Full Description
The Strait of Gibraltar - the shortest point separating Europe and Africa. Fifteen kilometres of water across which, when the sun shines, Moroccan and Spanish towns can see each other as clear as day, and at night, when the surfers and the eco-tourists have gone, immigrant traffickers pit themselves against two sets of coast guard. Traffickers such as Morad - holding court at a back table in the Cafe France in Tangier, he allocates passengers to boatmen, collects fares, and regales prospective clients with dazzling stories of life in the North. The would-be migrants are a disparate group, held together only by their longing to be free. Kacem Djoudi, for instance, who has escaped from the civil war in Algeria; Nuara, with her newborn child, whose husband hasn't been in touch for months since moving to France; Pafadnam and Yarce, who have survived the brutal journey from Mali; Aziz, the young narrator, and his cousin Reda, severed, in different ways, from their families in southernmost Morocco. As the moment approaches for them to cross, it becomes clear not only how much they have overcome to get there, but also how much still awaits them.
Tense, dramatic and blackly compassionate, Welcome to Paradise is a striking tale of human desperation, of countries bled dry of their people, and of media fantasies of Western life never to fulfill their promise.
