Homing is believed to be the inherent ability of an animal to navigate towards an original location through unfamiliar areas. Pic/Thinkstock

My father's mother died on this day 27 years ago. I mean to say yesterday. She was also my godmother. I even got my name from her, hers was Rosie. I have seen photographs of her at my baptism in Kuwait. I was barely five years old at the time. All that I remember of her funeral are vignettes: my sister and I crawling over my weeping mot­her, trying desperately to comfort her, uncertain why the sight of my grandmother sleeping in a casket in the middle of a little apartment in Dadar, opposite the Portuguese church, could cause so much grief. I have a distinct memory of being given a wreath to put over what I realize now was her grave.