date : 1994

Michael's character, Paul, is a young student who discovers he has contracted AIDS a few years after having a blood transfusion at the age of 15. This moving story is told by Paul's friend, played by Michael Riley. He has known Paul for 2 years, after having met at the University of Toronto. 

As he goes through the ordeal of Paul's illness, he tries to find a way to cope with his own raging emotions - and to keep Paul's spirits up. To deal with the tragedy, and to try to make sense of the surreal world in which they find themselves living in, the two friends decide to create a story of a family, the Roccamatios of Helsinki, using the history of the 20^th century as a metaphorical guideline. Each story would parallel an event from one year in this century. As his illness advances, Paul sinks deeper into depression. He uses the disturbing, dark events of the century to tell his tales, as a way of expressing his anger and pain.

Created July 16th 1999