Dreams

Everyone has dreams when they sleep. It's just a matter of whether you remember your dream or not. I woke up one morning a few days ago while dear husband was getting ready to for work and I couldn't remember what my dream was about, which is of cos normal. But what I did remember distinctly was that I did have a dream, it was a strange one (my dreams usually are) and that I spoke English in my dream. Perhaps it was the unusually early hour of my awakening, the fact that I managed to sleep through most of the night and the cat didn't try to attack my toes or a question that husband had asked me a few nights prior (we'll get to that later), but I started wondering.

Why do I only dream in English?

I asked the husband if he dreams in English or Swedish and after some thought he said Swedish which makes sense cos that is his mother tongue. But my mother tongue isn't English but I have never dreamt in Malay! At least not that I can remember. Granted my Malay is far from satisfactory and I usually (shame-facedly) struggle to maintain a conversation with my parents in Malay but that is SUPPOSED to be my primal language, isn't it? I mean, I grew up in a Malay speaking environment. My parents speak Malay, my grandmother understands nothing but Malay and growing up, we've only had Indonesian maids. So question no.1, why do I dream only in English and question no.2, why the heck is my Malay so damn lousy??

Perhaps question no.2 answers my question no.1. Perhaps my brain functions and processes in English before translating (if needed) my thoughts to Malay or Swedish or any other language I may need to use at the moment.

It's not really a major topic of discussion but I just thought that was interesting that I dream ONLY in English and the fact that I realise that only now.

What language do you dream in? If you're multi-lingual (like most Singaporeans are), do you dream in different languages?

Coming home from work a few nights prior to that morning, dear husband had told me of a discussion he had had with a colleague that day. His colleague P had suddenly asked Mathias, how do you think people who lived in prehistoric times, before spoken language existed, dreamed? How do they know what they are dreaming about if they can't say what it is?

Yeah, these days they actually can be that free to have such discussions. So anyway, it apparently became a pretty heated discussion with the two men trying to figure it out. How do you formulate your dream if you don't have the power of language to describe what you dreamt of?

My theory is that dreams are a way for our brains to let off some steam. Release images of things we've experienced which I guess would mean that people in prehistoric times dreamt of things they saw and sounds they heard. But with the complexities of modern life and evolution of language, communication and interaction, I still go back to the question, why do I only dream in one language and why that particular language?

Just a thought that I needed to release on a cold, snow stormy day.