ABSTRACT
It takes effort to make a connection between a distant event and a stranger on a doorstep, to realize that the difference between an alien and an asylum-seeker is often just a matter of perspective. It's easy to be put off by a group of foreigners standing on a street corner, chattering away, while feeling pity for the same people somewhere else, darting across different streets, heads down, hoping to elude a sniper's fire. It's easy to look with distaste at a pesky youngster begging theatrically for money, yet pray for a kid on television, cowering in a combat zone. Even though worse things were happening to more people throughout Bosnia, these orphans had come to represent, to some, all that had gone uncontrollably wrong with the world. Some influential people in Western countries, including the Austrian chancellor's wife, began talking about carrying out a rescue mission.
