Signs of Communication

The Little Monkey has recently developed the requisite manual dexterity, will, and nous to start communicating with his little paws. Last week it was waving (during which he looks a bit perplexed about why we’re all so pleased about wiggling our hands in the air, but joins in the fun nonetheless), and lately it’s been clapping. Initially each clap was greeted with a mixture of surprise and delight (mostly his, partly ours), but now they seem to have taken on a more prosaic meaning; it’s difficult to be sure, but it’s possible he’s trying to tell us that he wants ‘more x’, where x is usually some nice sweet fruit, like pear or melon. The Little Monkey has been going to baby sign language classes for a while, and the sign for ‘more’ is quite similar to a clap. It’s pretty exciting that our baby, who wasn’t even a discrete entity 9 months ago, is on the verge of being able to communicate important matters, such as “Look, there’s the cat!”, “More grapes!”, “Look, there’s the cat!”, “Lau Lau!”, “More grapes!”, and “Look there’s the cat!” Marvellous.