“Just a few days and I will be eleven!” Liz shouted from the balcony of her house. I supposed the data was meant for me to digest.

Her family lives in the same apartment as I do only that my house is on ground floor while they are in the first floor right above my house. Every time we pick a conversation, it is usually devoid of greetings; a habit you only find in the city people. Sometimes I wonder how it would be if I lived in the Kibarani village. I would definitely get a lot of “Shikamoo”; the formal way for children to greet their elders. When it comes to Liz, it always seems like a continuation of a chat regardless of the last time she saw me. Go city Kids!

Liz sounds like a Martian desiring to fly back to the moon for a proper landing on planet earth. Only I seem to understand her in the whole neighborhood, she thinks. She is not a baby anymore. Her entire household think she is in the wrong continent. They think she should have been born in Russia, which I totally agree.

I sensed the excitement in her voice as she declared to the world that she was about to turn eleven years old. That has to wait until April the 19th and to be very particular as I always tease her; it has to be 4.03pm. Not so far I bet, at least not in her sight. Nothing really seems to stand her way.

“Tell me about it!” I shouted. She came prancing down the staircase to join me at my favourite early morning spot; my verandah. Happy New Year indeed, I thought to myself. I knew I wasn’t going to get such words from her even though it was the first day of the New Year. She is the kind of a child I would call weird but adorable. The kind a lady of my age would go round the world to have for a daughter.

She stood right in front of me at first, somehow to show off her best out-of-school outfit; a high cut pair of faded jeans shorts and an overflowing orange club t-shirt reading “Piranha Swimming Club”. When she wasn’t wearing that t-shirt, it had to be a tight pinstriped sleeveless top that made her look like a neatly sharpened artist’s pencil.

“Talk to me girl” I picked, I wanted to hear more of her thoughts.