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You are here: Home / Open Threads / Look at that face! (Open Thread)

Look at that face! (Open Thread)

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This is not the baby Princess Kate pooped out this morning; it’s five-month-old Sonies Aawal, who survived being buried in rubble for 22 hours after the Nepal earthquake demolished his home last week.

earthquake baby

Yes, he’s a boy, and he wears pink Mickey Mouse PJs. Don’t judge — it’s 2015, fer crissakes!

His parents and big sister survived too. So, some good news among all the bad reports coming out of Nepal.

Open thread!

[Photo via Buzzfeed]

Reader Interactions

89Comments

  1. 1.

    Edmund Dantes

    Or his parents are traditionalists that believe boys should wear pink like it’s right and proper from our ancestors. ;-)

  2. 2.

    mai naem mobile

    who the hell cares what he’s wearing? he is alive his parents are alive his sister is alive. awesome story

  3. 3.

    Amir Khalid

    A century ago, pink was considered a masculine colour in the West. Maybe in Nepal it still is.

  4. 4.

    Tommy

    @mai naem mobile: His eyes. Look close to the above pic and you can see the photographer in Sonies Aawal’s eyes.

    BTW: At about that age my parents were poor grad students. Getting my cloths from flea markets. Pretty sure I’d have liked some “Pink Mickey.”

  5. 5.

    Germy Shoemangler

    Maybe what he’s wearing is what they changed him into after they rescued him, Because what he was wearing before must have been dirty and torn (after being buried in rubble). And it was the first thing available from the charity that is helping rescued children.

    But there’s nothing wrong with pink on a baby boy. Or blue on a baby girl.

    He’s a beautiful guy. He represents HOPE in my eyes.

    Never give up.

  7. 7.

    Betty Cracker

    @Amir Khalid: When my daughter was born (1998), it was really tough to find clothes for her that weren’t pink. So annoying! It’s just not her color!

    Also, one of my neighbors at the time had a baby girl around the same age, and she asked me when I was going to have the baby’s ears pierced. I said never — she could decide that for herself someday.

    The neighbor looked horrified and asked, “But how will people be able to tell she’s a girl?” As if that mattered!

  8. 8.

    WereBear

    This is fantastic news! And yeah, that onesie doesn’t seem to have that dug out of the rubble ambiance. It was what they put him in after a bath.

  9. 9.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    He’s got an adorable face. I rarely say such things about one so wee. And he sure does look like hope with that smile.

  10. 10.

    WereBear

    And since this is a thread about feminism AND an open thread, here’s my latest post that speaks to how women truly live in a different world:

    Human sacrifice in modern times

    From the previous thread:

    @Betty Cracker: @Baud: I wish she had been born first. She might have been able to take over directly from QE2 since the women in that family tend toward immortality.

    I also wish this princess had been born first. But I suspect that it wouldn’t matter. At least it would get the conversation going!

  14. 14.

    Betty Cracker

    @WereBear: I think the Brits already altered the rules of succession so that the firstborn is the heir regardless of gender. IIRC, Prince Charles pushed hard for that, which kind of surprised me.

  15. 15.

    Germy Shoemangler

    Every baby and toddler photo I see of men from the 19th century, they are dressed like little girls, with long hair.

  20. 20.

    Germy Shoemangler

    @Betty Cracker: The both times my wife was expecting, we didn’t know what we were expecting, and so we were gifted with many yellow baby clothes.

  21. 21.

    Big ole hound

    And yet a few days from now the royal girl will be fawned over and this little guy will be a total unknown.

  24. 24.

    Germy Shoemangler

    @Amir Khalid: Yes. That’s how they did it back then (at least the upper classes). Some of them even carry little handbags.

  25. 25.

    Baud

    This is not the baby Princess Kate pooped out this morning;

    Someone flunked high school biology.

  27. 27.

    Baud

    @WereBear: I wonder if that was because no one had designed infant clothes that facilitating diaper changing at that time.

  29. 29.

    Tommy

    @slag: Amen. I don’t have kids. 45. I have a niece who is 6. Story.

    She was three and had like a full X-mas tree in her room. I am sitting with her alone and playing. She is showing me all the stuff on the tree. I ask her which ornament she liked the most. She pulls one off and runs back to my lap. We talk about it and she says:

    It is pink!

    I’d find pink is her favorite color. I keep talk with her.

    She asks me what is my favorite color?

    I say purple (true BTW). She giggles and says, “purple is a girl color.”

    At this point we had one of my first “Cool Uncle” conversationwith her, what will be many more. I told her there isn’t a “boy color” or a “girl color.” There are colors and who knows what each person might like.

    I made the mistake of telling Katie’s mom about this soon after and there was a second, long conversation about we don’t do “boy” and “girl” stuff in this house.

    I might note Katie’s parents, my brother and his wife. Not remotely liberals. A Blue Dog and Tea Party leaning mom (I should note I like her more than my brother) to be honest. The above just Parenting 101.

  31. 31.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @Mustang Bobby: And he has such a big name! I got that from a woman who was considering naming their first son George, and she said her only concern was that “it’s such a big name.” Her husband had no such concerns, so George was George.

    I hope your parents are excited to have reached such a milestone while so young for such an “achievement.”

  32. 32.

    Schlemazel

    @Betty Cracker:
    Back in the 60’s my dad was bitching about long hair on some kids he saw on the street. IHe said he couldn’t tell if they were boys or girls, I replied “If you are not going to screw them what difference does it make?”

    Might have been the hardest he ever hit me.

  35. 35.

    Cacti

    I was reading about tonight’s Mayweather/Pacquiao super fight in Vegas, and Floyd Mayweather, Jr. is set to walk away with a $74 million individual cut after taxes/splitting up of the total purse with his camp.

    If the fight goes the full 12 rounds, that would work out to about $34,259 per second of action.

    Wow.

  36. 36.

    Schlemazel

    Speaking of changing social norms
    I have a photo of my dad’s family from when he was about 4 ~1929. He is in a dress and has shoulder length ring curls. Word was grandma spent hours doing his hair.

  37. 37.

    Baud

    @Tommy:

    Since Roman times. In fact, in the Roman Empire, it was illegal for anyone except Ceaser to wear purple.

    @Cacti:

    I don’t follow boxing, but this fight is getting a lot of buzz.

  38. 38.

    Iowa Old Lady

    @Schlemazel: I think it was Zsa Zsa Gabor who said some old guy was raving about how he couldn’t tell the boys from the girls and she said, “Darling, they can tell the difference which is what matters.”

  40. 40.

    Germy Shoemangler

    @WereBear: In old 1930s movies, if the scene takes place at bedtime, the men (especially the old men) wear nightshirts and long nightcaps. I’m thinking the nightcaps were for extra warmth (before central heating) and the nightshirts for easier and quicker access to the chamber pot under the bed.

  45. 45.

    Cacti

    @Baud:

    Since Roman times. In fact, in the Roman Empire, it was illegal for anyone except Ceaser to wear purple.

    In fact, in antiquity, a true purple dye could only be made by squishing a sufficient quantity of certain Mediterranean sea snails.

    Accordingly, purple colored garments were cost prohibitive to all but the wealthiest individuals and an instant marker of elite status.

  46. 46.

    WereBear

    @Germy Shoemangler: According to Wikipedia, pajamas for men did not come into play until around 1870. And so traditionalists would have scorned them.

    I thought so even before I read this:

    Author Lucy Maud Montgomery, touches upon how pajamas were viewed by the Canadian provincial culture in her 1931 novel, A Tangled Web: “The night before, as he was sitting on his bed, studying if there were any way to wheedle the secret out of Dandy Dark, he had absently put both feet into one pajama leg. Then when he stood up he fell on the floor in what his terrified wife at first thought was a fit. Very few of the clan sympathized with him as to his resulting shoulder. They thought it served him right for wearing new-fangled duds. If he had had a proper nightshirt on it couldn’t have happened.”

  47. 47.

    Baud

    @Cacti:

    Makes sense. I always assumed the reason purple was a symbol of royalty was because the color was expensive to produce.

  48. 48.

    Germy Shoemangler

    @WereBear: Wristwatches were considered too effeminate for men.

    It must have taken a ton of advertising and marketing to change that around.

  49. 49.

    Brachiator

    @WereBear: Queen Elizabeth pushed for and won a concession that makes all daughters equal to sons in the line of succession. So, a first born daughter will be the heir.

    As it is, the new princess will be fourth in line, after Charles, William and baby George. And Harry can continue to be the party prince.

    Also, technically I think that Kate, the Duchess of Cambridge, is not a princess, but her daughter is an HRH and a princess.

    Of course, the Brits could have avoided any confusion had the nobles not gone back on their words and accepted Henry I’d daughter Matilda as queen back in 1135.

  50. 50.

    the Conster

    Note to Hillary:

    “Whenever we contemplate bold progressive action,” Pfeiffer said, “whether that’s the president’s endorsement of marriage equality, or coming out strong on power-plant rules to reduce current pollution, on immigration, on net neutrality, you get a lot of hemming and hawing in advance about what this is going to mean: Is this going to alienate people? Is this going to hurt the president’s approval ratings? What will this mean in red states?” And yet this hesitation has always proved overblown: “There’s never been a time when we’ve taken progressive action and regretted it.”

  51. 51.

    Baud

    @Brachiator:

    Kate can become “Queen” if William is “King,” but the husband of a true “Queen” remains a “Prince.” I wonder if they’ll change that someday.

  53. 53.

    Baud

    @the Conster:

    There’s never been a time when we’ve taken progressive action and regretted it.

    Huh? Is Pfeiffer saying that we’ve never lost an election because the electorate reacted negatively to a progressive action?

  54. 54.

    Tommy

    @Baud: LOL. This thread of how somebody becomes King of England I think is why my Scotish family in like 1867, headed from the Isles of Skye, to the US. You know, just saying. God darn fucking brits :).

  57. 57.

    Baud

    @Tommy:

    I was going to ask if your ancestors were the couple in Far and Away, but they were from Ireland.

  59. 59.

    Doug R

    @Baud: The Conservatives didn’t tax the oil sector enough in the good times and now with oil prices plummeting they are facing massive deficits.

  60. 60.

    Baud

    @Doug R: Ah, so it’s the economy, stupid. Thanks. Hope it works out, not only in the election, but in governance as well.

  62. 62.

    CaseyL

    Congrats on the new arrival!

    Babies are adorable. I like babies: all you have to do is hold, coo at, and carry them around to make them happy.

    Once they acquire speech and some semblance of conversation, I never know what to do with/say to them.

    As they get older, it gets harder for me. I don’t have kids, don’t hang around with kids, and they might as well be people from another country whose language I don’t speak.

    That’s fine, though; there are plenty of people around who do know how to speak Kid.

  64. 64.

    WereBear

    @CaseyL: Funny, I have success with them by simply treating them as I would anyone else.

    Matched to interests, of course. It might be simply because I’m still excited about puppies and kittens and the color purple and cool gadgets.

  66. 66.

    Cacti

    @Baud:

    Huh? Is Pfeiffer saying that we’ve never lost an election because the electorate reacted negatively to a progressive action?

    Pure rubbish if that’s the point being made.

    Sometimes you do the right thing because it’s the right thing to do. Following the enactment of the major legislative priorities of the Civil Rights era, the Democratic Party lost 5 of 6 Presidential elections from 1968-1988. But for Watergate, they’d have likely lost all 6.

  67. 67.

    Baud

    @Cacti: Right. I’m not sure what he means by “regret.” I don’t “regret” that we fought for Obamacare, even though it hurt us in the midterms. But the excerpt makes it seem as if political leaders are wrong to worry that progressive action will ever lead to adverse electoral consequences, which is an assertion I would need a lot more proof for.

  69. 69.

    satby

    There’s a young lady down in the gulf coast of Mississippi who has been studying the gulf water quality in the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon disaster, which happened when she was 12. She’s 16 now and eligible to attend the GENIUS Olympiad, an international high school project competition about environmental issues that is hosted at the State University of New York at Oswego June 14-24, 2015. She’s the daughter of a single mom, her dad died when she was 3, and she’s fundraising for her trip.
    I know people who know her, but it’s a great cause and wondered if any Juicers wanted to kick in a bit:
    http://www.gofundme.com/GoFundAdara

    I know we aren’t big fans of GoFundMe, but take a moment to read Adara’s story, please! Anyone wanna match my $30?

  70. 70.

    Brachiator

    @Baud: The nobles and political officials went out of their way to make sure that Albert was styled Prince to make sure that he understood that he was not co-ruler with Victoria. Of course he was her unofficial chief advisor anyway, but he could not do something like address Parliament or make any demonstration that he actually helped rule.

    I don’t see this changing anytime soon.

    There is an interesting scene in Wolf Hall, where Anne Boleyn is crowned queen. But even so she is not sovereign.

    But all this talk about monarchy and more pleasant news events is just getting me warmed up for the upcoming British elections. It is a lucky thing that Kate had her kid now. The news can get her out of the way now before jumping into voting results and the possibility of coalition fever.

  72. 72.

    WereBear

    @satby: Thanks! Shared. WIll keep it in mind for my next paycheck — ever since the trooper car slammed into me, I’ve had lawyer bills and deductibles and I’m on a very limited budget.

  73. 73.

    pluky

    @Baud: No need really because all queens are not equivalent. A king by definition is regnant, but a queen can be consort, dowager, mother, or finally regnant in her own right (as is Elizabeth II). So the spouse of a king is a queen (consort), while that of a queen (regnant) is a prince (consort). Note that consorts have no title in their own right (i.e. no domain in fief), hence Phillip’s collateral designation as Duke of Edinborough. The exception to this is when a royal couple are co-regnant (e.g. Ferdinand & Isabella of Spain, or William & Mary of GB), then both have regnal titles.

  74. 74.

    satby

    @WereBear: Thanks for sharing! I’m hoping you get compensated fairly for all that trouble!

    We always talk about the need for more girls in STEM careers, (and more minority students the same) and here’s a chance to help an amazing young lady from modest circumstances. I just thought people would want to know about it.

  77. 77.

    muddy

    @Tommy: I find this a little ironic. I picture in my head genealogy being as a plant, one stem has many roots and each stem will produce many branches.

    I see your comment as saying that you don’t like the British handing down a title for being born in that family, no wonder your family moved away from that silliness, etc. But when you discuss your personal heritage it’s always about this one lineage from Isle of Skye. Perhaps I misremember and all branches of your family came from there, every last one came from Scotland in 1867 and you’ve kept it pure since then?

    It was interesting to me looking into my family’s actual history how quickly the group branched out, and there was not “family history” but a multitude of families and histories. Many of which were more interesting and more to be celebrated than the “family line” I was told stories of as a child. That “family” just happened to be the one thread who kept hold of a bible that had been handed down. Those who didn’t have a bible or were not the one child to inherit it out of the family just don’t count under the family line way of thinking.

    You have more family than you think. There is more than the one direct line in your family, the same as there is more than the one direct line for King of England. It’s this extreme branching which makes it mathematically possible that everyone in/descended from Western Europe is related to Charlemagne (c. 800CE).

  78. 78.

    Origuy

    Mary I was the first Queen Regnant in English history. They didn’t have much choice after her half brother Edward IV died young. She married Phillip II, the King of Spain, but it was made very clear that he was not the king of England. She gets bad press in history (Bloody Mary), what with burning Protestants and all, but she had a hard time establishing herself as the person in charge.

    The current royal family is more Scottish than English, the Queen Mother was Scottish nobility. Phillip is Greek and Elizabeth came from German stock. Prince William will be the first monarch who is from English ancestry (from Diana) for generations.

  79. 79.

    Cervantes

    @Baud:

    Someone flunked high school biology.

    Back when I was a child, there was a woman we knew slightly who gave birth via the usual canal, except it happened while she was … er … occupied in her water closet, which she said she had entered for the usual reasons.

    She also swore later that the delivery was the first she knew of the pregnancy, which seemed unlikely, even to us kids, even back then, but we were told quietly by our elders that she probably had her reasons for saying so and never we mind what those reasons might be.

  80. 80.

    Brachiator

    @Origuy: You could make a case that the current royal family is more German than Scottish or English. And you’re right that with William (from Diana) there is a return to more English ancestry.

  82. 82.

    jon

    @Betty Cracker:

    The neighbor looked horrified and asked, “But how will people be able to tell she’s a girl?” As if that mattered!

    There are headbands that the overworried parents of baby girls place around the heads of their mostly bald or short-haired offspring to fend off the possibility of someone assuming she might be a boy and cursing her with lesbian vibes or whatever it is that will ruin her forever. Mental cooties? I’m not sure, exactly.

    Anyway, my ex and I had bald boy babies and often joked that we could make those headbands and put a little truck or a green plastic army man or something on it to ensure no one makes the tragic mistake of assuming the little guy is a girl.

    Ah, the marketing opportunities are endless when concerned parents are out there.

  83. 83.

    Brachiator

    @WereBear: I can celebrate and wallow in the British monarchy because I am not British and have no stake in it. But even if the Brits abandoned the monarchy, they still would have the remnants of their class system, which has more impact than the monarchy.

    But as I noted here or in another thread, celebrating the birth of a royal is just a warmup for a bigger show, the British elections next week. It’s going to be fun, especially if Labour does well, but not well enough to form a government on their own.

    Maybe I’ll throw on a few episodes of the political satire In the Loop to help get ready for the coalition madness to come.

  84. 84.

    PurpleGirl

    He is adorable, a little kitten. It’s great that he, his parents, and sister survived the earthquake. A good news story if there ever was one. May their lives be peaceful for a while now.

  87. 87.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Betty Cracker: Yep. The British royal succession used to go by some kind of male primogeniture, but now it’s strict primogeniture. It’s moot for a couple of generations at least, but the rules changed.

    I’d say that the fact that the reigning monarch has been a queen for as long as most people can remember was probably a factor… but the two perhaps most famous and beloved monarchs in British history before her were also queens, so go figure.

  88. 88.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Germy Shoemangler: That was the style well into the 20th century: babies and toddlers wore long gowns and were generally dressed in what we think of as girls’ styles.

    Once boys got a little bigger, they wore short pants in all weather; long trousers, at least in the Anglophone world, were an accoutrement of manhood. This is why, as mentioned in the recent discussion of Kunstler, some people still get their knickers in a twist about grown men wearing shorts even when it’s 110 in the shade: they interpret it as men rejecting manhood. What I can’t explain is why this peeve occurs in people who are my age and younger. It’s probably of a piece with mens’ rights activists wearing fedoras at all times: some sort of affected man drag.

  89. 89.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Germy Shoemangler: I’d read that wristwatches became fashionable for men as a result of World War I, in which military-issue wristwatches were used to synchronize operations.

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