Miraculous Person. Wrong Country? - Part 2

Hello again as I'm now into this sequel from last time. Just to recap, I've been emphasising how people on the autism spectrum such as myself don't or usually have hard times fitting in the Australian way of life despite having unique gifts and characteristics. However, the momentum of taking this spectrum seriously has been steadily growing with many people taking note including Repco employees.

With the likes of The Assembly, we can finally see autistic peoples' true colours which to me is paramount especially with my lifelong experiences of ignorance and misunderstandings.

Since I've posted the first part, I've made a grand opportunity to share something from this month's Passion Projects group which would make a good piece in order to stand out from the rest of our national society (usually).

And this is one of the participant's project of pride. Here are the miniature figurines of the Warhammer franchise. Despite not getting into this, I've been impressed on how all of them are painted. His secret or more strategy is having a very steady hand in order to make high details. The bigger figurines have movable and removable weaponised arms held by magnets. My passions only gone as far as dinosaurs and other prehistoric life, cars, computers and other tech stuff, certain games including Pokemon, mechanical know how and art but the biggest take away is when autistic people have those passions and expertise, they flourish. 

But how often do we see, hear or know anyone else who's on the spectrum? Even artists? It's hard to know apart from myself but there is one particular celebrity.

There is David Byrne. He's the lead singer, guitarist and primary songwriter for Talking Heads and also high up on the autism spectrum (Aspergers to be precise). Thanks to his ideas, Talking Heads have been described as one of the highly acclaimed groups in the 1980s when the New Wave genre kicked off. What started with him along with other students from the Rhode Island School of Design to become band members created such songs that even inspired many other music artists to the modern age.

To close this off, one particular song Once in a Lifetime is when Davide Byrne demonstrated his own perspective, like his alienated meditation on life.

This moment occurred when both my dad and I watched this music video for Once in a Lifetime on Youtube then to be drawn whether the lead singer is autistic. Later, it turned out to be the case.

But of course, there's the rest of the world.

Australia has been quite an interesting country since I've been growing up. Anyone outside would understand that Australia is the largest island in the world, mostly covered in desert, everything else feels and is far away, weathers get wet or dry feeling like seasons despite the usual 4 seasons on our planet.

And then there are the inhabitants of this country. In general, they're hard yakka meaning they work hard, down to earth, they have a laid back lifestyle but they have a tendency to use slang. This is their strong piece of identity but for anyone who thinks literally, that can become downright awkward. I should break down their phrases using the Aussie slang and set about translating what each phrase means.

- Uey (U-turn)

- Sicky (day off sick)

- Smoko (work break)

- Barra (wheel barrow, short for Barramundi)

- Dead horse (tomato sauce)

- Snot box (vanilla slice)

- Alright (good, nice)

- Frothy (beer)

- A bit (decent)

- Dunny (portable toilet)

- Barbie (short for barbecue)

Some of the phrases can be understood but there are a few that anyone else just can't get their heads around. Let's begin.

We'll first start with tomato sauce with it's strange name of dead horse. How the hell can anyone come up with that idea? After some figuring out, the name 'dead horse' happened to be a rhyming word. At least its more continental name ketchup doesn't seem to be a problem but grabbing a meat pie or a barbecue cooked sausage on a slice of bread then grabbing a bottle of 'dead horse', are those people serious? There's another odd name for this particular hand-held dessert.

This is a vanilla slice. It has nice thin flakey layers of pastry and between those layers of pastry is the dominant filling of vanilla custard. It's a very pleasant thing to look at and even take a bite although it's named a 'snot box'. How is it called that?

There are 2 phrases that appear odd such as 'Barra' with 2 meanings for a wheel barrow and a Barramundi, one of Australia's large freshwater fish but if anyone is passionate about cars, they would be aware of Ford's Barra engine fitted from the BA Falcon models until it's end of production. And 'barbie' being short for barbecue, would that image ring the bell?

Well this is one literal interpretation I can think of. This bit has been featured for the music video for Black Hole Sun if anyone's curious.

There's nothing wrong with being literal and strongly passionate about certain things or even have different perspectives. Not being accepted for those traits feels terrible when the world feels dull and everything feels to world is a dark place with moments of political turmoils, wars, disasters and worst of all segregation. Throughout the history of humankind, there have been many dark moments but at the same time, understandings of all things science, technologies, new ideas from the Renaissance and movements against prejudice and moments of social injustices have helped shape our world for more generations to come.

Even in the modern era, recognition of first nations people pick up steam including NAIDOC week. However, there's this matter of more people being diagnosed with autism and how will Australia and even other countries deal with this growth? That tends to be a big ask.

Organisations here like Aspect, Amaze and even the Autism Valued organisation have been helpful for people who've been newly, currently and even diagnosed late with autism to grow understandings, strengths, needs for more inclusion and most importantly display a purpose in life. What I can't believe is having communities who still lack knowledge on the autism spectrum including GPs. I've been lucky to complete my counseling sessions and blending with the right kind of people including some incredible autistic people has been a decent help for me to become an individual who shouldn't under any circumstances be counted out by anyone.

One last piece of oddity to emphasise but also compare is the thylacine with the last one in existence dead on September the 7th, 1936 in the Hobart Zoo. And later, there are some people who claim and want to prove they're still around. To me, why would I want to buy that?

I know all along that I don't particularly have a 'disability' and I can do many things once I get opportunities to learn and do so. I can mingle with people but ideally with similar personalities and passions. Are there any things I can't do?

Lastly, I'm passionate about being a mould breaker and also with other people who have other abnormalities and/or face discrimination or plainly misunderstood, just wait until they'll do anything to make others in communities think twice.

Now, before I'll conclude here, I like to share this particular movie I've watched recently at a local cinema.

That movie is titled Goat (abreviation for Greatest of All Time) and it consisted of the young basketball playing goat named Will having to contend with bigger animals and given little chances and play times when signed into the team. Despite all those problems, he and the basketball team succeeded to the end.

The most important thing about the movie is the motivational point of dreaming big despite others.

See you next time!