10/Mar/06 - War
Status: [color=crimson]Lucid Dream[/color]
[color=#4169ff]I just woke up from this dream and—wow. I had to run to the computer and type it right now, because it was so intense! This was a Lucid Dream from the beggining, I don’t know when I realized I was dreaming, but I remember more then once telling myself not to interfere with the plot, because I wanted to see how it ended. So throughout this dream, I played along, even though I was lucid.[/color]
We were in war. Our armies were camping in a clear area surrounded by woods. These woods were dark green pine trees, a very european landscape. It was a war agaisnt Napoleon, for he had invaded the place we lived in.
I was a high–rank in the army, I wore a blue canvas shirt, brown pants and sandals; and I had a sword of my own, it had a silver blade with golden drawings near the hilt. It was cased on a dark brown scabbard, with a black dragon drawn in it.
Nana was dressed beautifully in white atlantean robes—
[color=#4169ff]A long time ago, I had this crazy idea of writing a book. The name of the book is Lua Nova, “New Moon”, and the story happens in Atlantis. Nana’s mother is a stylist, she draws clothes and has a fashion brand in Brazil.
She also adores literature and symbolism, so we were once talking about my book, about the atlantean culture, and she suddently had an insight and started sketching like crazy on a notepad and talking at the same time: “so they must wear white, because of this and that, and since it’s very advanced country, I think this same robes shall be worn by men and women, I’ll make it long, but not long enough to…” so on.
She drew all the clothes people should use in Atlantis, and there was this one robe, long and white, somewhat like a long kimono with details in golden strings… It was just beautiful! I’ll see if I can scan the picture for you guys later.[/color]
—covered by an almost transparent orange veil which looked like a fire aura on her. She also had a silver crown in her head, just a ring over her forehead, a simple crown.
She told me my mission was to take the kids safely to our destination through the woods. Two knights were going to be assigned to come with me for that task, but no more. I had to avoid the enemy troops no mattered what.
She gave me a kiss in the cheek, handed me a black robe with a hood [color=#4169ff](Nana’s mother made one of these for me, I still have it)[/color] and told me to go.
I went back to the middle of the encampment, where there was a lot of people and the smell of food. I had to pick up the kids. They were all in a huge red tent, and they were really small—about 8 to 12 years old! It was abysmal that they had only assigned two knigts to help me protect the kids, they were in serious danger!
I told them to follow me outside. They were already dressing especial clothes for hiding in the woods. I noticed my cousin, Rafael, was among the kids I was taking with me. I wondered what that dream was supposed to mean.
Outside, I met my two knights, wearing their silver breastplates and greaves over green coloured canvas shirts and dark brown pants, which meant they were a rank lower than me. [color=#4169ff](I still wonder why I wasn’t given any piece of armour myself.)[/color] Me knights were Daniel and Pedro [color=#4169ff](the junky friend, not the cousin)[/color].
I refused to have Pedro with me and dismissed him. People stoped speaking around me, everyone was surprised by what I had just done. I yelled that I needed a new knight with me, any volunteers would be welcome. Two people came from the crowd in appliance: Fábio [color=#4169ff]i[/i][/color] and T.
I didn’t want either on that war, but it seemed they were already in the army, and taking them on a mission which consisted in avoiding the enemy would be safer than sending them to a battle. And I knew they would both outclass it when it came to protecting kids from being harmed.
I accepted both on my (ridiculously small) troop, and started to leave the camp in silence with my three knights and the kids following me.
We were now in the woods. The place was like the Amazonic woods now, such dense woods that the sunlight arrived in the ground as circles and spots. It was somewhat warm, and there was a strong fresh smell of wild life all around us.
[jump]
There was a clear area in front of us, and Bia [color=#4169ff](she was our “readings” teacher when we were 8, she had a classroom on the library building and we had weekly classes with her to read things together and borrow books; she’s buddhist and a really incredible person, she gave me a book of Korean lyric poetry these days)[/color]. She looked at our group with disbelief in her eyes.
‘The war is a horrible thing,’ she said. The remark made me feel bad, but I told myself I had to protect the kids. ‘But sometimes, it’s unavoidable, and what the four of you are doing is very noble.’
She then opened a sack, revealing it’s contents: a lot of small wood sticks. She picked one and handed it to me. It was a necklace with the small piece of woodstick hanging on it. ‘These are rosewood sticks,’ she told us. ‘They will protect you on your journey.’ She told the kids to come and pick necklaces for them too, and handed another three to my knights.
‘Now go. You don’t have the time required to stay still on a war.’
We left. We were now waling again in the dense woods, when I heard the sound of horses. The enemy was approaching. I became anxious. I had to think of something. The kids were clearly apprehensive too. I whispered ‘Go, go, go!’ to the kids, pointing a bushy area, they ran to that direction.
A scream. Suddently a gigantic monster came from behind the woods. It was the body of a huge spider, with tentacles that looked like long thick dreadlocks and it had the head of Pai Mei (Beatrix’ martial arts teacher in Kill Bill). He held small bombs with his tentacles.
He asked what did we think we were doing in his woods, and how dared we disturb him. I tried to explain the situation, but he kept interrupting me.
Napoleon’s army was now near, I could listen to it. The monster was above the kids, and they were hiding in his furry tentacles. He stepped back and with a gesture, handed a bomb to each kid. The bombs were all lit. I yelled in horror ‘No! You’ll kill them.’
He told me and the other knights to stay near them. ‘But—,’ I insisted, and he roared:
‘I said—stay near!’
We stood near the monster, the bombs in the kids hands were still lit. I felt completely uneasy about the situation. Finally we saw horses and people dressing light blue clothes and complete armours.
The monster said ‘Now!’ and I saw a myriad of small bombs flying over my head and falling on the enemy troop like rain. There was a huge explosion and then all we could see in front of us was black smoke.
The monster then offered to give us protection to the place we had to go to.
[jump]
We were in front of a stone castle. The monster was no longer with us, and now Franco [color=#4169ff](former classmate of mine)[/color] was telling us we had just won a terrific battle and that this castle was now ours.
I asked T if I could trust him to take care of the kids, he nodded silently. Then I left them and walked inside the castle.
It was cold inside the castle of Novo Alcázar [color=#4169ff](Alcázar is a fancy synonim for castelo, ‘castle’, in Portuguese. I trust it’s root, القصر, means something like Palace, am I right, Nadim?)[/color]. Beyond the main entrance there was a huge wall—it resembled one of these walls they used to put in old churches between the entrance and the nave, to keep the acoustic isolation.
Past that wall, there was a huge room that lead to a huge open grassy area in which camp was set.
I walked to my left, past Giulia and Artur [color=#4169ff]i[/i][/color] downstairs, into a cold stony room. I opened a large wooden door and walked into a huge dark room.
Inside that room, I found some people from the S.A. [color=#4169ff](I hadn’t noticed that until I woke up)[/color], like Silvia, Pedro Lopes, Marina Sawaya, Luque, Pedro [color=#4169ff](again, the junky friend)[/color]—who stood silently sit and didn’t say a word in my presence—and Marie. There was a loud discussion going on, we had to sign a document to Queen Talita [color=#4169ff](Oh maan!)[/color].
We had to decide wether or not we would stay in the war. If we decided to stay, our first move would be to attack Napoleon, while if we left the war, we could start rebuilding our villages and—you know—get back to our lives once again.
To my complete astonishment, all of them but Luque were for staying in the war. They were all around a wooden table [color=#4169ff](the one in the dinning room on the farm I grew up in)[/color] which was covered by paper: maps, spreadsheets, lists, books and… Crosswords booklets.
I couldn’t believe they were actually going to vote for war.
‘I think we should show Napoleon how it’s done!,’ said Silvia, ‘We must show him why no–one dares do anything against our people.’
Marina agreed: ‘And there’s more, think of all the fortune we would gather in this war, our people would live in wealth forever.’
‘THIS IS OUTRAGEOUS,’ Luque roared. They were driving him insane. The only people in the room who weren’t making part of the heaten discussion were me and the two Pedros: the junky one looked cranky, while Pedro Lopes had a weird sarcastic smile in his face.
The others were trying to tell Luque there was no deal, and there was no way he would convince them, he should accept he had been outnumbered and write the document down already.
Finally, Luque resorted to me. ‘Bruno, I know you’re a pacifist, tell them to stop that. It’s insane! They must stop!’
I took a deep breath, everyone was now silent and looking at me. [color=#4169ff](A situation I’m most used to, by the way, that happens all the time in the S.A.: people have the craziest ideas and start the most heaten up discussions in the history of humankind until someone resorts to my opinion, which is usually the last to be given… Since I’ve been president of the S.A. for the last year, I got used to makeing these speeches—which usually make a lot of people’s minds!)[/color]
'Well, first off… I’d like to say I’ll respect whatever decision you people take, and if you want me to, I’ll deliver the letter to the queen myself, whatever the outcome of our voting is. That said, I’d like to announce something. In the past days, I’ve been in the woods, trying to protect our kids from the war, only to deliver them here, a place which throughout my journey I trusted to be a safe place for them.
'In my humble opinion, it’s inhumane that you guys are actually suggesting that we stay on this war, even if we’ve got the chance to withdraw from it without resiging to Napoleon’s desires.
'Fellows, what we have here is the chance to get out of this stupid, crazy war without having to sign unfair treaties and whatnot… We can opt between that and having our resources sucked, our youth drawn to the war nightmare, life partners lost…
'And death. I believe in our people just like you do—I think we can win battles and end up earning a lot from this war. But think about it. It is us, a small army, barely equipped, against Napoleon himself. Against the strongest, best equipped and by far the largest army of our time. Think of the massacre, fellows, think of the massacre.
'Think of our kids, the ones that had their lives risked only to arrive here, losing their parents and brothers, losing their families. Think of our culture dying in order to few of us to gather more money, and for a future nation in which our citizens will have better lives—but at what cost?
'Winning whis war would mean raising a new empire and ruling the world, and I think that’s exactly what you want. But not for our people. For you. For the satisfaction of becoming heroes, leaders—for turning out to be right all the way through. After all, if we don’t succeed, the worst thing that can happen to you is die a painless death.
‘Fellows, I don’t think it’s right to make our people undergo a risk of that nature, I don’t think it’s right to make any more people die for a cause as this. And if you vote for the war I’ll give your decisions my support—but that will be the last thing I do for you. If you go for war, then I’m leaving once and for all this place.’
Silvia lowered her head at the beggining of my speech, and as soon as I finished it, she said ‘You know what? He’s right guys. I’m not supporting it either.’
Marie agreed. Pedro Lopes nodded smiling. The other Pedro remained as silent. I knew he was voting for the war anyway. Everyone needed some time to think, so they all walked away, leaving only Silvia and I around the table.
She told me she was sorry for being such an egoist, and that I was right, she just wanted to win that war to make people like and trust the coucil, but that was a nasty way of doing it, and she was ashamed of almost putting people’s lives in risk for doing so.
She was speaking top of her mind, and I could see she was being honest. I woke up soon after, she was still talking to me in the dream. I don’t know what were the results of the voting.
[color=#4169ff]Notes on the dream: Wow! I mean it—wow! I simply loved this dream. It obviously has to do with the fact that some day next week I won’t go to school because Rodrigo and I are applying for the army.
As you guys know, this has been very troublesome for me lately, because, well… I don’t want to support the army in any way—in the end, even though it may help some people and all, it comes down to war and death. It’s an organization I don’t want to support.
But as this dream showed me, I can stand up for myself, I can try to make something nice out of being in the army… I stood up for myself, that was great. I don’t know the outcome of the voting, but I think I might have avoided battle there, that’s something I’m most delighted for.
Some things are still mysterious to me. The whole fragment about rosewood (I actually have some pieces of rosewood sticks I brought from the Amazon; when I woke up, I thought about making a necklace out of them) and the monster…
Queen Talita was also amazing. I had to control myself not to laugh inside the dream. (Oh, it’s great to be lucid in dreams! It adds so much to the vividness and the interpreting!)
Talita clearly symbolizes something to me, I just don’t know what! Well, if it helps, her name means ‘child’ or ‘kid’, and she is one of the people that I trust the most. And she fascinates me more than I can tell for her wisdom and friendlyness. In some sense, she’s a rolemodel for me, she’s always been.
My cousin was among the kids. That might be due to the fact that we didn’t get the scholarships (final decision on that was taken by school yesterday). I’ll have to carry him on my back now, an extra life I’ll be responsible for this year.
There are loads of things to analyze in this dream, shame I don’t have the time. Any helping hands? [=[/color]
