Why?

I am proud of my friends.
My friends respect me just as I respect them.
They have an interest in my well-being and will try to help me when they can. I try to help them too and enjoy being able to help. But if I am unable to help or if I am asked a favour and I say no, my friends will respect that too.
My friends respect my opinion. We may not always agree, but my friends accept our differences.
My friends respect my property, they will never steal from me and they will take good care of my things if I lend things out, and of course return my things at first opportunity.
My friends respect my time, they try their best to keep appointments and apologise if they made me wait.
My friends respect my home. They do not intrude on me, they ask my favour to be in my personal space. And my friends will leave my house when I ask them to.

Because my friends show me respect and care for me, I respect and care for them too.
You know this already if you are my friend. And that is why I am proud to be friends with you.

I dreamt of a refugee camp

I dreamt I was in a refugee camp, or maybe it was a camp of revolutionaries, getting ready for the fight. I huddled in with the women. We were sitting with our back to a ruin of an outhouse. A sign said toilets and I went inside to have a look, it was dark in there, no electrical lights, only light enough to see the toilets were all blocked and there was no running water.
A sudden commotion made me rush outside, people were screaming, some in anger, some in excitement, pointing in the direction where I could see the bombs were falling. After a moment of chaos the bombing ceased, but a horde of driver-less vehicles that looked like harvesters were raiding the landscape, digging up and plowing everything until there was no sign of buildings or of the bombings that had taken place only a short while before.
I went to stand in line with everyone else at the official desk. When I handed the clerk my passport I noticed that it was not just a temporary passport, but that it looked fake, and I knew immediately that I had a passport like this because the embassy expected it to get stolen. Inside the passport were also some obviously fake money - it looked like monopoly money - and I had no clue what to use it for. The woman said some friendly phrases and gave me a bag full of kitchen utensils to get me started. I stared at the stuff, and another woman in line expressed her interest in what I was given.
I spent some time trying to get along. Wearing worn clothes, collecting stuff here and there, and hardly aware of what was going on with the other people in the camp, until someone shouted "it is his birthday! Cake! Cake! Cake!" and I saw some people crowding around a man and another guy running and shouting happily while balancing a fine-looking cake, which was obviously meant for the birthday guy.
When I tried to follow the man with the cake, the scenery changed, and I found myself in an enormous bakery and cake store. I remember saying to myself "oh, this is the place that I have visited before when I dreamt of the enormous chocolate shop". However I did not see lots of chocolate, but big exhibits of cake in all sorts and sizes. It was busy, I had to zigzag in between the customers in the store.
The store opened up to a scene or an arena, where there was a show coming on. I spent some time trying on a pair of khaki coloured dance shoes that someone else had brought with her. When they did not fit, her friend made a cut down the side of the leather so I could squeeze my foot in. I remember thinking that she was ruining the shoe. In the end I chose for another pair of shoes, a red/bordeaux pair that she had also brought with her.
The audience seats were filling up quickly. I told someone I would be right back, while I went to the nearby makeup department to have a look at what was on sale. There was a magnificent display of perfumes, and mascaras in different colours, and they were on sale, what luck I had. But when I asked for something in particular the woman behind the counter gave me directions to the other end, actually the complete opposite corner of the store. When I was about to leave I saw that on the other side of her stand she had the most wonderful gift-wrapped easter eggs and I thought of buying some for my sister.
I started walking, and passed by a number of different departments, and realised suddenly that I was no longer inside, but walking outside, and there was some kind of festival going on. I was controlling a big paper-like balloon which I was walking on the inside. The shadows falling on weird bicycles and men in high hats, were no longer recognisable, and took on new shapes and colours, and people gathered together to watch the spectacle. It was like a parade, and some people marched along with me. It was an eerie atmosphere like a Tim Burton movie...

Photo courtesy: Boiteaoutils