The Meaning of Dreams

I have dreams almost every night. Some are so real that I could be watching a film. Mostly, they are combinations of scenes and places I have never been to, people that have nothing to do with my real world. I used to be more interested in the meaning of dreams and what I dream of. My dead sister Daisy was a believer in astrology.

A long time ago, my dreams were kind of prophetic. It was on three occasions when I dreamt of the Virgin Mary. I just lost my job in Dept. of Trade as Foreign Trade Officer after Alejando Melchor published a list of 5,000 "undesirable" government employees, those with records of political activism and a "wanted" kin in the underground. It was an awful situation for a single mother to wake up one morning, read in the papers that she has no more job. Then the Lady of the Immaculate Conception came to me ..as a dream. I woke up to the soft music from my stereo in the living room, went out of the bedroom and saw the front door open with so much light streaming in. She was there in the middle of a flowering garden and was floating closer to me, smiling, her hands outstreached. I stood, half paralyzed and then after some minutes the apparition gently receded behind some clouds. She came to bring you dramatic changes in your life, my astrology expert sister told me.

A few days later, I got a call from Johnny Gatbonton of Editorial Associates. He asked me if I was interested to do media representation work for a Hongkong company. I said yes and that's how the media door opened to me, first via advertising and much later, editorially.

The second time I had an apparition of the the Virgin, it was the Lady of Mt Carmel - floating in a field of tulips with the blue ocean in the background. I was then in a Batangas resort learning to dive. I had already began my new job as media representative for major foreign publications. With the supportive help of former bosses I had in the banking sector, I succeeded to put together Philippine supplements for Financial Times and later, for Int'l. Herald Tribune. At that time, Manila was being promoted as a financial centre.

The third apparition was of the Lady of Lourdes sorrounded by a sea of devotees. By this time, I had switched jobs as media representative for Financial Times and the Int'l. Herald Tribune to being a regular contributor to Far Eastern Economic Review. It was on one of my visits to London when I met FEER's business manager who asked me if I wanted to work for Review, instead of FT. Jokingly, I thought. But then Rodney Tasker materialised from one of these FOCAP happy hours. He had a book review to write and asked me if I would do it as he was leaving for Bangkok next day or so.  I gave him the 1000-worded book review, was fully satisfied and disappeared from Manila's radar. He was also ASEAN correspondent which required him to travel regularly.

Then I got an urgent message from FEER's editor in Hongkong. It said that Tasker may not be able to return anytime soon. FEER and Tasker were sued for libel by then Defense Minister Juan Ponce Enrile. I don't know if it was seriously or jokingly said, but Derek Davies said they needed someone with "balls" to write political report on the Marcos regime. Leo Gonzaga was the business correspondent. These were days of dictatorship and press censorship.

Three dreams, three apparitions and life on a fast changing lane. It was never anything like one I've dreamt of. It was a dream and a reality all at once. Today, early Sunday morning, I woke up early due to an attack of severe coughing. Got out of bed, took some ginger tea, opened my Facebook and read through words of wisdom regularly coming from FB friends. You are always compelled to measure your own adequacy and inadequacies. I went back to bed and fell asleep deeply. And I dreamt I was having a stroll on a sunny day with my best friend. I wanted to take pictures of spring. I tried to fish out my camera from my handbag. It wasn't there. My HTC was also missing. There was another camera but it wasn't mine. Then I took the Saltsjöbanan train and there I met the face of Sweden's postal code lottery, Rikard Sjöberg who was joking with the driver. Rather undramatic and unprophetic! But maybe I'll get the lottery and start a women livelihood foundation in Cape Verde.#