Thursday 29 October 2009

Les pompiers


Aren't dreams funny things? We all dream in our sleep. And according to the people in the know, we dream so we can rid ourselves of the day's worries and joys and start the new day afresh. Now, I usually have the strangest dreams when I'm not doing much at all. For some strange reason...

Anyway, last night I also dreamt. Now, remember I am Dutch and talk Dutch on a daily basis. I also use a lot of English; watching telly, reading/writing blogs, reading books. I do also speak German fluently, French to a good degree and Italian to get on by.

So, when I woke up this morning I wasn't too surprised, since a few weeks ago I had dreamt in German. Last night however, I dreamt in French. Not a language I use often, which I noticed in my dream as well!

I was with my coach and wanted to park on the side of the road, behind a colleague of mine. As I was parking on the heavily sloping road, the bus tilted and dropped down the hill. I had two ladies on board as well, but they (like me) were unharmed, since the bus landed on some trees and bushes, cushioning the fall. We got towed back up to the road and again I tried to park. Again, however, the bus tilted and rolled backwards down the slope, this time with only me on the bus.

This time I couldn't get towed back up the hill though and I had to call 'les pompiers'. Now, why I had to call 'les pompiers' was a bit fuzzy to me after I woke up, because the bus wasn't on fire and I was able to get out quite easily. However, I phoned 'les pompiers', they arrived and I explained to them what happened. In that instant I showed my lack of French knowledge. I told 'les pompiers' that I wanted to park on the road, but 'la rue faisait comme ça (imagine hand gesture doing a slope of a hill) et l'autocar faisait comme ça (imagine hand gesture doing a roll down a hill) en arrière!'.

I used to dream in French a lot, while I was living in both Italy and France. I dreamt almost exclusively in English while I was living in England and for the last few years I have been dreaming in Dutch. Funny how your mind sometimes decides it gets bored with it all and gives you another language to do your dreaming in...

5 comments:

  1. You Europeans are so much smarter than us North Americans. We have two official languages in Canada, but most us us can only speak one -- badly in many cases. :)

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  2. That's different. I have never had a dream in a different language.
    Reading your blog and you mentioning Italy I just remembered a story about my FIL. He was Italian and when he was born the midwife called him Dutch because they said he was a fair Italian!
    (fair skinned) You being Dutch I had to share that with you.

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  3. IM GUESSING THE 'les pompiers' IS THE FIRE DEPARTMENT IN WHAT LANGUAGE?
    I WISH I KNEW MORE THAN ONE LANGUAGE
    I LOVE TO DREAM EXCEPT FOR WHEN THEY ARE IN HOSPITALS AND VERY GOREY, HATE THOSE!
    IF I DREAMED IN ANOTHER LANGUAGE I WOULDNT UNDERSTAND IT!

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  4. @Anvilcloud: The reason I speak four and a half languages is because I have a knack for it (not bigheaded at all me!) and because Dutch isn't a language spoken very widely around the world thanks to some doofus heads who traded New Amsterdam (New York now) for the country of Suriname in South America: jungle all over!

    @Just Breathe: I don't often have dreams in foreign languages right now, but on occasion...

    @Cry: les pompiers are indeed the fire brigade. It's the French term. I don't think you can dream in another language if you don't understand it. But I am not sure about that....

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  5. Oh, that's funny! You called the fire brigade? And told them the road went up and the car went down? In French? ROFL!

    Dreams are really strange sometimes, aren't they?

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Any weighty (and not so weighty) comments are welcome!