He has started smiling, just not enough yet to really get that on camera, but this little sample may give a good idea
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We also got a new (used) stroller today. The story was quite interesting, it was advertised at our Nasese bread store and when we called, we heard we can check it out at a baby store at downtown boulevard. We had already settled that we would not need the whole combo with car seat. But then these people in the store first tried to sell us new stuff. When we explicitaly asked for ‘the used stroller from Linda’ they warmed up a bit, but only a bit saying ’2 people already looked at it and did not like it’ … well … we kept insisting and got to see the stroller. Then used the shops phone to call the owner and negotiated the final price. And shortly after we took a first stroll.
And, yes, I cut my hair just a tiny bit more … not much though 
This morning I actually witnessed the breakfast: all kinds of stuff, pancakes, sausages, bacon and eggs made to order…. but I just can’t think of eating anything at this time of day.
We dropped people at the beach again and then left for another tour-de-dump and returned to pick them up and then it was pretty much going back to Lautoka, good time to relax, read a book or just doze off.
Lunch was a nice BBQ feast. Interestingly enough, by schedule, that was supposed to be on shore and the day before .. and the pasta lunch on the day we would return, which kinda makes sense. I was wondering if they simply turned the left over lovo food into BBQ food, but somehow I don’t think so. I think they were just not to sure about the weather. Anyways, teh BBQ lunch was great.
On the way back we took a straight route to Lautoka, which took us away from the Yasawa Islands into more open water and thus the sea was a bit rough. Everybody was busy packing and then we got together for a group picture. Really nice that Blue Lagoon Cruises gave everyone a nice Polo Shirt as a souvenir.
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Right on time we docked at the wharf at 4 PM and we had to schlepp our luggage a bit, since our driver was not allowed to enter the wharf. But he was there, right on time, the drive was smooth, we had to stop once to change Julius’ diapers and he got a bit antsy in the last hour .. but right on time, at 7:30 PM, we were back in Suva.
As a bit of a summary: Great trip, great value for the money you pay as a local We also got lucky with the weather. Outstanding was the crew and their behavior. There was no attitude issue ever … everyone was willing to help (e.g. first lunch, Koro, the chef, after having done his duties, offered to hold Julius while we eat). The other thing I will keep in mind is the lovo … best ever … and its all in the detail. The 3 days/2nights cruise is plenty … i am not sure what I would do on a 7D/6N tour … read more books? I actually finished a book which i had started the weekend before on Toberua (from their “leave one, take one” library). Interestingly enough it was translated in German, and i had not read a novel in German for a long time, but it worked pretty well.
One last thing: I think we got very lucky with the group that we were. All very nice people, all very understanding about having a very young (loud) one on board, we got to talk to most of them, everybody was interested in Julius instant ice-breaker.
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The night went pretty ok, even in the fairly small bed, which the 3 of us shared. Julius woke up at 4 and at 6, but overall we got a lot of sleep and it seems he loves the slight rocking motion of the boat. Once we got up, Ritsu went for breakfast and then we got ready to go ashore. The boat has now moved further north to Nanuya Lai Lai Island, where Blue Lagoon Cruises owns part of the beach.
Very nice indeed, lots of activities offered: kayaking, spyboards, snorkeling, fish feeding. Of course sun bathing and just enjoying the water. We just walked around, trying to keep the little one out of the sun.
I dipped a bit in the water but found it too cold. Morning tea was pretty boring. So we got back to the boat and gave Julius a sponge bath.
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Lunch: Pasta feast (buffet), gladly lots of other stuff too: yummy fresh fish, 2 chicken dishes. Towards the end, whole crew came and did a surprise ‘Happy Birthday” for Ritsu and she got a cake! Yeah! Very cool.
Afternoon, more beach stuff, we were just lazy reading and relaxing. AT 4PM I went back to the beach to watch the volleyball game (Passengers Vs Crew, though I could only spot 3 crew members)
after 15 minutes I got bored and wanted to return to wife and kid, but noticed that the ship was gone!!! As I found out, they sailed out a bit to empty their waste tanks. So I sat their waiting for it to come back. Finally around 5:30 PM i could return, Ritsu was already a bit worried, but we both laughed about it. And then everyone got ready for dinner.
Just before they started bringing people over to shore for dinner, a big group started playing and singing songs in the dining room.
Then around 7:30 PM they started shipping people over to the island and we were getting ready for our Lovo feast (Lovo being large quantities of pork, chicken, fish, beef, lamb and then all kinds of root crops being baked in an underground earth oven).
I have had quite a couple of Lovos in Fiji, but this one was by far the best and I think because it was the most authentic. While in other cases the meats were just wrapped in tinfoil, and then covered with palm leaves, to get a bit of that flavor, here they actually spent the afternoon to weave those palm leave baskets and put all the meats in there and cook them in it. What a difference! Super smokey special flavor! Other great things, once it was all ready to eat: Kokoda (of course), Palusami (very good), salad stuff, fruits and veggies .. and desert later.
Julius behaved extremely well, he was sound asleep for most of the time, maybe the outdoors, maybe the Kava …
What sounded like a dorky idea for later was the ‘international contest’ … every country represented had to do something about their country … so .. we got a loud song about kangaroos, wallabies and platypuses from the Australians, a semi offensive soccer song from the British, a wonderful retention of a Maori song by the 12 year old Peter from NZ (singing all alone, just his parents in tow, helping with a line or two), a bavarian story by one of the German guys and then all the Fijians and Fiji locals teamed up to sing the national anthem and started another round of dancing and i just joined with Julius.
That kinda closed the evening for us, we took the first boat back to the ship and went pretty much straight to bed.
We saw this great ad in the papers, local special for a Blue Lagoon Cruise, and it coincided with Ritsu’s Birthday. We had initially planned to go to Toberua to celebrate, but they were already booked out for that weekend. So, since they offered a free upgrade for the first 5 callers, we called right away.
This would be our itinerary and this our vessel
Saturday morning I woke up at 2 AM, got out of bed at 3 AM and at 4:30 AM we were picked up by our trusty driver Bobby. Several reasons why I decided to hire him instead of driving … first of all, the drive is very strenous and long and with a baby on board (and limited space in our car) it was just better not have to drive myself. As we found out later, we would have had trouble parking our car safely. The savings of taxi money over own fuel are not that great. Around 8:30 we arrived in Lautoka (basically the other end of Fiji)
The check-in felt very professional albeit a bit over the top. We stayed in the pre-boarding lounge, with bar, snack stand and boutique and pre-briefing, I thought we may be at an airport. At 9:30 we hopped on our shuttle to the marina and then we were welcomed by the captain and boarded our home for the next 3 days / 2 nights.
The cabin, while small of course, was very nice, clean, they put up a nice baby bed for us (very similar to the one we have at home). We had a briefing / morning tea on board about the tour with introduction by the crew, and each passenger group got to introduce themselves. I think i did that with Julius firmly secured to my chest. We had a safety drill at 11, boat was only half full (32 passengers) which felt very nice.
Lunch was buffet style: fried fish, curry, salad, grilled chicken, risotto, salad, desert and fruit. Very nice, nothing special, fried fish was nearly gone when we came, but otherwise there was lots and lots.
As we cruised on, we arrived at Somosomo Bay on Naviti Island where we had the chance to go ashore for a short swim or snorkel. Later on that afternoon, we were all supposed to go to the village there, but due to the rain, the village came on board. I would say roughly 50 men, women and children came over and did a traditional Kava ceremony for us.
followed by some Meke (Fijian song and dance)
and later they tried to rip off the tourists a bit by selling their shells and handicrafts.
But overall very nice, Ritsu got to dance too.
My favorite part was the Captain’s welcome champagne party. While I was sure this means some cheap sweet sparkling wine and limited to half a glass per person, no, the stuff was actually some nice dry bubbly and I got lots of refills … (i was just too late for the appetizers, spring rolls and samosas).
After that it was time for dinner, another nice surprise, I thought all meals would be buffets, but this one actually had a menu and it was a nice, sit down, 4 course dinner. Starting with a shrimp dish (like kokoda, only with 2 prawns pp), a veggie soup, Ritsu had fish, I had beef ternderloin (which was far away from ‘tender’), desert was Yasawa baked cheesecake with icecream (weird flavor). Julius was very antsy during dinner .. so no much eating for both of us.
Finally, after a very long, fun-filled day (it seemed more like 2 days packed in one)… bed
So here we are on this cruise ship, having lunch and suddenly the master of ceremonies starts a little speech, announcing that a young beautiful lady is celebrating her birthday, and they all start singing and a big cake shows up. Ritsu was obviously very surprised. Here is the video clip
Here we are in our cabin of the MV Yasawa Princess and enjoy some downtime reading and dozing off.
So, here we are on a Blue Lagoon Cruise out in the west, exploring the Yasawa Islands and celebrating Ritsu’s 21st birthday. Having lunch with the baby at my chest took a bit of getting used to, but at least he is sleeping.
The crew surprised us with a big happy birthday song and cake, I have a video clip of that later (as I will write more and post more pictures of the whole trip)
Well, not really, but the way he goes after his favorite food source looks in this picture very much as if he is biting into a juicy hamburger.
Just so you folks get used to a new look on the photos to come. And yes, please, leave your rants and comments.
We will be gone for the weekend, so, updates may occur later
Sleep schedule is a bit wacky right now, plus Ritsu has signs of a cold coming and so I try to let her sleep as much as possible. Julius loves being in the office with me (to look for porn, yeah, right ) while I am still wearing part of the carrier harness (something I do more and more, it is part of my outfit now), in this picture he is just laying on my arm, dozing off. Makes typing a bit tricky though.
We both have this problem of keeping our excitement concealed when we have presents for each other, and just as Ritsu gave me that great Jinbei a few days before my birthday, I could not hold back giving her her present. take a look:
This is a classic indian suit “salwar kameez“, of which you see a lot here (just not worn by cute Japanese chicks). This will be great to wear for Diwali.
Her birthday is coming Sunday … so no early congrats please, it is back luck where I come from.
Turns out that our new housegirl / nanny Vula is really great at cooking … she made some sweet/sour fish (all nicely fried, batch by batch) with lots of veggies … and this is what we will eat in just a bit.
Julius really enjoys his bath and he is very calm afterwards. We found out that coconut oil seems to be the remedy for everything here. His diaper rash is gone and even my dermatologist said I should use it on my scalp.
Vula keeps doing a great job with him and helping me and Ritsu with the household (and her cooking is great, too)
How about a nice panoramic shot of the Suva downtown area, including the new Suva Central building .. while it is still being worked on, they seem to be ready to open the business levels, while the office levels are still being worked on. You can barely make out the Reserve Bank Building behind it.
(click the picture for a much bigger version)
and here is the QTVR file for your panoramic viewing pleasure … please excuse half cars and such.
My mom sent me this picture today, I printed it out and Ritsu asked when I took this picture of Julius.
Well, this photo is 37 years old and this is me! Amazing to compare that to shots of Julius so far. He sure has my looks (then again, don’t all babies look alike?), but I hope he got his mom’s brains. (I also think he got her dimples … but that we still have to see)
You like horror movies?
You enjoy the thrill of rollercoaster rides?
Looking forward to your first bungy or parachute jump?
Think you knew the meaning of sleep depriviation from your wild party days?
Here is a new cool thing to try!
Grab a 10 pound bag of rice or flour or anything about that size and weight. Download this audio file and have your mp3 player play it in loop mode for one hour. During this time you must not take any of your 2 hands off (baby’s head needs support), if you sit down, double the volume, if you get up and wiggle around you may decrease it again. If you lose eye contact with the sack of rice, volume goes up again, so no watching TV.
Try it, it is fun, you can feel the callus growing around your nerves
Level 2: do this at 1 AM, 3 AM, 5AM in a row, then stay up all day as if nothing has changed.
Level 3: add a ringing phone, a boiling pot and a cat demanding food.
Ok, enough sarcasm, I used the chance of recording one minute of Julius crying, so go ahead and give it a try … you can always turn it off (Unlike us)
That was a really tricky operation last week to get a passport photo done, and the result is just as bad as most passport pics in the world. I hope it is usable, it has quite some shadow in it.
On the other hand, Ritsu reports she saw his first full frontal smile. Can’t wait to get that on camera.
Finally he is sleeping!
It seems he has a bit of a stuffed up nose which we treat with saline drops, but his sleeping patterns are a bit erratic. He took a long nap with his mom in the afternoon, but did not want to go to sleep at night. So: leading by example seemed to help.
Well, the vet said it would be good to keep Nietzsche with her for a couple of days to see how he responds to treatment … and it seems he does pretty well … so much for the good news .. the not so good news is that he might have CRF which basically means his kidney’s are not working too well … it basically is fatal (but so is life itself) and it is now very much a question how much longer we treat him (like putting him on the drip every other week) and how much that will prolong his life … slap me, but sure enough there is the question of cost … and the there is the fact that we have a main focus on a baby right now …
I am about to pick him up from the vet and going to pay a 200 FJD bill for his 5 day treatment … We also know that his medical condition makes it pretty much impossible to take him with us wherever we move …
A bit sad, albeit I think we have already given him a chance to experience a home he never had … I am just not sure what to do from here on … I know he would love to just sit on my lap late at night …
update So I picked him up, he was fairly peachy, he started eating a bit .. but then also started being loud because he wanted out … and I also heard some other cat outside like waiting for him … well .. let’s see
Another beautiful morning in Toberua … did I mention that the weather was not that great that time? Very little sunshine, lots of wind but just a little rain, but for the first time in eleven trips so far, all our meals were taken indoors.
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We had to take a picture in front of ‘our’ bure #9 (Wakaya), from the first trip on, we managed to get that one. It is one of the most recently renovated ones. And while there are some more luxurious ones on the other side of the island (less wind, sandy beach) there are also less nicer ones. We were surprised to find that the balcony doors, which had nice wood shutters had been replaced by glass doors. Reason being that with the constant wind on that side of the island the shutters need to be closed most of the time and it is pretty dark. I kinda liked it that way.
For 11AM Ritsu had booked a massage and they had finally finished the new massage bure.
During that time we asked for a nanny, and the lady that came seemed to be more comfortable with little babies … or so it seemed. I went to the bar bure to check out the basket weaving demonstration, which was very interesting, all the great things they can make from palm leaves.
But my fatherly instinct told me to check on Julius and when I came the nanny had just mixed a stored portion of breastmilk with some random scoops of formula powder and cold water and was about to feed that while Julius was laying there crying … I took immediate action, made a new bottle for him, changed him, took him with me and said ‘thank you’ to the nanny. Oh, I asked her if she had any kids herself … nope …
So, this kinda sums up the nanny experience we had on the island … They were just as efficient as baby monitors … in there defense, maybe they are not used to deal with kids THAT young. And the new guest relation guy Hudson was happy enough to waive the nanny fee and apologized.
One meal left: lunch: rosemary/cheese ravioli in a basil/cream sauce. Someone must have brought in a ravioli cutter, this was the very first time we had ravioli in Fiji (canned ravioli is not available) and this weekend we had it twice (obviously handmade).
Followed by a nice garlicy/parmesan sprinkled grilled piece of tuna on salad (other options were a chicken salad or a feta fritatta) and probably for the first time ever I did not select the desert, the self saucing chocolate pudding (but Ritsu had it and I got to try it)
After that we had time for another half round of pool, we had Julius with us in the car seat (having given up on nannies) and he could just not stand see me losing … so we packed and got ready and were on the boat home at 4PM (he must love the vibration, he slept the whole time)
Trip back was fine, car was still where we left it, unharmed this time, traffic was smooth and house was ok too and Misha survived the 48 hours without us (this time we did not get a cat sitter)
We are already looking forward to our next visit.
Before arrival of the scheduled nanny, we took Julius with us to the bar, where he got upset because he thought legal drinking age was 21 days, not 21 years!
We returned to the bure and got him ready for the night and handed him over and went back to the bar, where there was a lot of activity. Full house, quite a number of kids and all very sociable.
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Just when the lali drum sounded and we sat down for dinner, one of the ladies came telling us that Julius is crying again (hey, he is a baby, that’s his job) and so Ritsu went to check on him and I went 5 minutes later to check on Ritsu. There were 3 ladies from the island seemingly not able to deal with him, so Ritsu did a quick change and made a bottle for him and when we returned to the restaurant everybody had lined up already, so we had the end position. But still all of the yummy things were there when we passed by.
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By the way, the elderly gentleman passing the seafood buffet and going straight for the meat is Sir Edmund Hillary (The first man to ever scale Mt. Everest and he also has his face on the NZ 5$ bill). He was there with his whole family and enjoyed the privacy of the island, thus I did not dare to let him hold Julius for a picture … though it would have been nice
As with last time, I mainly enjoyed the seafood appetizers: crab vakamiti, smoked marlin, those yummy garlic prawns, kokoda. Much later I touched some beef, but was already full. Other bbq items were chicken drumsticks and pork and sausages. The desert was fruit in cream rolled into a fluffy pancake with chocolate sauce on top
This time I did not have the energy to hang out with the crowd and just fell asleep with Julius on my chest.
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