In this story spanning Sweden and India, Jose, an impressionable young Indian, travels to Sweden in the year 1984 to meet Carl, an amateur radio friend he has never met. Jose does not know till he meets his Indophile friend, that Carl is gay. Jose's experiences on his first travel overseas culminate in his falling in love with Inga.Their friendship is climactically resolved when Carl visits Jose and his Indian wife Leena in the winter of 1993 against the backdrop of political upheavals in Europe and India and militant trade unionism on the tea estate where Jose is employed.