Saturday, 16 March 2013

Is Asperger's Syndrome a gift or a curse?

Hi guys, just a short post from me for now. Yes I am around but this week has been one of those super busy weeks - my boss has launched a brand new project so I am working flat out in the mornings and afternoons whilst spending my evenings at the theatre performing. Something had to go and that was blogging - it is tough but I have only two weeks of the show left and I can't wait for it to end to be honest. I have had a really difficult incident I had to deal with this week which I will blog about hopefully on Sunday if I am able to resolve it - it is just the way I deal with such matters. I have these thoughts bouncing around my head - anger, frustration, worry, anxiety - and when I spell them out clearly on my blog, it helps organize my thinking and I gain clarity from the writing. And besides, I always get to share it with some of my faithful readers who are always happy to offer kind advice.

I will leave you with one thought for now - you know Calvo the guy I was having so much trouble with in the show? The penny dropped recently. He is autistic - he has Asperger's Syndrome. I have written about dealing with people afflicted by Asperger's Syndrome before. It is so obvious and now I totally see it. Recently, he had annoyed me to the point where I made a complaint about his behaviour which had crossed the lines too many times. He was taken aside and given a stern talking to and guess what he did after that?
Should I be nice to Calvo on the basis that he is autistic? 
He came up to me and said, "Hey I bought new shoes, do you like the colour? Nice shade of red!"  Huh? Did he not get the fact that I was so pissed off with him I made a complaint? Did he not care? Or is he so oblivious to the fact that I can't stand him? That's when the penny dropped as I looked at his new red shoes in disbelief: classic Asperger's Syndrome. I guess people of his age (he's 47) did not have the benefit of modern psychology - people just labelled him as weird, strange, anti-social or socially awkward. This has put me in a dilemma. Do I offer him kindness and understanding given that I have dealt with people with Asperger's Syndrome before? Or do I say, fuck it, I am never ever going to see him again after this show ends, so I am just going to ignore him. He's not my problem.

Guess what? I am choosing the latter - I didn't say a word to him today and I intend to say as little as possible to him until the end of the show. So sue me. My patience is wafer thin when I arrive in the evening to perform after a bloody long day at work whilst my fellow actors have had long lie-ins and spent their afternoons watching crap on TV.
This is how I see my fellow actors.

Sometimes I look at Calvo and I do feel sorry for him - he is like a bull in a china shop offending people left right and centre every single day. People hate him, people say really nasty things about him - sometimes to his face or they make complaints about him. I get the feeling that he is totally oblivious to just how much people dislike him and he would go and chat to those who hate him as if he was their best friend. Is this a blessing or a curse? If everyone hates you, wouldn't you rather be blissfully unaware of that fact? Sure he has no real friends - but even he is unaware of that fact, well perhaps until the day when he needs help and he will find that he has no one to turn to, no one to rely on.

This reminds me of a movie called Shallow Hal. In the movie, the protagonist Hal is a very shallow man who judges women by their appearances only. So he meets a hypnotist who hypnotises him so that he will see people for their inner beauty instead and he falls in love with the gorgeous Rosemary who is actually a really fat woman in real life, but under hypnosis, Hal sees her as this supermodel with the perfect figure. His best friend is appalled at what happened and persuades the hypnotist to break the spell - but instead of thanking his best friend, Hal was furious as he didn't care what Rosemary actually looked like in real life as long as he was seeing this supermodel in front of him. And as Hollywood movies go, yeah there's a happy ending, but there you go - like Hal who was hypnotized to have an altered vision of reality, Calvo sees me as his friend when I can't stand him. Is Calvo blessed with a gift or is he living life with a curse? Would you rather be 'unaware' of people hating you? You tell me. Personally, I'd rather know where I stand with people - even if it is painful to find out that some people really hate me. Otherwise, how would I be able to tell whom my true friends are? Let me know what you think - please leave a comment below, thank you for reading.

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3 comments:

  1. Chin Lam Toh16 March 2013 at 07:35

    Hi LIFT, Im very intrigued by this Calvo. Theres a question mark whether he knows how unpopular he is. In my first workplace I was openly hostile to a colleague over certain issues, but he went out of his way to be "nice" to me & even exaggerated it. This only infuriated me further. Maybe Calvo uses this strategy to withstand the onslaught of contempt heaped on him. Be shameless & thick-skinned, rather than admit your fragility. Be despised not pitied. Makes him look ridiculous, but preferable to looking pathetic. At least, that should net him his fair share of admirers.

    Calvo sounds like quite a character. Despite the social ineptness, he gets theatre stints & still functions in society. In Spore he'd be eaten alive - treated as scapegoat, dumped with donkey work, systematically mauled to bits by office politics. He wouldnt have a regular job, but drift from one kind of contract work to another. That being said, IF he really IS autistic (as opposed to obnoxious & pretending not to realise it), then yes, its a Blessing for him to be unaware that he is universally disliked.

    Definitely infinitely better than enduring painful snubs, jibes & stabs while conscious of your condition, but can't change anything & just act blur. Of course best is to be free of pychological affliction, but thats getting rare!

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    1. Limpeh Foreign Talent16 March 2013 at 11:05

      Hi there and thanks for your comment. You know, only he can answer that question about where he really knows how unpopular he is. As he is Spanish, he perceives the other Spanish-speakers in the show as his best friends and he would chat to them in Spanish as if there was a sense of Spanish kinship. But I know that these Spanish guys have told me that they officially despise him - regardless of his nationality. One of the other Spanish guys came up to me last night and offered me his empathy - we had a long chat about how hard it was to have to work with Calvo and yeah, make no mistake, the rest of the Spanish contingent have zero respect for him but does he realize that? Does he just pretend to be thick skinned and blur (which is possible of course) - or is he, as I suspect, a classic case of Asperger's syndrome? I am guessing it is the latter based on the evidence I observe.

      As for the colleague who infuriated you - I don't know enough details but someone like myself may be capable of something like that. I am cunning and manipulative, it's about office politics: keep your friends close and your enemies closer. You may not like the people you have to work with but you still have to get work done - you're there to make money not friends at the end of the day. Is Calvo capable of this kind of manipulative office politics?

      No. He's not. Even if he is trying, he's failing as he is offending people left, right and centre like a drunk bull in a china shop. Yes it is that bad. So no, he doesn't have his fair share of admirers - certainly, there's a sense of 当局者迷，旁观者清 - try working with him and you'll realize just how difficult to get along he is. I only have 2 more weeks in this show and I can count the number of shows left: 13. Just 13 more working days from right now. I can tahan until the end lah - can't wait for life to get back to normal after that.

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    2. Limpeh Foreign Talent17 March 2013 at 01:50

      Oooh boy I had an incident with Calvo tonight which just confirms and double confirms that he definitely has Asperger's Syndrome. It's v late now and i will blog tomorrow.

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