It's the Small Things | A Warm Gesture in an Unknown City

12 Viale Ombrone, Rome, was a small apartment situated in the Centro Historica part of the city. The area where we lived was planned by the famous 17th century architect Coppeda. The piazzas had grand buildings, all sculpted and narrowed in front, facing inwards and creating a wonderful symmetry in stone, towards the piazza. Quaint fountains with sculpted frogs blowing water from their mouths created a magical atmosphere. 

Our apartment had beautiful Roman rust-coloured tiles designed with bordered flowers on the floor. A piano, a big jade vase and a wall of glass shelves that contained glasswares for  wine, water, champagne and more. It belonged to an old couple who had passed away. The son let it out to the Indian Embassy without removing much from the house. My husband's predecessor had taken this small apartment for a short spell. 

It was the end of December when we first landed in Rome. We spent three months here, familiarising ourselves with the Roman way of life. Initially I wore silk sarees with shawls and coats but slowly, realising that maintaining the sarees for everyday wear was difficult, I turned to wearing trousers. Although, most Italians found the saree to be bella! 

Illustration: Pariplab Chakraborty

I also joined a class run by the municipality to familiarise myself with common, everyday Italian words.

In a few weeks, we realised we had to find a larger house as we had to entertain foreign diplomats regularly. Our new home was in the newer part of Rome, known as EUR, built by Mussolini, where he tried to replicate some of the iconic Roman buildings. There was a replica of the majestic Colosseum, the Roman Forum etc., except these structures wafted a Mussolini streak of hard white stone without the grace of the splendid Romanesque grandeur.

This house was built on multiple levels, with some rooms set beneath a sloping tiled roof, making their ceilings so low that one had to stoop to enter. There were eight small rooms like this, studded with glass windows.

It also had four large rooms with glass windows overlooking the architecture outside. Each room had a different view – while one faced the busy Christoforo Colombo Road, the sitting room looked into the garden which had umbrella pine trees and lemon trees, another into Alessandro's garden full with Acacia and pine trees that attracted the starlings in the evening, and another into the swimming pool of our neighbour where two Cocker Spaniel dogs seemed to love to sunbathe in the winters. 

While I wondered how I was going to manoeuvre this shift, Bruna Mirri, the landlady of 95A Viale Algeria arrived to help me out. This was her house.

“You look rather crestfallen,” she had told me. Our luggage had just arrived from India, it lay in the veranda downstairs. She helped me unpack a few artifacts and some kitchen utensils. Her house had beautiful furniture and paintings but she found a place to hang our prized Chinese scroll and unpacked my pressure cooker. 

“Now, with some familiar things around, you will feel good. Luciano and I built this house with much thought and have spent wonderful days here. I want anyone who takes this house to be happy,” she said. 

She spoke English, which was also comforting. We struck a strong bond of friendship. She would unpack stuff out of cardboard cartons, take the flattened cartons into her small Fiat chinque cento car, drive to the garbage bin, unload the stuff and be back in 5 minutes to unpack some more cartons for me. I couldn't believe a lady I hardly knew was helping me unpack my luggage shipped 3 months ago from India. When my husband came home, he heard the pressure cooker whistle and saw a smile on my face.

Bruna and I became close friends. Every time she visited Rome from Kuala Lumpur, she would take me to a non-touristy site, like a cemetery of the old nobles, where graves had sculpted cherubs, dotted with pomegranate trees, signifying eternity; or an old student cafe where students gathered to fight Mussolini's fascism; or a gelato place where it was still made in the old style. Twenty five years since we left Rome, we still correspond and share interesting travel experiences.

Lata Govind was a teacher and an educational consultant at an NGO called Mahila Samakhya in Lucknow. In her 70s now, she spends her sunset years between Madras and Bangalore.

We’ve grown up hearing that “it’s the small things” that matter. That’s true, of course, but it’s also not – there are Big Things that we know matter, and that we shouldn’t take our eyes, minds or hearts off of. As journalists, we spend most of our time looking at those Big Things, trying to understand them, break them down, and bring them to you.

And now we’re looking to you to also think about the small things – the joy that comes from a strangers’ kindness, incidents that leave you feeling warm, an unexpected conversation that made you happy, finding spaces of solidarity. Write to us about your small things at thewiresmallthings@gmail.com in 800 words or less, and we will publish selected submissions. We look forward to reading about your experiences, because even small things can bring big joys.

Read the series here.

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