Precisely 77 minutes from now, Mrs. Shirakesh will be stoned to death in the marketplace of Chundakar. Simultaneously, a television talk show is trying to pay silent tribute to this cruel act from afar. The television host Hilda Ludowsky has invited the young, traumatized soldier Rose, who only recently returned from a tour of duty, and her father, Mr. Fahnenberg. They are joined by the beauty queens Ruth and Heidrun, who just stirred up a big controversy with their bikini pageant in Chundakar, and a General named Gert; at least his unit was able to set up port-a-potties in Chundakar’s marketplace to provide some relief to the women there. The guests are clashing already, even before the broadcast begins. They cannot even agree on the term “war”, and the escalating controversy over education and human rights soon leads to anything but a moment of silence.
