my guesthouse on a crashing plane with me in a dream. Incidentally, the person on the plane whoin the dream was from my guesthouse, but who in real life I have only seen from afar is a model-turned-UN employee (Kosovar Albanian) who was spotted at the UNICA pool yesterday afternoon (where VC was *completely* covered, NOT swimming, and wearing LOADS of Clarin's finest sunscreen and wrinkle control cream). He makes a more significant appearance in the dream, later.
So we discover that we have to make a landing at an American military base, which none of us are thrilled about, except that we hear that they *might* have wireless internet, which gets everyone excited (dreams are so strange: "well the crash landing kind of is a downer, but at least we'll be wireless!").
- At UNICA, yesterday, everyone was commenting that it should have wireless internet so people could do their work by the pool (which is already overcrowded -- a bad idea, in my opinion).
We were assigned rooms, and I went to visit the Belgians. Apparently, they were sharing a room with Balkans Beauty in the dream (who in the dream was, for some reason, Uzbek). I walked into their room with HVD and thought I saw Uzbek on a gay website (!) -- not sure if HVD saw, and never having spoken to him (even in real life) about any of that stuff, I didn't mention anything about his roomate's online wanderings.
The group of people we flew with went to go get food somewhere and HVD and I stayed back and sat at some sheltered picnic tables, where we would socialize outside our rooms. All the people, before getting food, had been wandering around with their laptops -- holding them up and crouching down, turning around, as if water witching for an internet hotspot. HVD and I decided that we were sure we could find one, so as soon as the others left, and we found one, we started checking email and talking. We were sitting right next to each other (me on his left) and his left arm was SO warm (like it was physically emanating heat) that I leaned on it (!).
- Yesterday when I saw his partner (supposedly not THAT kind of partner, but I have my doubts), I was sad to not see him. Then I came back later, saw him in the computer lab, and was too chicken to say we should exchange emails in case I come to Belgium (which would not have even been sketchy at all, but I was nervous -- and this is AFTER I already beat myself up over the missed opportunity of seeing his partner an hour earlier and not exchanging emails!). When I saw him (his back was turned), I crept up and pretended to strangle him (VC has noticed that fake physical attacks on people is his way of showing chummy affection!), and he turned, smiled, and winked (as he does, and as his partner rather successfully copies). His neck was SO WARM that I almost melted (and almost forgot to release my grip and stop strangling him!). Some people are hot (in terms of attractiveness), but other people are physically, temperature-wise, hot (like they are human furnaces). I have SUCH a weakness for that, and I almost didn't want to stop strangling him lol. Plus he's one of those people who is so fleshy that, like, if you had to commit cannibalism, then you could live off him for like a year...that's macabre...anyway, that's were the warmth thing in the dream comes from.
I got a bit shy, but I noticed that he sort of pressed back (like leaned into my lean) and I sort of grinned, thinking that I was just REALLY happy to be warm, and worried (but not enough to not snuggle-up) that people would see us (outside at these picnic tables). Eventually (and this is the most X rated part so don't get your hopes up), he kissed me (AMAZING lol), and I protested that people would see, etc. and his response was that he already caught the Uzbek guy (as I suspected when we saw him in the room, earlier), so there was no need to be hiding things. He then told me that what he looks for in a person is that they have really healthy ______s and he used the medical term for the name of the little red chunk right on the inside of your eye in the corner closer to your nose (which of course I don't remember the name of, now) and I started to explain that my left one was a little inflamed but was quickly getting better.
- In real life, starting in Herat (how I don't know, since I can't think of anything except the pillow on the plane that could have given it to me) I got a little pink eye in my left eye. It sort of went away and came back, so yesterday I got antibiotic drops, but am rather self-conscious of it. It's hilarious that in real life, when I was researching the details of acute conjunctivitis online, yesterday, I no doubt saw some diagram of an eye which I don't remember now, but which I used vocabulary from in my dream when HVD demonstrated amazing knowledge of (and strange concern for) optical health. Human minds are so amazing -- this is why I love the scene in Romy and Michele's High School Reunion (which was SUCH a pick me up back in boarding school when Hawk Barbie and I saw it with a friend when we'd all been, as we always were in boarding school, super stressed and a little down), and the character played by Lisa Kudrow recites, in a dream, the scientific process for making glue.
We then just sat there talking and reading emails, just sitting close and being warm (nothing else you people with dirty minds!), the others came and greeted us in a friendly and casual manner, and I woke up.
- I have seen bits of American movies here and there the past few days that inevitably have a romantic scene were there is a couple, sitting on a couch or something after dinner, talking, looking into each other's eyes, maybe a little tipsy from wine with dinner, and you can see that they are just caught up in each other warmth, the moment, that romantic moment...I realized that I have not had that in an extremely EXTREMELY long time. Don't get me wrong, I have met people capable of that, while in Egypt (although they are rare), but it hasn't actually materialized (in parts, yes, but in a complete way, no). I don't remember the last time I sat so close to someone that I could actually smell the skin on his neck, and I *certainly* don't remember the last time that that moment occurred at the end of a long date, in a free and fulfilling social space, complemented by mutual respect, good conversation, and a sense of security and contentment with life. *sigh*
Note to certain Egyptian friends: Don't take offense at this comment...Cairo is not the kind of place where this can happen (in my opinion). There will never be (at this time in Cairo) a bottle of wine and hand-holding across a dinner table at a restaurant, or a slow midnight stroll to a bench by a fountain in the middle of a plush city park...it's nothing personal...it's just the situation.
{non-sequitur #1}Continuing on my previous post about funny comments on Indian sports channels, a music video announcer yesterday referred to one of the videos that sky rocketed up the chart unexpectedly from last week as having: "emerged from nowhere like a gorilla in the mist." (!) I'd bet that a lot of Americans my age/her age wouldn't even get that reference, let alone in India...so unpredictable, the things that make up global pop culture currency. (if you don't know the reference, then google "Gorillas in the Mist" -- I couldn't decide if I should hyperlink the movie or the book or Dian Fossey's Fund's website, so I just left it be)
{non-sequitur #2a}
ESPN, here, is NOT covering the mouth-watering all-Belgian (a theme in my life?) final of the women's tennis Roger's Cup in Montreal, today (go Henin!), but they DID just have coverage of the finals of the "small agility" category of a dog obstacle course competition (prize: $10,000). At least they didn't replace it with something I would never want to watch, like American football, and the dogs are SUPER happy when they finish the course (which is indicated by their retrieval of a green Micky Mouse fly swatter from a pile of other trinkets!), but I still find the programming choice, odd.
EDIT: Damn, Henin lost. I'm glad I didn't see it :*( Check out the link, though, and you can also read about the totally UNBELIEVABLE Martina Navratilova's 175th title win -- she'll be 49 in October).
{non-sequitur #2b}
After the dog competition (I guess this is a sequitur!), they had some kind of breaking news that the women's log rolling champion, who'd been on some incredible roll (no pun! but maybe that's the origin of the expression!?!?) and had won the last several competitions, had just been upset unexpectedly. She was really jolly about it (as you expect forest people to be) and was fake-drowning the girl who beat her as they smiled for the cameras (maybe she shows affection with the same play-assaults that VC does?), but the most important part is that they had totally awesome bodies! I have been watching a lot of track and field, and decided that the perfect male body (meaning a combination of both what I want to look like, be with, and could be with ridiculous diet and exercise) is embodied by the male long-jumper, and the perfect female body (meaning a combination of what I find physically attractive and think Genetica could look like with physical training) is embodied by the pole vaulter. ANYWAY, these log-rollers totally give the pole vaulting chicks a run for their money! They were totally hot!
EDIT: You can check out this website for the log-rolling info. It's a bad photo of the girl who one (a chunk angle), but you can see that she beat the woman who'd won the world championships for the PAST FIVE YEARS.
Note on T&F bodies: yes male sprinters are as built as male gymnasts, and yes most women high jumpers could double as Milanese runway models -- and yes they are both attractive in their own sort of disfigured way -- but as far as natural but amazing-looking bodies go (by my own personal and perhaps ill-defined criteria) male long-jumpers and female high-jumpers are still the way to go.
VC