Salvatore Granata is a rather poor man who lives with his wife, son and daughter in Calabria in Italy. One day Salvatore decides to move to Belgium to work in the coal mine of Waterschei as a Gastarbeiter. His family will stay in Italy as Salvatore will only be in Belgium for three years. He hopes to earn much money in a rather small timeframe so he can buy a forge for his son Rocco who is now still a 9-year-old boy. After a year, Salvatore decides his family should be with him, so they also move to Belgium. They soon discover the life of a gastarbeider is difficult: they have to live in some kind of barracks, they are neglected by the Belgian people and they do not earn much. They are astonished when they hear Salvatore signed a contract of five years and male children of gastarbeiders are ought to work in the mines as soon they leave high school. Rocco meets Helena, the daughter of the local grocer shop. However, the man is a racist and forbids his daughter to play with Italian boys.