Photo by PINGGOT ZULUETA

A young Italian flight attendant was living the fast-paced life—traveling from continent to continent and meeting different kinds of people. She was having the time of her life and everything was an exciting adventure for her. But her world changed when she came to the Philippines in 1970, set her eyes on a handsome, dark-haired Filipino, and fell in love.

Their meeting was a product of chance. Being a lover of the arts, Silvana Ancellotti couldn’t help but agree when a certain artist named Mr. Lopez (the couple has forgotten his first name), who saw her at the Hilton Hotel (now Manila Pavilion), asked her to be a muse for one of his paintings. “He said he liked my eyes, expression, and features very much and asked if I was interested to have a portrait by him,” relates Silvana.

“The day of my appointment, Mr. Lopez picked me up at 2 p.m. and we went to his studio in Padre Faura near Assumption. And I didn’t know, the studio was actually the apartment of Ramon Diaz, and the first time I met him was in his apartment.”

Being an impulsive, feisty, and adventurous 21-year-old, Silvana did not hesitate when the 26-year-old Ramon asked her out on a date to go dancing. “I’ve always liked good-looking men, and Ramon was very, very good-looking,” Silvana says with a smile. But more than the fated physical attraction the two felt for each other, Ramon and Silvana also shared a common passion for the arts, languages, and traveling. And their commonalities were the things that ultimately brought them together. Silvana also reveals that Mr. Lopez also wooed her but their chemistry just wasn’t clicking.

“I have traveled a lot and I spoke several languages so I was sort of looking for somebody who’s also gone around a lot,” explains Ramon. He also loved the fact that Silvana was living a “freer” lifestyle, as compared to most Filipino women he knew. “I could invite her to go out of town, but there was one time she also brought a chaperone,” recalls Ramon.

“You see, we were instructed not to go out with a Filipino whom we didn’t know very well,” shares Silvana. “But I was young and restless so I told one of my stewardess-friends to come with me. I said, ‘This guy comes from a good family and let’s go and see the volcano in the middle of a lake.’”

Her friend agreed and the three of them went to Tagaytay. Out of precaution, though, Silvana and her friend brought balisongs with them. “If anything happens, we stab him!” she laughingly says.

But Ramon remained a perfect gentleman all throughout their trip. “Ramon was chivalrous, and he was such a funny guy. He was full of good humor and bola!” Silvana admits. After Tagaytay, the couple also went to Baguio, Caliraya, and several more scenic places in the country.

As Silvana was shuttling to and fro, they only physically saw each other for a month and 20 days. But all in all, they were corresponding and dating for almost six months. But Silvana’s blissful stays in the country were suddenly threatened when she was promoted. “It meant that I would not be able to come back to the Philippines for a long time. I would’ve gone to Africa and Europe more…and it was impossible to come back here,” Silvana remembers.

As an alternative, she then asked Ramon to live in with her in Italy, but Ramon vehemently refused. “He was very conservative and he didn’t like it. It wasn’t setting a good example for his sisters. He also didn’t want me to be the breadwinner,” she says.

Silvana then suggested she take a six-month leave and move in with Ramon in the Philippines, but again he declined. “So I told him we have nothing else to do but to get married. It was that sentence thrown in the air. He said okay, but I meant it as a joke. He took it seriously. So when I came back, he had an engagement ring,” narrates Silvana.

When she explained that the marriage talk was simply a joke, a conversation just thrown in the air, a hurt and incredulous Ramon asked, “You were joking? You mean that our relationship is a joke for you?” Not being one who could resist his charms, Silvana reconsidered her anti-marriage stand and finally agreed to marry Ramon.

They got married on March 20, 1971 at a small church atop a mountain in Italy. It was the first day of spring and flowers were starting to bloom. It was the perfect day to get married. Only a few guests surrounded the couple when they took their vows, for Silvana wanted it to be intimate and to not be this big blur that grand and large weddings usually are. “I wanted something that I will treasure and remember very well. So I just invited my closest friend in the university and my closest relatives,” she points out.

Breaking tradition, Silvana opted to wear a loose and quixotic floral dress and adorned her locks with a circle of flowers that had two tails that fell on her shoulders. It was Ramon who donned white. The wedding was inspired by renowned Italian Renaissance artist Sandro Botticelli’s Primavera tempera painting, an opus that announced the arrival of spring with Venus, Flora, Mercury, the nymph Chloris, Zephyr, and the Three Graces in it. In her wedding ensemble, Silvana looked a lot like Flora—the goddess of spring.

For their honeymoon, the couple rented a car, went to Venice, and stayed there for a week. There, they rented a speedboat and went all around the city’s famous canals. After, Silvana decided to tour her husband to the east of Italy, where small renaissance villages are a sight to behold. “We stopped every time we find a beautiful place,” Silvana muses. Their honeymoon lasted for almost three months. “It was very fun! That’s how we really are. We enjoy seeing nature and reveling in the simple joys that travel brings about. We are always after the enchantment of learning things,” Silvana stresses.

Although Ramon studied printmaking, graphics, photography, and painting in Europe for five years and had been accustomed to the European way of life, the Filipino in him still proved to be dominant. Being the outsider, Silvana couldn’t help but to be shocked at some Filipino traditions, as in the wives touching the food of their husbands and the wives waking up even in the middle of the night just to prepare their husbands a decent meal.

“We have very different cultures. We didn’t know each other’s traditions that well. So there are two cultures at play in our relationship. But I learned slowly,” Silvana says. “And she’s still adjusting,” Ramon retorts.

And even if they fight quite often, as Silvana is naturally impulsive and reactionary, Ramon doesn’t mind. After all, Silvana saved his life. “Two years ago, I had a heart attack in the beach. And I died for a while. What she did was she gave me a heart massage by pumping my chest after seeing me seconds after. My eyes were inverted already and my face was swollen,” Ramon recalls.

“I slapped him first to wake him up. I slapped him for all the things he did to me before!” Silvana teases.  “Lots of women who see their husbands having a heart attack will do nothing. But she saved my life. It took 11 hours before I was brought to Manila. I was in the ICU for one month and a half,” Ramon emphasizes.

“And so I owe Silvana my life and I am paying it with great interest,” he funnily ends.

On first impressions

He said: When I arrived here from Europe, all the women who were available were 18 years old and below. All of my friends were married and all the nice girls I know were also married. I traveled a lot and I spoke several languages and I was sort of looking for somebody who’s also gone around a lot. When I first saw Silvana, I said to myself, “How do I get to sleep with her?”

She said:  At 21, I had been open to everything. I was thirsty for everything. I loved traveling. I never lived in the Philippines and I was more interested in China and in Thailand. But when I met Ramon, I found him very attractive. He had this fantastic jet-black hair, he was very good-looking and charming…he spoke my same language by way of interests. He was chivalrous. Full of bola-bola!

On parenting

He said:  I let our children think for themselves. We are a family who never cares what other people will think or say. I always tell my children, “You must know for yourself what is right.”

She said:  We’re very hands-on. My children are focused on school. We stressed the point that they have to go to a Filipino school where they will be very Filipinos. I wanted them to learn the language and to be very much proud of who they are, of their own heritage. Their focus has always been in education, sports, and giving back. They are socially inclined. It doesn’t mean that they live in a better house and that they have better education that they are better than other people, that they are superior to them. Actually no, they have to give back to society. And we never gave them too much money. When they wanted something, we see to it that they have to work for it.

On each other

He said:  I love her orderliness, but I hope it doesn’t cross my path very often. There are some things I leave lying around and I want those things to stay there. But she arranges things and I couldn’t find them anymore. She uses her time for organizing many things. She wants to solve many unsolvable things. Like when she goes out the street, she sees trash everywhere and she wants to clean it up. She starts thinking about it but then I tell her she cannot solve it.

She said:  Ramon is a good father. He’s also very generous and he has never been stingy. He never knows how to say no. He seldom gets upset, but when he does get upset, you have to run! He is super polite and very respectful. He’s never violent and there’s never a bad word thrown by him—no swearing.