In the present, in Spain, Miguel's mind, affected by a brain disease, seems cloistered in the past, in Argentina, in the seventies, when he risked his life for his ideals. He is obsessed with finding a woman named Diana. Mario, his son, who has been away from Miguel for a long time, now feels compelled to unravel the mystery of a name that, like a curse, pursues his father.

Shalamcheh is a small town located in the Khuzestan Province. Situated on the border with Iraq, north-west of the city of Abadan, which is only 53 kilometres distant from the Persian Gulf and near the Iraqi-Iran border, Shalamcheh was one of the main Iraqi troop sites at the time of the war against Iran. Approximately 50,000 Iranians died fighting around the town. Today Shalamcheh is a gateway for pilgrims headed to Karbala, a city located in central Iraq, south-west of Baghdad. Considered a holy city by Shia Muslims, home to the Imam Hussain Shrine, tens of millions of pilgrims visit Karbala twice a year.