To Dana and Anna

Redford and Newman, in the famous movie from ’69. The idols of generations.
And why wouldn’t they be when they look good, shoot with precision and,
in the most dramatic of moments, conduct dialogue with composure?

Even when wounded and surrounded they know what to do: from Bolivia
they would find refuge in Australia. “There we won’t be foreigners, there
they speak English,” says Butch. It bothers them that they’re foreigners
and not murderers and robbers.

Smoke has joined the earth and the sky, but nobody understands smoke
signals with an accent. Lack of understanding kills. Butch Cassidy and
the Sundance Kid are heroes. Ausländer raus!

Whenever I’m in a hopeless situation, I, too, want to find refuge in a distant
country in which they speak my language. At such a time I usually
go for coffee at the Counseling Center for Refugees.

Translated by Omer Hadžiselimović

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