In a small town outside Istanbul, Sinan Basioglu, a devout Kurdish Muslim, wishes to move his family to the safety of his old village in order to take his fifteen-year-old daughter away from the relationship she is having with their neighbour, the seventeen-year-old American son of expatriate teachers. But when a massive earthquake hits the village, the Basioglu family is faced with greater challenges as their survival becomes dependent on their American neighbours.