Parallel universe

Not surprisingly, the medium-sized shopping centre that's a couple of kilometres from here was pretty empty at 9pm on a Tuesday night. In the central area, only the supermarket was open.

So what would be the perfect song to make you feel like you'd walked into a spooky yet magical alternate reality, one more like a film set moving in slow motion? One where everything outside the doors - all the billions of people - simply didn't exist anymore?

If your answer was Gary Jules' version of Mad World, as heard in the movie Donnie Darko, go to the top of the class.

It really was the most freaky experience. Inside the supermarket itself, there was something altogether more mundane and appropriate to a suburban shopping experience playing on the speakers. But the cavernous space I had to walk through to get there was, for about 30 seconds, on a plane only the elves know about.