A small village on the Syrian-Turkish border in the early 1980s: The six-year-old Kurdish boy Sero experiences his first school year in an Arab school and has to watch his small world being radically changed in the course of an absurd nationalism.

The inmates of a reformatory for underage girls have had turbulent pasts: prostitution, crime, violence, and drugs dominated their lives. One of these young women is the rebellious Karin, who lets no one get close to her. Only the young pastor Johannes manages to reach her, bringing Karin's mysterious and sad past to light.