In 2010, I was appointed to manage a Rom camp in a wealthy northern Italian city — the kind of city whose GDP matches that of a small EU nation. Its ring road was the kind you get when a fellow citizen becomes a minister: no emergency lane, potholes, battered guardrails. In the coils of an access ramp sat the old camp, a piece of land that made developers and volunteers salivate — the first to build on it, the second to feel, and perhaps be, good people.

The Roma had to be moved. A consortium of the Municipality, the Curia, and the Red Cross found the new site and the man to run it: an unknown who had directed a large migrant centre in Paris, on Rue Tillier.

I had returned to Italy and knocked on the municipality's doors looking for work. There was, as it happened, a hot potato — the kind nobody wants because it ruins careers: the Rom camp. I accepted. Partly for the challenge, partly to skip the queue — using risk to reach the upper floors without the slow grind of an outsider. I did not see that I was a fuse.

A round of introductions. A visit to the police headquarters. I found myself in a squad car with the deputy prefect, driving that ring road. The concrete barriers slid past like an eighties music video. It was raining in patches. We reached the camp.

My nomadic baptism. They, poor devils, had to listen to a little speech full of winged images and good sentiments — the kind that surely pleased the Curia delegate present, but might have been better suited to a middle-school essay. I felt as though I were onstage in some provincial Khovanshchina, though Mussorgsky had nothing to do with it, and I had real people in front of me. I would get to know them. It would become deeply interesting.

A few days later the camp was moved to an industrial zone: 130 caravans, mine the largest — whether as a mark of power or capital, I never knew. It served as my office. Suit and tie, always. I dislike the "dress like a pauper so they know I'm on their side" look that social workers often affect. And since I had to meet the authorities almost daily — for them, yes, you do need a costume if you want to be believed — I told myself: if I must for the one, I must for the other. The Roma understood. Paradoxically, the disguise was for the authorities; the dignity was for the Roma. One outfit, two meanings.

The Curia gave me staff: retired teachers, Caritas volunteers. A different parish from the previous team, who came from the world of political activism. We tackled basic needs. We built.

Two clans. One from Craiova, the other — smaller — from Pitești. There were family heads. There were needs. First among them: the residence permit, which was mandatory at the time. I made a pact: you help me carry out a census, and I'll help you get your permits, since I have direct access to the police headquarters. They accepted. Balancing interests is something the Roma understand easily — unlike many of my interlocutors of the time, as would become clear.

The pact: I made a book with a photo and the personal details of every adult, then delivered the census to the municipality and the police. If they stopped you, they'd know you were here and leave you alone. I had informal consent from the authorities, and it worked.

A few months passed. The census advanced. But one inhabitant — whom I had seen in a violent argument with other family heads — kept slipping away. He was the last one left. Finally he gave in, came to my caravan, let himself be photographed — but pulled a face, the kind teenagers make to feel original. I wondered why he was playing the fool.

A week later I delivered the book to the authorities. The investigative unit called: come immediately. The fool was wanted for murder. "We'll pick him up discreetly. Don't worry."

Life went on. The work was a balancing act between neighbourhood committees, media pressure, authorities, volunteers. And the Roma knew how to play, if you put yourself in the game. There is an ironic, joyous quality to their way of being — though the mood can shift in an instant.

My camp paid its bills. I don't know if it was the only one in Italy, but it caused a stir. How did I manage it? I went to them to "beg." Every evening, a round of the caravans, collecting a coin from each. The reasoning was simple: give me one coin at a time, instead of getting the final blow all at once. The reversal of roles amused them, and they understood its usefulness: in media terms, a camp that "pays its bills" defuses a great deal of hostility. These rounds were also my way of knowing people, taking the pulse. Sometimes they offered a beer — more than one per round, by the end — and we drank their way, with a little salt on the bottle neck.

Once a month I took all those coins, often greasy or sticky, to the municipal energy company to pay the bills. With a certain roguish spirit, I savoured the scene of the clerks forced to count the coins, the fruit of my begging and the Roma's.

Sometimes, having no alternative, I brought my two children to work. There were many children there. They played together. One day I called them and they didn't answer. I called here, I called there. Suddenly I saw them emerge, along with three other children, from the industrial waste skip. The kind of thing that gets your parental rights revoked — or qualifies as Italian neorealism, depending on how you look at it.

Another day, a squad car brought two minors back to the camp. They had been caught climbing into the clothing donation containers on the street — the kind with a mechanism that can trap you inside. The kids got out of the car. The officers handed them over to me. The suit and tie demanded a serious talk, but I struggled not to laugh. The police officers too, to be honest.

Many Roma had a category C driving licence. I persuaded the local haulage federation to come and run an assessment test — well publicised, of course. The aim was to defuse the perception of social danger on two fronts: public narrative, and the Roma's actual behaviour. Promote real work and real integration. Reduce the community's most socially unacceptable actions. And prevent the palpable risk — my imaginary fear? — of vigilante reprisals against them.

Over time I learned that the most "annoying" ones, the most visible — the ones begging at traffic lights — are in fact the poorest, the lowest rung in the camp's hierarchy. The more discreet ones may be involved in criminal activities. When the police, ordinary citizens, and the media go after the Roma at the traffic lights, they are targeting the weakest — the ones who may actually need help. The untouchables are colluding, and who knows what connections they might have, and not only with organised crime: white collars need labourers too.

The great day arrived. The local heads of the haulage federation came with two gleaming lorries. They let the Roma try them out. Four or five handled them well. For now, it was a game where everyone had fun — but something was being built for tomorrow, one step at a time.

With the volunteers, we created a school. Italian law requires mandatory schooling, which in practice means placing children in classes by age group: you're six, you go to first grade; eleven, you go to middle school — regardless of your knowledge of the language or your level of education. The idea, agreed with the education authority, was to train the young Roma at the camp for a few months, preparing them to enter school in September, at the start of the new school year. I could count on a number of retired teachers willing to teach at the camp.

So school began. We set up tables, a dozen chairs, notebooks, pencils, markers. We gathered the children. They sat down. Not a second passed before we saw them all together — with the same synchrony as the Australian coral reef when it spawns — each one running off carrying a chair like a trophy. They looked like sunbeams radiating from the little school in every direction. They certainly had the speed of light.

In the following days, though, the school began to work, thanks to a new pact. At the end of the lessons there was a snack — yoghurts and puddings provided by the municipal dairy. It was deeply moving. Education always is.

But the camp had its shadows. Let's say there was a humanity without frills, with an extreme sense of transience and, at the same time, a capacity for compromise. On my daily rounds to collect bill money, I heard stories of Rom families back home who rented helicopters to throw money onto wedding guests. I'm not saying it isn't true.

During those rounds, there was one caravan where I could never get the agreed payment. In the end I had to raise my voice with the family head — the same one I'd struggled to photograph for the census, whom I later learned was wanted for murder. We argued. A couple of days later, the investigative unit picked him up. Naturally, everyone in the camp thought I'd had him arrested because he'd argued with me.

A few weeks passed. One evening, on my round, I reached the killer's caravan and my blood froze: he was there, and no one had warned me — least of all the police. I was alone in the camp. I made a decision that probably saved me: I walked toward him, looking him straight in the eyes. In the end, he lowered his gaze. Danger averted — if there ever was any danger. Maybe it was just a film in my head, Sergio Leone style.

There was a Rom at the camp who worked for a well-known courier company. He slept in his van so it wouldn't be stolen. He had a wife but no children yet, if I remember right. Since he met the requirements — a stable income, a "real" job — I set about finding him a house. After a few months, the accommodation was found. And his wife's arms were broken. Because "if they got a house, they must be police informants." That was how the camp reasoned. Terrible shadows.

Then one morning I found four extra caravans.

I knew this was the beginning of the end. Losing control of the numbers — who is here, how many — means losing control of the structure. I knew it from directing a centre in Paris built for 300 beds, where 1,300 people actually lived. This drift had to be stopped immediately.

Emergency meeting with the authorities. They understood the risk. Meeting with the family heads at the camp. I obtained their authorisation to remove the excess caravans if the occupants didn't take them away within a couple of days. Meeting with the leader of the party whose volunteers had managed the camp before me. He understood and agreed.

The next morning, a police van, a couple of squad cars, the municipal lorry with its mechanical claw. The Roma lined up at the entrance like the figures in Pellizza da Volpedo's Fourth Estate. Accompanied by the deputy prefect, I approached them. With a gesture, they indicated which caravans to remove. The claw lifted two away. The police couldn't believe their eyes. We parted agreeing on a second appointment to remove the other two.

A couple of weeks later, the same routine. Everything proceeded as before. The party leader agreed again. This time, at the camp, there was only one squad car, plus the lorry. But the wind had changed. No welcoming committee this time. The deputy prefect and I went deeper into the camp. Meanwhile, a local radio station raised the alarm: "Accorrete compagni, il dottor Baudo sta smantellando il campo" — "Comrades, come quickly, Mr. Baudo is dismantling the camp."

The Roma surrounded us, knives drawn. We managed to slip away. Operation aborted.

I went back to the party leader, furious. "How could you! You gave me your word — you knew the purpose was to protect the camp!" His reply, words I will remember all my life:

"Sì, ma avevamo bisogno di creare un caso nazionale."

Yes, but we needed to create a national case.

End of the camp. End of the school for the children. End of the collaboration with the authorities. A few days later, the riot police came through to beat people. The camp lasted a few more weeks, in the hands — it was said — of organised crime. Then it was dismantled.

On the access ramp where the old camp once stood, the three towers of the Provincial Administration now rise.

Written in dialogue with an AI assistant. The life, the memories, and the voice are the author's. Disclosure is the point.