baby wayne

thank you to all those concerned friends of otis who continue to vote in reality grandmother. a couple of additional suggestions have been put forward by interested voters who have felt disenfranchised by the reality grandmother voting system. these suggestions have been ma liz and nonna. feel free to indicate your support for these options.

in the meantime, and while you consider your vote, otis would like to make his on-line movie debut. the release of episode 1 - a jolly jumper is perhaps more keenly anticipated then the imminent harry potter IV film or any of star wars episodes 1-3. without further ado, babywayne films present .... otis - jumping on a screen in front of you.

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as some of you may be aware otis' paternal grandmother is the only grandparent who has yet to decide upon a title. whilst this indecision may have been the cause of some initial entertainment, now that otis is five months old something must be done ...

so, we are proud to introduce "reality grandmother" where you get to vote on exactly what otis' grandmother should be called:

while the votes are being cast and counted there is time to fill you in on otis' visit to reality grandmother's sixtieth birthday. it was a lavish affair and otis seemed to be almost as popular as the birthday girl herself.

after arriving otis took a turn around the ivanhoe yard of his great-aunt robin (sister of reality grandmother) with reality grandmother, who seemed keen to be seen with her first grandchild.

for once, otis turned his back on the camera, perhaps to better show off his recently acquired vanuatu island shirt. otis was soon snatched away by eager friends/relatives/unidentified guests and we saw him again some time later in the afternoon.

after a delicious luncheon buffet grandpa charles (chucky) gave a short speech. reality grandmother gave a slightly longer speech that was free of heckling and received a large round of applause. later, the couple posed for the cameras.

one of the guests was kind enough to bake a cake that was not only delicious, but enabled everyone to remember whose birthday it was and how old she was.

in order to eat cake and escape the heat of the sun, otis retired gracefully indoors to lie on the floor, read some books and play with some toys. whilst doing this otis made a charming new friend called noah who gave otis his very first anatomy lesson.

otis' aunty ili came down from sydney for the big occassion and on the way home from the airport we stopped at our local favourite - a minor place - for food and coffee. some may be surprised by the similarities in hair shape and size. the closer observer may note ili's absence of friz and now, thanks to the anti-friz regime prescribed by a new york curly hair specialist, i am on my own friz reduction programme.

don't forget - your vote counts. see how wonderful democracy can be.

at long last some record of otis' trip to vanuatu. of course, without this many would doubt that otis had ever left the country.

a few facts about vanuatu

it would appear that two of the main results of european colonisation of vanuatu have been the introduction of christianity and the establishment of vanuatu's status an an international tax haven.

the first of these became apparent to us over sunday breakfast on our first morning when diners at the 'resort' were sung to by a choir for around an hour. the joyful singing of the choir did not seem to match up with the apparent every day experience of those living in port vila.

Our brief excursion into the town revealed miserable poverty, and terrible living conditions. as the 'air vanuatu' in-flight magazine advised us vanuatu is one of the world's 40 tax havens - there is no tax other than a 12.5% consumption tax. the main benefactors of this regime are clearly the seemingly shonky proprietors of large numbers of french and australian businesses. some of these businesses appear to be aimed at the french and australian tourists and others appear to be simply money laundering operations.

still, while the ni-vanuatu live in shanty-towns the corpulent ex-pat business operators live in enclaves with each house having lagoon frontage and pedigree dogs.

you can't go anywhere is vanuatu without the music. sure, it seems pleasant enough at first - a kind of happy midnight welcome to distract you from the heat but after hours of this every night you start to go a bit crazy.

otis is a nice baby. we had a seemingly recurrent conversation with a large number of ni-vanuautu, mainly women, that would start out with the phrase "nice baby, nice baby," would include questions about his sex, age and name and would end with the reiteration that otis was a "nice baby, nice baby." occasionally, resort staff would come and grab him and take him away for a cuddle.

we stayed in a large resort set on a lagoon outside of port vila. the weather was beautiful - it was mainly hot and sunny with occasional bouts of humidity and the odd drop of rain. in the end this really contributed to us not doing particularly much at all. We pretty much established a daily routine that involved alternating between eating and sitting by the pool and swimming. every evening we would go for a walk before otis' bed time. towards the end of the week we branched out in to some mild actvity that included a couple of hits of tennis.

otis appeared to be having the time of his life. apart from the newly discovered joy of swimming - fortunately we were spared the embarrassment of any accidents in the pool - the week in vanutu was marked by much smiling and laughing and the introduction of a whole range of new squeals, squawks and other entertaining sounds.

some exciting pictures of activities are featured below:

otis goes for his first swim - he seems to enjoy based upon the amount of splashing and laughing. it is unclear whether he distinguishes swimming from a really large bath without the armpit scrubbing.

otis enjoys some relaxing towel time after his swim.

some time with mum in the hammock. getting three of us in and out of the hammock without injury or incident was one of the week's greatest achievements.

a view of the beach with dad. we were searching for meaning through muteness and secrecy but couldn't work out what that meant. confused? ask uncle tom.

back in the pool again and becalmed by a moment of zen realisation brought about by splashing oneself in the face.

enjoying a final cuddle with mummy by the pool - is otis' head actually bigger than kimberley's?

despite out best attempts to book a bassinet for otis on the flights to and from vanuatu we were foiled by the boeing 737-600 which has no space for a bassinet. on the way there this problem was solved by lifting up the arm rests and laying otis across the seat to sleep. on the return flight we were upgraded to business class and although the seats were bigger and you couldn't kick the seat in front if you tried the arm rests were fixed - otis had no choice but to be cuddled for the whole three and a half hour flight.

overall the holiday experience was very relaxing - if a little wierd - but next time we hope that the adventures of otis will be more adventurous.

Otis recently enjoyed a short stop-over in Sydney en route to Port Vila, where he met several of his relatives and enjoyed a number of lunch dates.

Otis was thrilled to visit his Great Grandma Laurence, where he enjoyed a delicious lunch and rhubarb pudding.

Next, Otis enjoyed a walk in the park and a coffee and cake with his Aunty Alexandra, Aunty Melanie and second cousin Jackson.

On Thursday Otis went to Chinatown to meet his Great Grandma Lee, who took him to yum cha. Despite eating one too many pork buns, he managed to squeeze in one custard tart.

Whilst in Sydney Otis enjoyed the generous hospitality and fine harbour views at Grandpop Ross and Grandma Christine's house.

Towards to end of his visit, Otis was excited to meet his mothers old school friend Aunty Vivien, who is expecting an Otis of her own shortly. He hopes everything is going well, and can't wait to meet his newest friend.

Before jetting off to Port Vila, Otis also met with Aunty Ili and Great Aunty Kathie for a leisurely lunch in the botanical gardens.

Otis also took the opportunity to engage in a spot of shopping in the big city. This resulted in a number of new outfits and a very first pair of sunglasses. Although they looked very fetching Otis was more interested in taking the sunglasses off than keeping them on.

Stay tuned for part two of Otis on Tour - Vanuatu,
love Kimberley xx