Small Things that seem Nothing, but ...

... it touches someone's heart very deeply.

"Not all of us can do great things. But we can do small things with great love" said Mother Teresa. That is one of the wise words that I keep as something to live by and very often try to tell or explain to our young children. And recently our 4-year-old daughter and 3-year-old son did something which proves Mother Teresa's sayings to be true once more. 

I can't really remember from which point that the duo grow to become so attached to one of our neighbours that lives alone on the ground floor in the same flat buliding, since he has been moving in for about two years and we hardly talk. Our six flats building is basically empty because only two flats are occupied, ours and his, so it is pretty easy for the little ones to notice his movements.  

Almost every morning they would cling on our main balcony railing to say hello and wave goodbye to the neighbour known to them now as "Onkle (uncle) Ricardo", a young local businessman running a popular restaurant in town, as he leaves in his van to work. They exchange conversations in a mix of English and Spanish. They are quite alert everytime he leaves or comes back home (his flat door is slammed close, his footsteps on the gravels in front of his door, the van's noise etc) they would then drop what they do to run to the main balcony to greet him. If they happen to be playing downstair and the uncle shows up, they would shake hands and converse as much as they could. He too never has problem to halt what he is doing to come to say hello to his little friends. If  he isn't too busy he would personally take care of the smoothies our children want to have at his restaurant and make sure they are being well-handled. Sometimes he does super nice thing like bringing them special cakes or treats which are only available in the capital and he looks on with a smile as the thrilled little ones eat away their sweets.    

One of my favourite things about the friendship of the trio is when and how he looks at our children. Something is just sparkling and his eyes are filled with nothing but love for the two. He would also smile constantly as he silently watches them. I can imagine that for him it feels good to come home after a tough or long day at work, to have a warm welcome that is so pure and real from the children as his girlfriend only comes to visit him every other odd day or at the weekends.     

This has been going on for about two months. One day, our daughter proposed to her little brother an idea to write the uncle greeting cards. Pens, pencils, colour pencils, tons of stickers were all over their working area, they were smoothly decorating the cards. As Ricardo left the flat for his usual afternoon bike ride or gym routine, they were very excited to slide the cards under his door as a surprise. He came back sometime and found the cards. Of course, we couldn't know exactly about his reaction but as he prepared to leave again to his restaurant, kids were waiting on our balcony and he quickly expressed his profound thanks to them. We sat them on our laps and told them it is very kind of them to put a smile on someone's face with their nice gesture and may they continue to be nice and kind to others. They were all happy. I did think the story with the cards was over after his thanks but it wasn't. About a week later that I came to know, to him, the cards with some doodles and shaky writings, mean to him more than just kids' cards. That was when we went to his restaurant and we exchanged our Instagram accounts. I thought it'd be nice to have a way to stay in contact with him so the children can still see him and vice versa, as we are getting ready to leave the DR. 

Amongst his photos uploaded onto Instagram, was a collage of photos of the cards that he posted shortly after he found them. The caption of the photo is precious. He wrote in Spanish which the translation into English would be "Coming home and your neighbours of two years left you a surprise like this under the door ... Priceless (emoticon with hearts as eyes) Thank you for such love Luisa and Johannes DE (refers to them being German). 

I didn't actually expect that a grown man, a well-known body-building enthusiast and very sporty, a committed and serious businessman would be so touched from the simple approach by the children next door and told his friends about it. Later on he announced, by reposting a photo of the kids, with a caption, "My neighboured-nephew and niece". It is kinda nice to have friend and neighbour like him, a person who understands the virtue of even simple small things. The things that can easily go unnoticed.

Kids will miss definitely miss him so much. And we will miss the cute sights of the three of them together.

You see, love can be shown in many forms, sometimes not through big words but through small acts of kindness. It is also good to remember "Never stop doing the little things to others because sometimes those little things occupy the biggest part of their hearts." Let it be a little wave, a short hello, a helping hand or simply the hand-made cards full of drawings and stickers for your neighbour! :-)