“For me I would describe myself as Asperger’s, meaning not...

“For me I would describe myself as Asperger’s, meaning not understanding of what’s happening around you and all that stuff.  It can be hard to tell when people are being happy or being serious.  You have to be very careful or they might get upset.  It can make me anxious.  I’m lucky because I’m good at arts and paintings so I found an art studio for special needs people called Mawaheb.  Our teachers and parents push us sometimes, but that’s just because they want us to become adults inside ourselves.  I learned to ride the metro.  It takes a lot of time to learn because you are scared of getting lost but my brothers taught me.  When I went to England to study painting I flew on an airplane by myself.  Actually I was scared at first but I got my boarding pass and followed the signs to where my boarding pass said to go.  Now I’m even working as a waiter in a hotel.  It’s very hard and sometimes I get nervous but I’ve never had an accident before.  Tonight I’m doing a poem for the opening ceremony about being the same as everyone else.  It’s going to be live on the TV.  I’m excited but also a little nervous to be honest.  I’m going to pretend like the stadium is empty except for all my friends that I love.  My parents are very proud of me.  They said: ‘Look at Nazeer.  Our shy boy is no longer shy.’”
(Special Olympics World Games, Abu Dhabi, UAE)