 At a construction site in Tehran, Afghan refugees provide cheap labor. When Najaf, an Afgan widower, breaks his foot in a fall, he dresses his teen daughter Baran as a man and sends her in his place. Memar, the avuncular foreman, sees that this "lad" is too weak to carry bags of cement, so he gives Baran s job to his tea boy, Lateef, and gives her Lateef s easy assignment. Lateef is furious with Baran, but when he discovers her secrets--that she is a young woman and the sole bread-winner of a large family--he discovers within himself more noble and empathic impulses. His transformation and actions become the film s center.