The Naming of Leo

As we had received a lot of suggestions for your nickname, your mum and daddy were thinking very hard about how we should call you after you were born. Your grandma Vern wanted to call you "Kuei Nam" because when we first find out that you are a boy from the Ultrasound scan, you showed everyone your little e-nok and the doctor then confirmed. Your grandma Joy suggested to nickname you "Ton-kham" because at the time daddy was working in a Gold mine in Sepon, southern part of Laos. Other suggestions were Feedo, Look-Toum and so on but none of them clicked. It's not easy at all to find the nickname that we like the most for you.

When you were still inside mum's tummy, we called you "Boumboum" which was the nickname we adored so much. Just a thought of changing your nickname to something else beside Boumboum made your mum cried. We decided we would continue to call you Boumboum sometimes, but we needed a nickname for you that everyone can call and that perhaps it should not be as embarrassing as the name "Boumboum" when you grow up. So daddy suggested to your mum that because your mum's nickname is Lena and your blood group is O, we derive your nickname to be "Le-O" or Leo, which means the Lion or the strong one. "Leo" is also part of names of famous and inspirational people, such as Leonardo Da Vinci who was the world's most famous engineer, artist and inventor (your aunt Linda somehow likes to call you "Nado" - so if we call you together it'll be "Leo - Nado"); or Galileo who was one of daddy's most favorite astrophysicist of all time. Your mum seemed to like the name the first time she heard it. So that's how you got the nickname "Leo" - or Leo Boumboum.