We all have dreams. Some people have more realistic dreams that can be easily realized with a little more effort. For some people, it remains “pink dreams”, such as seeing unicorns. Dreams help us to stay down to earth and to feel ourselves like kids sometimes.

The first day of the camp leaves behind several emotions: a sense of security (because we did not have to wake up in the middle of the night from an air raid alert), delight from meeting new, interesting people who, like me, are passionate about literature, who are deeply involved in the cultural world of their own country with a desire to change something, and fear — because while we are here in Armenia talking about how to write about peace and war (which is undoubtedly essential) russian rockets “flew” into cities all over Ukraine.

And when I look at the photos between the discussions, I see the streets I used to walk when I was at university, I see my friends’ posts

“it hit near us… it was scary”

“we are fine. we just came out of the storage room, but there is no power in the whole Lviv”

“hey, we’re fine, don’t worry.”

 “It came to our neighborhood, it was loud. We’re sitting in the bathroom”

“My cat is hanging a flag! Who do you want to fight?”

“I need to finish the story”

And you don’t know what world you’re in. You seem to find yourself in a surreal world, in a kind of “theater of the absurd”, and you just do not know — what will happen next? Do your dreams have a place in this world? Will you have time to fulfill them?

For the last seven months, I have been trying to answer this question and looking for the right words. But you can’t be sure that you’ll wake up tomorrow. What is the point of making plans when everything can be ruined in a minute?

This day taught me to keep believing. Because the people around believe in their future. They want to write, find opportunities for creativity, make films and performances, they dream to live and breathe life itself. And even if we speak different languages, it does not prevent us from sharing something good with each other. And this is inspiring.