Rome

Jorge Pedro Uribe Llamas

Where to find the essence of this beloved double neighborhood (the North and the South)? Historically, in the Romita neighborhood, named so because it resembled, centuries ago, a certain Tivoli in the Italian capital. The first thing here is to visit the rectory of San Francisco Javier, the historical center of the old islet of Aztacalco ("in the house of the herons"), behind the Cuauhtémoc Metro station. In the shade of pleasant trees and evoking the dangers warned by José Emilio Pacheco in Las batallas en el desierto (1981): "They kidnap you, they take out your eyes, they cut off your hands and tongue, they make you beg for charity and the Man of the Sack keeps everything." Of course, Romita has changed a lot since then. Currently, it does not seem likely that chichicuilotes are still being roasted in these streets, or that atole de ciruela is prepared as in the past. However, delicious breakfasts are still enjoyed in the little square on Saturdays and Sundays, that does not change. We feel like talking about the famous Buñuel movie, the avenue that still leads to La Piedad, the outdated farce of the hanged every Tuesday of carnival, the tortilla shop, the urban garden, the mechanical workshops... However, it is time to change location. Thus, we walk along Puebla until we stop at the corner with Flora, the lovely little sister of Pomona, the deities of flowers and fruits. How beautiful the nomenclature of Roma is (whose mother was Romita, and hence its own name). To elaborate on it, we must refer to the spirit with which the neighborhood was divided during the late Porfirio era, in the context of a capital populated by half a million inhabitants. Mexico City expands at full gallop to the astonishment of ecologists. On average, three neighborhoods are created per year, and not a few towns cease to be so almost without realizing it. Federico Gamboa publishes Santa. The zarzuela Chin-Chun-Chan becomes fashionable. And the Orrin Circus delights everyone thanks to Edward Walter Orrin, who is also the manager of the Chapultepec Avenue Land Company, S.A. That is, those who established the neighborhood on December 30, 1902 (Roma Sur was constituted four years later through another subdivision company). That is, those who name their streets and avenues, supposedly based on the cities and states where the circus has performed with sufficient success. Except for Flora and Pomona, of course. For its part, Jalisco becomes Álvaro Obregón around 1928. Oh, what times, dear reader! "In Roma lived the second-class rich, the pseudo-aristocrats: those who, impoverished by the turn of the times, were left only with the dream of continuing to live as in the times of Don Porfirio," wrote Guillermo Tovar de Teresa. Pseudo-aristocrats or not, surely everyone was delighted with the novel urban arrangements: streets with a width of 20 meters, a Parisian-style boulevard of 45, medians with grass and lanterns, good drainage works... And in the heart, a beautiful garden with a circular fountain and iron benches, which we still enjoy immensely, just like Plaza Luis Cabrera. How many illustrious neighbors have lived in Roma! Ramón López Velarde, Leonora Carrington, Fernando del Paso, María Conesa... The Jewish community of Syrian and Sephardic origin (the ashkenazim leaned more towards Hipódromo and Condesa); fortunately, synagogues in good condition survive, and are used. And what to say about the buildings: from the Toreo (its land, it is known, is now occupied by El Palacio de Hierro) to the Balmori, passing through the Museum of the Object of the Object in a beautiful art nouveau mansion, and the Benito Juárez School, by Carlos Obregón Santacilia. The church of the Sagrada Familia. The Insurgentes Condominium. Nevertheless, the essence of the neighborhood is not found exactly in its constructions, but in the people: the vendors of Medellín who in the afternoon move to the cantina across the street, those who come to have dinner or buy organic products or listen to jazz, those who still read the beatniks, cyclists and mannequins, Lupita and Marcos forever, Guillermo Tovar once, the survivors of so much tremor and economic and real estate fluctuation... You and us, and a bunch of trees in their squares.