Regional Competition

In 1992 a wave of refugees from the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina reached Denmark. With existing refugee camps completely full, the Red Cross pulled a giant ship into the canals of Copenhagen. The ship, Flotel Europa, became a temporary home for a thousand people waiting for decisions on their asylum applications. Among them was a 12-year-old boy, Vladimir, who fled Sarajevo together with his mother and older brother. They spent two years in the limbo of Flotel Europa. Two decades later, Vladimir Tomić takes us on a journey of growing up on this ship filled with echoes of the war — and other things that make up an adolescence. The coming-of-age story is juxtaposed with personal VHS archive material shot by refugees who shared the “space-time vacuum” of the Flotel.