Dreams of the Holy Mountain

I had a series of dreams last night that struck a chord with me. It's about four hours after the even, but here's what I remember:

House in the City
For some reason I had to move to "the city" for six months. I'm renting a house while I have mine rented out. Also for some reason the only pet I take with me is Ebony the black cat - youngest of my cats - who seems to settle in. The house is close to a street, and is two story with the entrance being a porch on the left side, made from old brick and concrete. It's two story and there's a narrow backyard that extend back to a railway line. On  one side is an alleyway/gravel road that goes under the line, and a wide gate in the fence opens to that. The place is serviceable and has character.

The Holy Mountain
I appear to fall asleep, maybe while I'm dreaming about the house above, and I materialise in a temple/hall. It's a large building that seems to be at the front of a block similar to the one mentioned above. The building has an entrance at front, and extends down a gentle slope with several levels separated by a single step. In the building there is an array of artefacts and art objects from Eurasian history, a mix of colours, styles and mediua. There is one common bond though, and that is that they were all religious items or symbols at one time. Down the back there appears to be a toilet/kitchen block, with a calendar and phone on the wall.

As I'm looking around two people appear at the front of the building. One is Cathryn Platine (whom I met in person in 2006 when I visited Gallae Central House in up-state New York) and the other woman I don't know. Cathy is about 20 years younger than when I met her in real life, and the other woman seems older with greying short cropped hair. They are both wearing colourful and patterned thick woollen kaftans. Cathy recognises me and asks what took me so long. She takes me on a tour of the place, and we all wander down into the garden.

This is also a narrow long shape (a bit like my own in real life) but is very well kept - lawn is trimmed and old large trees decorate it. To the left is an altar/pavilion which has a figure of a woman pouring water from an amphora with one hand, and carrying a baby on the other arm. There are offerings of all sorts around this. Outside the fence of the backyard is parkland that is in a state of diorder but not decay. In the distance there seem to be towns but only one or two houses nearby. What dominates the scene however is a gigantic mountain.

It can be seen in the distance covering a good portion of the horizon. Cathy introduces it as the Holy Mountain and I immediately think "Mount Ida" but I know this isn't the real Mount Ida in western Turkey. The mountain is green and lush with some snow on top and a glow about it that can be seen even in the day. As I look closely I can see individuals and teams of climbers struggling to reach the top, and others at the top who try and plant flags but fall or are blown away. Others try and build houses on the side of it but nothing is permanent. Some bright spark has created an advertising banner on the side of the mountain using a laser light, but whenever I try and read it, it goes blurry. Biplanes fly around it but there's nowhere to land. Cathy seems amused at all this activity.

Fade out
Just then I seem to fade out and wake up, but on reflection this morning I think I dreamt waking up. I lie there for a while and drift off and once again I'm in the building. Cathy and the woman look at me and I tell them that I'm here in a dream and that I need to focus to stay and the woman writes down the time and date on the calendar to note my appearance. I talk with Cathy and she explains that we are at the ideal rather than reality and that many confuse the two. Rather than try and "conquer" the mountain (which cannot be conquered or owned by any one person or group), it was was enough to enjoy the view. Then I fade out again...

Ebony
...and wake up back in bed in the house I'm renting for six months. I got downstairs to have a hot drink and sit on the patio and I find Ebony surrounded by cats. Some are shaggy and some seem dead and they all seem to be crowding her and purring up to her. I move one away and realise that it's Girlcat, who my family used to have when we lived in West Midland, and I recognise Rorschach who Carol and I had when  we lived in Adelaide Terrace.Then I wake up.

Now I could not get these dreams out of my head. The building in no way resembles Gallae Central House which I visited, and I suspect that the Cathy in the dream wasn't meant to be the real Cathryn either. Maybe the dream was telling me something about the nature of spirituality and religions. Ideas, anyone?

neat animated story

I love the style + music

Ugandan Anti-Homosexuality Bill

You may have seen links to an online petition against an Anti-Homosexuality Bill that the Ugandan government is currently considering. If passed, it would enforce jail terms and maybe the death penalty on those determined to be homosexual. That's pretty alarming on face value.I've not saying that people shouldn't do this, but that it may not have much effect on the Ugandan government.  A simple search of Google with 'ugandan government +petition' shows that it's not just gays that are being threatened currently in Uganda.

Christian activists are also petitioning the government to ban Islamic law; there is a land grab for Traditional and Customary land; there is also a petition to reopen local radio stations that were closed by the government; and Human rights network for journalists Uganda has petitioned the United Nations seeking its intervention to end the continuous cases of violation of the rights of media practitioners while on duty. There is also a a petition to support a campaign of sex-workers from Uganda to repeal the ban on the conference on sex-workers health rights and economic empowerment. There is a movement to reverse the ban on Reflexology (whatever that is) by the government as well. There is a petition to stop Child Sacrifice in Uganda (the page says that it "...is an intensely disturbing phenomenon that is driven by superstition, exploitation, witchcraft, and extreme poverty").

In short, is only adding a signature to yet another petition by non-Ugandans going to have much weight with the obviously biased and repressive government?

By all means sign that petition, but also send a direct message to the Ugandan Parliament about your concerns. You can do this by using the contact page at the Parliament of Uganda Website. As listed on that page, you can write via:

    P.O BOX 7178
    Parliamentary Avenue
    Kampala
    Uganda

That may or may not be too late for the votes on the bill, but 1,163,150 individual emails or letters is a far more impressive thing than a single petition with 1,163,150 signatures (the current figure when writing).

GOSH!

After discovering a Supercar Flight Model for Microsoft Flight Simulator I found there's also a version for Orbiter. What's Orbiter? It's a Space Flight Simulator with heaps of add-ins, manuals and tutorials. The last time I saw something like this I was using an IBM XT!

Oh, and it's FREE.