I’m a tecnical guy arrange to go to a conference with a colleague I barely know, an englishman with connections. The conference is in a somewhat remote academic place, the two of us stay at a rich relative of my colleagues. From there we attend an overnight event sponsored by the conference, and stay at a country resort. It’s an alcoholic event. The next morning I leave, my colleague has things to do, so I head back to his rich relatives place, pick up my things and head home. When I get home I realize I left an overnight backpack at the resort room. It has some papers and stuff important to me but not really of intrinsic value. In particular, it has all the documentation about the conference, the stuff about the resort, and so on. I don’t remember the details.

So I try to contact my colleague. His work tells me he hasn’t returned, I remember the relatives name, and call. They tell me he hasn’t returned. I explain the situation, ask to get in touch with him. Vague response that induces me to travel to their residence.

When I get there it is very strange. Nobody I recognize is there. However, the servants assure me that my colleague will be back shortly.

I wander the place a bit, find the room I stayed in. No sign of my stay, and the room has been re-arranged.

In fact, nothing at the place is exactly as I remember it — the sitting room by the main entrance where we waited when we arrived has different furniture than I remember, for example. This is rather disturbing, because the changes are in many cases subtle, pervasive, and it would take an impossible amount of work to change that much stuff in the short time since I was here last. Not only are the curtains different, but the windows themselves are in slightly different locations than I remember. The doors are different, and in slightly different locations. The rooms have different paint and wallpaper. The hardwood floors are a different color.

I go out to the grounds in the back, a large park-like area with grass and trees. It looks like I remember, but I can’t find the small delightful pond I had visited earlier that made such an impression.

TBC…​