Moving.

Next week we bid farewell to our beautiful flat in Tamboerskloof. I can scarcely believe it, but we've been living there for over 9 years. In that time a lot has changed.

In February 2001, when we moved in, it was part retirement home, part insane asylum.

In our stairwell was Tannie Elise. Who bore an almost uncanny resemblance to Betty White from the Golden Girls.

Here's Tannie Elise posing with Mr T.

She was prone to bouts of grumpiness. But they paled in comparison to the furious anger that erupted from her next door neighbour. A tiny woman who looked a bit like a badly shaved Ewok. Her name was Mickey, but she called herself 'The Bergie Queen'. Never really figured out why.

For such a small person, she could really push out the decibels. Like a monotone air raid siren, her rage would fill our back stairwell, sending shivers down our spines. Swearwords that would make sailors blush. And it didn't take a lot to set her off. A trickle of water past her back door and it was "Ooooh! Blerry hell! Fok!" Followed by the sound of 5 flats nervously locking their doors.

And madness roamed the halls.

Belinda, the caretaker of the block, was a schizophrenic with piercing blue eyes, who wasn't keen on her medication. "They're watching me, Aaron. The cameras are watching me." She would say, shifting her gaze nervously towards the empty ceiling.

They've all passed on to the great sectional title in the sky. (May they rest in peace.) To be replaced by young professionals, student hipsters and the occasional pop star.

But beyond the people who live within its walls, the building that has been such a large part of our lives for so long, has a character all of its own.

It's more than the considered Art Deco lines, the Oregan pine floors, or the beautiful mountain views. Our block has soul. And we'll miss being a part of it.