My formerly chatty grandfather, who has lain at Changi General Hospital since a stroke the beginning of the year, speechless and immobile, comes constantly into my dreams. I wonder sometimes whether all the rest of my family have to dream of him too but I never ask because Asian families like mine best avoid discomfort this way . Sometimes I dream that he has learned to talk again, that he has been talking to me, and I go about for half a day with a light heart, having brunch, reading and making plans with friends, taking in the hot breeze with fortitude, subconsciously maintaining its truth, until something banal reminds me of my dream. Then reality clashes with my dream-engendered beliefs, and questions the unquestioned memories, so that I must recognise that nothing has changed. He is still being fed through a tube, croaks as a substitute for laughter and festers in boredom. I haven't learned how to separate the guilt from the rest of my life, so I go about every day constantly carrying a bundle of tight feelings. Sometimes he is not unhappy. Today my father told him jokes to try to make him laugh, and he croaked for so long that he started to choke.