The most fundamental right is the right to life. Human rights are protected and safeguarded by human conventions and they include many different areas – among those are the right to freedom of movement and the right to seek asylum. However, even though most countries have signed the conventions, they do not always follow them. Every day human rights are being violated and the short story "The Go-Between" by Ali Smith (2009) is dealing with exactly that topic – people fleeing from their homes to go to other places to find freedom and safety. And the degree of desperation the refugees feel are enormous as nobody flees just for the fun of it "Nobody leave home unless home is the mouth of a shark" (l. 80).
It tells the story of a 33-year-old man from Cameroon educated as a microbiologist. He is a good sportsman and swimmer and has made his way through Africa to Morocco where he is trying to make a living while he is attempting for the third time to cross the border to the small part of Spain. Spain and Europe is his dream - the paradise he wants to go. It was the only thing that could get him to leave his home in Cameroon, though he lived under hard conditions. He had to leave, he was forced to leave. .
He dreams about "walking down the big streets of Madrid with their fine stately buildings" (l. 112), but in a way the dream of Europe has also faded a bit. The protagonist describes the other refugees as being blinded by Europe, however, he has another more ambivalent opinion on Europe. He abhors the European border police, the kind of police who come into the camp and trash everything on their way. They live in their own small society with police and restaurants as examples, a part of Europe and yet not. It is like even in the dreams he has about living in Madrid and walking down the big streets, he is not good enough for living in Europe. He is too different.
