Dr. Tzemin portrays the binaries of life of an ASD child, his coming of age, and his later life, in this short story, for the Special Feature. A Different Truths exclusive.
It all starts with Asperger’s syndrome.
I grew up in Yuxiang Township, Pingtung County, a small fishing village, named Beishi. When I was very young, I couldn’t speak or make friends. The only person in the world who could speak to me was my mother.
Before I was able to go to elementary school, I had two of the most important tasks every day: one was that I would feed the little monkeys in our stacked-wood house and the old hen in the backyard. This is not a task requests from my Daddy. It is purely because the little monkey and the hen are the only two friends in my world. If I ignore them, no one will listen to them.
After feeding the hen and the monkey, I will take an exclusive bench and sit in the middle of the front door 
of our barbershop to perform the second great task. I observed the guests who came for the haircut. Their strange hair stylings were really fun for a child who could never speak. I looked at these tens of thousands of heads with wide eyes and within my heart secretly with a smile.
Until everyone in our village knew me and no longer dared to come to our house to manage their hairs. I don’t blame them at all. The pressure on them it’s too big. The people around us, the residents of the village, the elders, the neighbors, the teachers and classmates in the kindergarten, all agreed that I was an idiot, except my mother. She firmly believes that I am not an idiot. I should be a philosopher. Later, I waited until I was big enough to know that I was not an idiot nor a philosopher. It was called “Asperger’s disease.”
Children with “Asperger” can’t communicate with people normally, they can’t make friends, they are isolated from the world, and they can’t escape. Children with “Asperger” are unable to learn at normal speed and are several times slower than the average person. In the general education system, they are often regarded as an intellectual disability or general learning disability kid. The process of growing up is often discriminated against. I am a child who ‘lives in a glass bottle’.
“Asperger’s Syndrome Disorder” (ASD) not only prevents me from facing the world but also leaves me in a 
state of severe learning and communication obstacles at any time. I cannot learn knowledge and know friends through the Intra-system approach. How to adapt to the external environment and people is my lingering nightmare. Until high school, I still wouldn’t speak with my classmates normally. Therefore, my whole life is destined to face a life and death struggle one after another in the condition of unable to learn normally.
What’s strange is that although I cannot learn normally those subjects, such as English, conversation, history, etc., that must be communicated to others. However, I have a few Inherent aptitudes that can make my classmates breathtaking. I can fully understand all the mathematics and physics in my daydreams, draw a lot of fun and lively comics, and also reset many kinds of various Rubik’s Tubes without learned off fixed formulas. Of course, this is another reason why I could not make friends because these specific functions have seriously defeated everyone who used to laugh at me. God wanted me to be a child with learning disabilities, but, on the one hand, let me have mathematical logic and painting talents. This is really put all things in an awkward situation. So, as far as I can remember, I have been reuniting between the two No. 1 always, “the real No. 1” and “the last No. 1”. It makes me feel like I’m going crazy, but I’m still willing to share with you here.
At the end of the second year of my junior high school, my teacher kicked me out of the original class and let me be a member of “the cattle class” for two reasons. First, because I always got a “0” in my English test, and second, I had no money to pay the extra tuition fees at his home after class. However, my teacher didn’t notice that I didn’t need extra teaching. My math, physics, and composition are always taken “100” 
on the test paper. From this perspective, I should be called the King of “the cattle class”. This is good enough for me to be admitted to the best high school in my hometown two years later.
Since I couldn’t change my habit of indulging in daydreaming all day long, so my senior high school career once again was reduced to “the cattle class” from a gifted class. In the simulation test before the National University Test, I only took a second bottom of the school, a total of 201 points, although I am very happy to not get the last one in the whole school. But my well-matched brother who got 200 points and the last No. 1, committed suicide not long later. So I got back the last NO.1 title. Three months later, I was admitted to the Department of Chemical Engineering of the National University by an extremely outstanding mathematical achievement. I defeated everyone in the gifted class now and they kicked me into “the cattle class” two years ago. I felt relieved to regain the No.1 that once belonged to me.
After entering the university, discovering the world outside the glass bottle was out of my surprise to let me indulged in mahjong and fishing. My performance has thus fallen into the abyss, with an average of three semesters flunked, no any semesters among eight, my average could exceed 70, and, of course, I graduated with the last No.1 again. After completing my military service duties, unfortunately, I became the only one who had been admitted to the graduate school of the best school in our country, the National Taiwan University. I changed back to the No. 1 in our university class again.
In the enlisted intelligence test, my IQ index ranks the last of more than 1,000 soldiers in the entire camp. The army commander determined that I was one of the idiots in the idiot group. In order to sympathize with me, I was exempted from strict military training. He only asked me to paint the camp house for three months. I am grateful for the understanding of the Ministry of National Defense. After being drafted into the army, I became an administrative officer who specialised in managing the money and accidentally gained the first prize once in the accounting review of the entire division. The reason was not for I got a zero error in the accounting settlement, but that no financial officer understood how I calculated it. So they had to give me the first-grade award.
When I was studying at the Taiwan University Institute, my life had already gone about one-third. I finally realised that a man like me still have to work harder. However, learning disabilities and bad interpersonal relationships have always kept me in a state of depression and embarrassment. After all, I still graduate with “the last No.1”. After graduating from National Taiwan University, I decided to look for the second self. With the background of the non-mathematics department, once again I admitted to the graduate school of Applied Mathematics of National Jiaotong University and I became the only one among my classmates who have the dual expertise of Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering and MA in Mathematics.
How time flies. Now I have taught calculus in the university for over 30 years, with students all over the country. I doubt how many students will eventually understand calculus. I think I must be a last No. 1 teacher. As grow older, I am increasingly tired of science and mathematics.
Called my sword loudly and gently lifted my travelling bag.
So, I want to pursue another dream in life. I want to become an extremely talented writer, cartoonist and magic cube player.
If you ask me: “What is your life’s desire?” I will answer: “I hope to have three pens and two squares. My three pens are a chalk, a brush, and a fountain pen. Chalk is used as a teacher to teach as many schoolchildren as possible; the brush is used as a painter and paints down everything changed by time, and the fountain pen is used as a writer and writes what I saw in my whole life. My first box is a camera. I would like to use it to commemorate the life. Another box is a Rubik Cube. I believe only such a Rubik Cube will allow me to leave a name in the world and can find no rivals in the universe.
If you ask me, “What do you have to boast about in your life?” I will be proud to say: “I must be the most intelligent idiot on this earth.”
©Dr. Tzemin Ition Tsai
Photos from the Internet
#Autism #Aspergers #LifeWithAutism #ShortStory #SpecialNeeds #ASDChild #BinaryLife #AutismAnAdvocayInitiative #DifferentTruths
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