Issue 27: Promises

APRIL 1, 2025

You give your word, sign on the dotted line, shake hands. But how much weight does a promise carry? This month, we look at promises made and unmade, the distance between reality and what might be.

As the United States slashes its commitments to foreign aid, Mara Kardas-Nelson writes about the decades-long boom and bust cycle of health and development funding in Sierra Leone, where the aftermath of the 2014 Ebola outbreak taught local doctors, aid workers and government officials to mistrust the sincerity of others’ pledges to help.

From Greenland, photojournalist Juliette Pavy documents the reaction to Donald Trump’s aggressive campaign to stake a claim on the territory. From Myanmar comes the story of a student turned insurgent who joined a militant guerilla group set on overthrowing the country’s military junta. And from a fishing boat in the Mediterranean, we take a look at the tuna industry in Malta, where fish are harvested not for locals but for luxurious sushi restaurants in Japan.

Two new pieces of fiction explore the pain of unrealized promises. In “Salt Air” by Karim Kattan, translated by Jeffrey Zuckerman, two Palestinian colleagues turned lovers spend a weekend at a seaside hotel in Gaza before the war, safe but alienated among expats from the destruction outside. An intellectual is released from jail in Cairo into a changed city and struggles to understand the contours of his new freedom in “Sleep Phase” by Mohamed Kheir, translated by Robin Moger.

We’re also delighted to bring you three poems from the Palestinian playwright Dalia Taha, who writes: “If you want to look at the sun / you will need to scan the mountains and the faces: / the world’s hardest things.”

— The Editors