Twice in the past week I have experience
jamais vu. My dears, it's eerie.
La premiere foi: I was on a train to
Erskineville to do some work with
Michaelangelo Optica. I was chuffing* along, thinking my own thoughts, when I was startled by the recorded man saying "stand clear, doors closing" and I jumped out of the train, fearing at the same time that the station was Redfern and I was getting out a stop too early. Alighting, everything looked deeply unfamiliar - neither like Redfern nor like Erskineville. Instead of doing the sensible thing (looking for the station name) I followed the crowd up the stairs. I could feel my brain thinking, well, yes, the stairs are correct and at the top we'll see we are at Erskineville. And I was. But I only knew that by deductive reasoning. Though I came out into the street and saw the correct landmarks, I had the very strong feeling I wasn't in Erskineville at all. Even after an excellent cup of coffee at
Cafe Sofia with M.Opt, the feeling I wasn't where I thought I was persisted for some time.
La deuxieme foi: I was walking up
Pitt Street from Goulburn. I stopped into a second-hand bookshop and browsed works on World War I. When I stepped back out of the shop I had no idea where I was. You'd think that the emotion attached to this would be fear or panic. Instead, it was curiosity. I ascertained my location - I could see and rationalise certain landmarks, and could read and recognise street labels, yet I had never seen any of these things before. I kept walking up Pitt Street, sort of on faith really, as otherwise my option would have been to stand still. I kept waiting to "come to" and return to normal, but it was a good few minutes before I really knew where I was.
Fascinating.
*kids: trains used to go "choof choof choof". That was the sound of the steam, which drove the wheels. Now we have super-zoomy electric trains. So tell me why
this is the road sign for 'train'.
**photo is of Dresden Bahnhof in Germany
