Mario Garau was Sardinian and worked in the Credito Italiano Bank. In the mid-1920s he was posted to China to work in the Italian Bank of China, in Tientsin and Shanghai. This was still the period of the International Concessions and of the Unequal Treaties. That banker was the uncle of Francesca Lixi. When she was a little girl, Francesca saw many chests and trunks arriving to her home, belonging to Mario Gaurau and containing many strange objects, 8mm films and photos.