NENA – “99 Red Balloons”
1984 was pop’s year of war. I’m not talking about Macca or Nena or Frankie: it was the moment I most keenly felt the charts as a battleground. There was a cosmic struggle raging in the Top 40 between the awesome and the terrible and in some huge and undefinable way it mattered which side won each week. Before this point I’d experienced the charts as a source of pleasure – the bad stuff rubbed up against the good but it hardly bothered me. After this, my concept of what pop included started to expand – the war continued but with the Sunday evening chart only one of its (many, many) fronts.
Unfortunately, looking back the actual sides in this private war weren’t truly determined by some righteous perception of perfect pop. Instead the casus belli in 1984 was simple and grubby: was it a girls’ record? Did they like it? Did they sing it? If so – to the dumper! Nena very much included – I hated this record fiercely: it was silly, it was sappy, it squelched. And to make it worse, Nena’s offhand, gamine bounce brought on that special pre-adolescent kind of “DO NOT WANT” where the “NOT” cuts in and out like a bad radio signal.
The version of her song we got – unlike almost anywhere else, the US included – is the English version, with the lyrics more rewritten than translated. The shift in emphasis matters. Both versions sing armageddon as a domino topple – once the baloons set the process going, the end of the world is an inevitability. But in the German version this happens with little human input – the people involved are tools of the process, and it’s a sad parable of a world doomed by systems. The English version is more savage. Here humanity gleefully digs its own grave, in a Strangelove style vision of a war nobody starts and nobody survives but everybody deep-down wants. “This is it boys! This is war!”
This version fits the music a lot better – its quickening tempo, its sense of release, the way the groove gradually liberates itself from that opening duck-walk and lets the song become a swirling, bumping kids’ party before it suddenly stops for the sad little coda. The downside is that you have a fine, husky voice singing lyrics in a second language and getting the phrasing slightly off – poor puns like “standing pretty” get worse when sung so haltingly. German, in any case, is a very underrated rock language – those thick crunches of consonants! So migration works an odd trick on “99 Luftballons”, changing it into a sharper song but a tweer performance.
8
There’s a brilliant episode from the most recent series of ’30 Rock’ which features Tina Fey trying to pass ’99 Red Balloons’ off to Kenneth as a nursery rhyme that her grandmother used to sing to her. It prompts the hilarious response: “That’s ’99 Red Balloons’, Nena’s famous anti-balloon protest song.”
Amused to see that in “Glorias 1″ in related items I put a totally different spin on the language thing. Oh, consistency…
Well, here’s the German lyrics to “Neunundneunzig Luftballons” and an English translation for comparison’s sake:
Hast du etwas Zeit für mich
Dann singe ich ein Lied für dich
Von 99 Luftballons
Auf ihrem Weg zum Horizont
Denkst du vielleicht g’rad an mich
Dann singe ich ein Lied für dich
Von 99 Luftballons
Und dass so was von so was kommt
99 Luftballons
Auf ihrem Weg zum Horizont
Hielt man für Ufos aus dem All
Darum schickte ein General
‘ne Fliegerstaffel hinterher
Alarm zu geben, wenn es so wär
Dabei war’n da am Horizont
Nur 99 Luftballons
99 Düsenjäger
Jeder war ein großer Krieger
Hielten sich für Captain Kirk
Das gab ein großes Feuerwerk
Die Nachbarn haben nichts gerafft
Und fühlten sich gleich angemacht
Dabei schoss man am Horizont
Auf 99 Luftballons
99 Kriegsminister -
Streichholz und Benzinkanister -
Hielten sich für schlaue Leute
Witterten schon fette Beute
Riefen Krieg und wollten Macht
Mann, wer hätte das gedacht
Dass es einmal soweit kommt
Wegen 99 Luftballons
99 Jahre Krieg
Ließen keinen Platz für Sieger
Kriegsminister gibt’s nicht mehr
Und auch keine Düsenflieger
Heute zieh’ ich meine Runden
Seh’ die Welt in Trümmern liegen
Hab’ ‘nen Luftballon gefunden
Denk’ an dich und lass’ ihn fliegen
=========================
Have you some time for me,
then I’ll sing a song for you
about 99 balloons
on their way to the horizon.
If you’re perhaps thinking about me right now
then I’ll sing a song for you
about 99 balloons
and that such a thing comes from such a thing.
99 balloons
on their way to the horizon
People think they’re UFO’s from space
so a general sent up
a fighter squadron after them
Sound the alarm if it’s so
but there on the horizon were
only 99 balloons.
99 fighter jets
Each one’s a great warrior
Thought they were Captain Kirk
then came a lot of fireworks
the neighbors didn’t understand anything
and felt like they were being provoked
so they shot at the horizon
at 99 balloons.
99 war ministers
matches and gasoline canisters
They thought they were clever people
already smelled a nice bounty
Called for war and wanted power.
Man, who would’ve thought
that things would someday go so far
because of 99 balloons.
99 years of war
left no room for victors.
There are no more war ministers
nor any jet fighters.
Today I’m making my rounds
see the world lying in ruins.
I found a balloon,
think of you and let it fly
If anything, Tom, I’d have said the opposite about which version had little human input – in the English version it’s the “boxes of software” rather than human beings who take the balloons for missiles (we were told at school that early in the Cold War this nearly happened for real, only it was a flock of geese rather than balloons). And the war ministers and fighter pilots seem to enjoy the whole process just as much. As for the German version being sad, well possibly, but when Nena spits out lines like “fühlten sich gleich angemacht” and “Mann, wer hätte das gedacht?” she sounds pretty bloody angry as well. A cracker of a record.
The really peculiar thing about this is how on earth a song with a perfectly serviceable English translation could reach number 2 in a supposedly insular country such as the USA – in the original German!? Can our North American contributors explain this?
Number 2 Watch – Kool and the Gang’s “Joanna” for two weeks.
#3 hmm, good point, I’d overlooked that “war ministers” line certainly – I still think the English version has more of a savagely comic bent where the German one is more serious/angry.
I travelled around Germany in September 1983 – Koln; Dusseldorf; Hannover; Berlin – and the latter, then divided by the Wall, was an unforgettable experience.
My vision of Germany had been formed from a mix of Gunter Grass, Cabaret, The Nightporter, Krautrock and Bowie – edgy decadence mixed with Teutonic efficiency. Seeing some of the squat culture of the city at the time of my visit revealed something of the more politicised punk movement, of which I’d (largely) been previously unaware – and which may be reflected (if slightly) in this song. I also developed a love of (certain aspects) of German culture – something compounded by ‘Wings of Desire’ and by Edgar Reiz’s Heimat trilogy.
Nena’s voice is adorably alien – her awkward phrasing part of the charm – it matches the earnest tone that I associate with German culture – (cf Nicole’s A little peace) and which contrasts with the more ironic if not gleeful (British) take on the Cold War in a forthcoming number 1.
The general idea of this lovely little satire isn’t a new one – it’s reminiscent of a poem by Roger McGough (part of another number one act as it happens), from the 1960s.
A little bit of heaven
Fell out of the sky one day
It landed in Vermont
North-eastern USA
The general at the radar screen
He rubbed his hands with glee
And pressed the little button
That started World War Three.
and so it goes on…
Was 1984 the peak year for CND membership? It faded away afterwards but I think we were more scared than at any time since 1962 and the Cuba crisis. One thing I do associate this with is spending an afternoon in a park in Huntingdon, being absolutely frozen by a bitter Fenland wind at a CND rally while a whole bunch of us were trying to fly improvised kites made of binliners. (Quite successfully actuallly.) A week earlier I’d spent a blazingly hot Easter weekend walking from Wellington to Ludlow via The Wrekin and Wenlock Edge.
I’m getting a little ahead of myself though. I’ve always really liked this record, for its insidious tune, Nena’s smashing voice, and for the hefty punch behind the apparently velvet glove. A well-deserved 8.
I’m guessing that the German-language version was the one shown on MTV, accounting for its greater popularity in the US at the time. The English-language one is played more today, I think.
I love this song in both incarnations, as much because as despite its quality as a dated “hey remember the 80s, weren’t they ridiculous” standard, which is all I ever knew it as.
Although the German language version was the hit in America, I seem to remember both versions of the song and video being played on the national media feed, with the English versions edging the German ones out by just a bit. No, I have no explanation for this, and I recognize I could be very wrong. I should point out that it seems like the guitars on the fast bits are mixed a LOT louder in the German version than in the English version.
While America’s charts largely avoid singing in languages other than in English, it’s worth pointing out that Kyu Sakamoto’s Japanese-language “Sukiyaki” was a #1 for three weeks in 1963, back when Pearl Harbor was still within living memory for the overwhelming majority of Americans.
…meanwhile, closer to home – in the spirit of confrontation that seemed to mark this year – the Miner’s strike was kicking off in the UK about this time. Dark days.
I think that my feelings about this at the time are an early example of my starting to develop critical faculties. There was a lot that my 11 year-old self would dislike about this record, for resons similar to Tom – the choruses that would appeal to smaller children, the jarringness of the opposition (baloons are cheerful things, while missiles are lethal ones – yes, I can see what they did there)
Also, a more personal reason, in that this record was clearly left-wing to my ears, and my parents were less overtly of the left and a generation older than most other childrens’ parents in my class. So while my parents were SDP activists, the younger parents had a more CND/GLC approach, and this sounded to me like the sort of thing that trendy-lefty parents would play to their children.
(I keep on thinking that I don’t come out as a very sympathetic boy in these reminiscences…)
However, even with all these caveats, there was something so joyous and surging about this tune that rose above all of my suspicions and gave me pleasure. As the song still does now.
The most striking reconsideration of this song that I’ve had as an adult is its use in the scene of ‘Boogie Nights’ where Alfred Molina is a venal and completely coked-up drug dealer, enthusing about his hobby of making compilation tapes. He then gets shot in a violent gun battle as his tape switches from ‘Jesse’s Girl’ by Rick Springfield to this.
I saw some silly Channel 4 one-hit wonders clips show at the turn of the century that had a memorable extract of Frank Bough on ‘Breakfast Time’ enthusing lustfully “That Nena… She’s quite something!”
As indeed she quite self-evidently was, though – and an unlikely 1984 NME cover girl, to boot!
re 11 – following on from the gay Englishmen theme explored in the Relax thread – I think the common belief among my friends and I was that young German women like Nena had hairy armpits, were into nude sunbathing and were totally up for it.
#8: re hits in languages other than English: A little while ago I was browsing in a second hand shop and came across an old 45rpm record which I bought out of curiosity. It was in Italian, called Al Di La’ and sung by one Emilio Pericoli. It turns out that it got to No 30 in the UK while Ray Charles was having a run at No. 1 in 1962, but peaked at No. 6 on the Billboard Hot 100. The title means ‘beyond’. And the record? It’s very, very good…
this is still a bit before my time so i may be misremembering a bit here, but i associate this song (and overall era) as a moment when the US charts opened up for continental acts. we didn’t have so many in the previous decades but starting in the mid-80s, particularly with Nena and Falco, it was much easier for european acts to chart in the states. not sure why. i’ve always assumed that mtv was a beast that needed feeding and at this point they would take anything. also, i believe mtv’s programmers initially took their cues from the uk, as that’s where the more visually exciting artists were coming from, and some european acts managed to sneak through by dint of their popularity on british mtv. is this accurate?
johnny: Yes, I believe it was actually that simple. As a 10-year-old I assumed that this situation was the steady-state norm – that the charts were always being invaded by foreigners with funny names who the DJ had never heard of before. Sadly it wasn’t always to be so.
Re: 13/8 and the Singing Nun, also perceived to have hairy armpits, had a French language no.1 in the US with Dominique, in Dec ’63, when the country needed some other-worldly balm to help it through JFK’s assasination.
My memory of this is of a ’78 era Blondie pastiche lucking out. Even Kids In America had seemed late on the bandwagon in early ’81, but … 1984? Is this just me, oldsters?
On the other hand, joyous, surging, great tune, nicely offhand vocal, spoilt by the squelchy Austro-funk moves.
Oh, and thanks for the tip Tim, Al Di La is gorgeous. Can I point you towards Gino Paoli, who wrote Cilla’s You’re My World plus a ton of beautiful (less OTT) songs of a similar ilk in the 60s. Unattractive, sweaty, bespectacled, so emotive, so fond of woodwinds, I love him!
This went to #2 in America and she never charted Hot 100 again. The video makes the song and the song is best in German.
I feel sorry for UK listeners on this occasion, because we in Oz had the proper version, and unlike the Americans we sent it all the way to the top – for five weeks, too. The missing unstressed beat from “NEUN-und-NEUN-zig LUFT-bal-LONS” in the “Red Balloons” version jars every time, and the opportunity to hear German in the English-speaking charts is so rare that it should definitely be savoured. Nena’s vocals sounded so much gutsier in the original, too, like a German version of Kim Wilde at her 1981-82 best, which was fine by me.
I’m not surprised that the 1984 UK record-buying public wasn’t ready for the German version, though, given that when I moved here two decades later British attitudes towards Germany still seemed to be stuck in the “don’t mention the war” episode of Fawlty Towers. But if it keeps the stag parties away from the most exciting city in Europe, who’s complaining.
My first German-language single was one of the first two I bought, and that was actually by mistake, but I loved it then and still do. I’d heard the song on Casey Kasem’s American Top 40 and went looking for it shortly thereafter, but when I took my new purchase home it turned out not to be the plodding rock of one-hit wonders After the Fire, but the sharp tones of Falco, singing his original version of “Der Kommissar“. That title also evoked the Cold War and even the SS, but the song itself seemed to be more about “my funky friends Jack und Joe und Jill”. It would be another year before we got this much more direct Cold War song… but most of us hearing the German version only knew it was a Cold War song because others told us; the video didn’t give much away.
I remember liking “99 Luftballons” at the time, but didn’t buy the record; unlike too many ’80s hits, though, this is one I can happily listen to anytime. It’s probably one of my favourite one-hit-wonder number ones, and its unique qualities came in handy for one of mein satirikal Internet writinks.
As this is the English-language version I should probably give it 6, but I’ll give it 7 für ein Lied für dich.
Never much liked it, but have to admit that its use in the Watchmen film kind of made my heart soar….You wouldn’t think it would work as NYC ‘first date’ music for the mid-80s (where’s ‘Steppin’ out’? you might think), but the silly bounce/lope of the thing just works to capture the deliciouness of lightly/carefreely shrugging off your old self and just enjoying being in the moment with someone fresh.
5, recently upgraded to an 8.
#14, I suspect it was more that US MTV needed feeding with whatever was visually exciting, rather than it taking many cues for from the UK MTV. I don’t remember MTV here having a great presence until later in the decade, plus the bunny embargoed Austrian you spoke of was number 1 in the US before the UK.
lonepilgrim #12 – certain parts of the UK media made an inordinate amount of fuss about the fact that she had hairy armpits and wasn’t afraid to show them off; like there’s one ideal image you have to conform to.
Erithian 21 – yes it was the major talking point in the TV room at our hall of residence the night she appeared on Top Of The Pops. Reaction (certainly from the lads) was generally favourable.
OTOH Tracie Young in Record Mirror said “How can she be sexy when she’s got the whole of the Black Forest growing in her armpits?” which goes to show these one hit wonders don’t stick together.
I have the follow up “Just A Dream” which is colourless sub-Blondie guitar pop. No surprise that it failed to consolidate her career.
This was quite a good time for German acts with Propaganda’s “Dr Mabuse” also in the charts and Peter Schilling’s “Major Tom” just missing out.
TOTPWatch: Just the sole performance of ’99 Red Balloons’ from Nena on Top Of The Pops;
16 February 1984. Also in the studio that week were; Slade, The Style Council, Matt Bianco and Break Machine. Simon Bates and Peter Powell were the hosts.
I really like the German original, but not the English version so much: agree with #18 that Nena sounds gutsier in German/with Tom that she sounds more twee in English. The English lyrics don’t really convey any sense of impending apocalypse – it starts off with the balloons in a toy shop and never really gets away from that, the war machine and the jet fighters just seem like more toys and there’s no real menace there. I don’t speak German (tho), so maybe it’s just the guttural consonants I’m feeling more.
She has a pretty strange voice; but what I like more than that odd combination of feyness and harshness is that she seems to be singing mostly to herself, almost like she’s lying on her back in a park looking into the sun and daydreaming.
#22 – ah yes, “Dr Mabuse”, as used to memorable effect in the John Hughes-scripted Some Kind of Wonderful.
Speaking of Hughes and German-speaking bands, let’s not forget Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and its excellent use of Yello’s “Oh Yeah”.
#24 The military-machines-are-toys thing is a pretty common ‘clever’ metaphor to show the FOOLISHNESS OF WAR – the film War Games came out the years before this. and obviously we’ve not seen the last of the war-as-game in this year’s Popular entries. So I just see it as of its time rather than particularly ineffective.
I agree with the gutsy in German/twee in English thing — which is why I like the English version more!
Brilliant review of a number 1 which from a distance of 25 years seems vaguely baffling – A bouncy Euro-pop tune about nuclear destruction sung by a lady with untrimmed armpits?!?!
I don’t feel particularly strongly about 99 Red Balloons, but I think some of those dull protest songs about Iraq could have done with a less grey earnest approach and a bit more pop colour.
The early eighties trend for anti-nuke songs is one of pops stranger digressions there was the Young Marble Giants eerie ” Final Day ” there was Enola Gay and Hammer to Fall (bombastic) there was 1999 and 2 Tribes (defiant) and ” The Unforgettable Fire ” which is possibly the best thing U2 ever did. Also that preposterous Ultravox video where Midge Ure drives home from work and discovers World War 3 has broken out by looking in a telly shop window in the rush hour as well -
typical huh?
p.s That comment about the pre-pubescent DO NOT WANT just stings with reality. The male ego never denies a need for girls as much as at the point where they are about to become the major obsession.
Top class writing.
Well really! What’s all this nonsense about not shaving armpits?
Armpits, assuming that they are otherwise clean – and you do wash them, don’t you guys? – are the source of the body’s natural sexy scent. Only the marketing arm of Big Business could think of removing that and replacing it with synthetic chemicals.
Do you boys shave your armpits? No? Well why should us women!
;)
Hi Rosie – I think those of us who have mentioned the armpit thing are metaphorically raising an arch Teutonic eyebrow at the fuss that was made about it 25 years ago. But I wonder whether we’re more or less hidebound now by supposed ideal body images? Beth Ditto, for instance, makes a more political thing about her weight than, say, Alison Moyet, for whom it was all about her extraordinary voice. I’m offering no conclusions, just setting it up for discussion.
I’d have been quite happy if the natural scent of the bloke next to me on my train last night could have been replaced with synthetic chemicals, mind you.
Oh dear. I always thought it was a song about balloons.
I’ll listen to it again. Lyrics sort of pass me by a lot of the time, which is a bit odd cos I’m a writer an’ all that… but when I listen to music it’s the tune and production and stuff that grab me, and it never really occurs to listen out for the words unless there’s a particularly grabbing line somewhere. Obviously there are exceptions. Anyway, what a great pop song! Of all the ones written about in this series, this has subsequently earwormed the most – by far.
I’m with JonnyB at # 31. I too simply thought that this was a puerile nursery rhyme about playing with balloons and shut my ears to it. The silly playground-type melody only reinforced my view that this daft little piece of jelly and ice cream Euro pop was one to just sneer at until it went away to “Junior Choice” where it belonged. I now realise I could have been wrong.
I have no opinion about Nena’s hairy armpits and cannot recall discussing them. Mind you, I bet any passing red balloon gave them a wide berth. 98, 97, 96…
I don’t get the passion for this. Clunky anti-nuke lyrics, passe synth sounds and and and hairy armpits to boot! A novelty at best surely, I didn’t like it then and certainly don’t now.
This is a 10 for me but I appreciate Tom’s writeup. I think the English version has plenty of drama, and some very nicely shaded bits to the lyric – particularly the lines identifying the doomsday pilots as “99 knights of the air”… “Everyone’s a superhero – everyone’s a Captain Kirk!” On one level it’s mocking the heroic pretensions of these bringers of death and catastrophe, and at the same moment I think it’s really sympathetic to them – they are magnificent in their terribleness, just like the Bomb itself.
Phrasing it that way makes me want to add the Smiths’ “Ask” to anto @ 28′s list (“If it’s not love, then it’s the Bomb that will bring us together”), plus their “Stretch Out And Wait” with the discussion of the end of the world floating over the conversation like a mushroom cloud. Oh, and “It’s A Mistake” by Men At Work….
Ha, just found an ILX post where I say basically the same things as above, but also add “Party At Ground Zero.”
I have a lot of time for the German language in pop. It’s the idea that a language that doesn’t lend itself readily to poetry/lyrics can pop up in music and be instantly intriguing. I heard the english version on the radio and was dismissive of it. On hearing the German version, it seemed to take on a more charming identity. So Nena was the springboard into a fascination with europop and eurorock. Propaganda popped into the charts, although I was pretty peeved most of their Secret Wish album was sung in English. Delving deeper, I came across albums by The Scorpions, Einsturzende Neubauten, Die Toten Hosen and of course the daddies that were Kraftwerk. Certainly some meaty morsels there. Three years hence, I hear a Slovenian band called Laibach cover an Austrian band (Opus) singing Life Is Life in German and become blown away by it(and their Beatles covers too).
It’s amazing to me how certain songs can lead you down an interesting path musically and culturally. All because of Nena’s 99 Balloons.
Out in South Africa, we got the German version on the telly – I know that because in those fledgling video recorder days, I recorded and rewatched the music vids from that period for years – but got the english version on the radio.
I much preferred the German version. It seemed to “scan” better too. But mostly, being 20 in 1984, I fancied the pants off Nena in the video. I guess that swings it.
I’m surprised that the German lyrics also mention Captain Kirk. I would have figured that was unique to the English version. Was Star Trek popular on the Continent?
It’s interesting that the English version of the video is cut differently from the German version (at least in the versions available on YouTube). Was it because the German version featured non-red balloons prominently, or because they blew up?
James T^H K @37: Is it possible that non-English-speaking popular cultures are more receptive to English-language popular culture than Anglophones are to culture in other languages? How many other Nena songs got much airplay in Britain?
I used to be fascinated by how whenever you saw the German version of the video, demure English language Nena transformed into this hairy armpitted monster lady.
There was a completely dreadful version of this song re-released by Nena in an “Errinern-Sie Mich!” way just before the invasion of Iraq. Seek it out if you like bad music.
@ Erithian # 21 “certain parts of the UK media made an inordinate amount of fuss about the fact that she had hairy armpits and wasn’t afraid to show them off.”
If all of the women you’d seen in your life had shaved armpits, you could be forgiven for being shocked at the sight of unshaved armpits. Saying she “wasn’t afraid” implies she was being deliberately defiant – she wasn’t. She just didn’t know better as it wasn’t the norm in Germany for all women to shave their armpits. It was just a simple case of cultural ignorance. It is the norm in Germany now.
“like there’s one ideal image you have to conform to.”
There are always boundaries, that’s as true now as it was then. It’s easy to say there shouldn’t be, but unless people en-masse go against the norms then nothing changes. Men still can’t wear kilts without sniggers, and they still can’t wear makeup without mockery. Everyone is expected to conform.
@ Rosie # 29 “Armpits, assuming that they are otherwise clean – and you do wash them, don’t you guys? – are the source of the body’s natural sexy scent.”
BO is the term you’re looking for, and it’s only sexy if you already find the person attractive. If you don’t and you smell their armpits it’s a downer, that’s why people use deodorant.
“Only the marketing arm of Big Business could think of removing that and replacing it with synthetic chemicals.”
Not really. The use of scents to cover the body’s natural smells goes back to the dawn of humanity. Big-Business just commodified it.
“Do you boys shave your armpits? No? Well why should us women! ;)”
Because you’ve been doing it for years. The fact that men expect it now really isn’t their fault. For what it’s worth some men don’t care. Most men don’t have moustaches anymore because women don’t like them, if you aren’t used to seeing them they can make men look ‘creepy’. Back in 1900 most women didn’t shave their armpits and most men had moustaches, but things change. Maybe 100 years from now nobody will cut off their body hair at all?
As for the song: Peppy, nicely catchy Euro synth pop sung by an attractive lady. Why not? It’s not amazing but it certainly has enough of a tune to stand up as a # 1 – ably reflected in its worldwide chart success.
I would really like to hear a remix/cover/whatever of this with the first hook – the lumbering one with the handclaps under it – removed, so it’s just the rushing one that sounds like it’s played on the steel drums. Faster, dammit, faster!
My first single – I was 12 at the time, just liked it as a catchy pop tune and thought Nena was a nice young lady. And the ‘you and I in a little toy shop’ at the beginning moved me – here she was singing about her and me being friends.
With repeated listening I came to appreciate the war message, and always found the ending, in which she thinks of the friend she sings the song to as she lets the balloon go (how did she lose him – did he die in the war or has the aftermath just left them separated?) incredibly poignant.