I was walking in a quiet neighbourhood somewhere in the outskirts of KL, where security guards patrol on bicycles, one late afternoon on a weekday. I was walking very, very slow, and noticed a girl lurking about on the sidewalk across the street. She openly sneaked up to me, with a cup of corn flakes in hand. Sentences in italics are spoken by me.
"I've been spying on you,"
First thing I noticed about her is the lack of shoes.
"I prefer to go barefoot. It feels so free..."
In my mind, I thought, "Yes, and maybe one day you'll start to get into nudism,"
"When I am not barefooted, I usually wear my crocs,"
"Every household seems to have them, I notice,"
"The only thing I don't like when not wearing shoes is when I step into sticky floors that are covered in syrup at school,"
"My name is Nisaa' - double 'a' with an apostrophe,"
"No 'Nurul' or 'Nor' or 'Siti' at the beginning?"
"My full name starts with 'Siti', and sometimes my friends mistakenly call me 'Siti Nurhaliza' because our names sound alike in full,"
"I like peanut butter with jam but sometimes I just scoop the peanut butter from the jar and then eat then my mouth will get sticky,"
"And then, will you brush your teeth?"
"No. There's no toothpaste [in my bathroom],"
We passed by some shop houses where all the grocers and cafés were, and received some odd looks from other people, but both of us know we are cooler than them. I decided to take off my shoes when we reached the pavement at the main road.
"Where is your school?"
"Just next to my house. I am famous for that. My teachers often refer me as the girl who lives right across school,"
"So, that means, if you forget to bring something to school, you can just rush back to your house to get it?"
"No, we're not allowed to leave school while in session,"
"Which school are you going to for your secondary education?"
"Next year we'll be moving to France [pronounced the American way],"
"France? You mean France [pronounced in the British way]?"
"Yup, my dad's company is sending him there. They've got branches all over the world,"
"And what about your mother?"
"She works nearby. Her job is related to construction, and she's always a busy woman,"
We reached Nisaa''s house, which is really just 10 metres away from the school gate. Inside, her siblings, all below the age of ten, are busy playing chess and Risk. This is too ridiculous. I don't even know how to play chess!
Nisaa' brought me to her room which she shares with her younger sister. Here's how she reacted after I gave her some drugs...
No, no drugs were involved. That is just how kids her age act when they are being recorded. She will end her childhood very soon, and will enter teenagehood, and lose all her kiddie wisdom and perhaps, start wearing shoes. No, I don't want that to happen.
I also taught her how to draw the dojob man.
But she really did read to me the entire book [in a localised American accent (the kind you'd hear from an upper-middle class teenager with a quilted Chanel purse look-alike who enjoys a Mocha Frappuccino on weekends at Pavilion)]!
After all that story-telling, we headed to the dining table, where we waited for Nisaa''s father [referred to as 'Dada']. He burst through the door with plastic bags full of groceries from Mercato. "Come, let's eat. Have you taken your shower, all of you?" he asked his little kiddies.
While eating, Dada asked me the question I do not like to answer - "What are you doing now?". After a few sentences, he start to go on about the goodness of imaging software, and commented, "Even Ansel Adams uses Aperture to make his blacks blacker! You should try it one day,"
After a dinner of rice with black pepper beef, omelette and broccoli, Dada summoned me. "Aina, come and take a look at my comics; I've got some titles you might like," as Dada took me to his bookshelves. He handed me about 5 kg of books. Unfortunately, Dada doesn't read Tintin. But he has mad love for Bone. "Read it. I did, and I literally laughed out loud!". Hm, that explains all the comics I saw at Nisaa''s room.
It was close to nine at night, and Dada got busy in the kitchen with his Jamie Oliver cook book [another trait of an upper-middle class household, or should I say, yuppie], caramelising onions for his spring chicken dish.
"Er, sir, I think I should leave now. My bed time is in thirty minutes,"
"Oh, OK. Which books are you borrowing?"
I hope to return them as soon as possible; I'd like to meet Little Nisaa' again.
