Asperger's and Autism: Achieving Independence After High School

Starting like any morning, we got up and went through our regular morning routine and met in the lobby at our appointed time.  But things really got interesting almost right away.  In walking to the BSD office for another morning class, we stopped to pick up breakfast at McDonald's.  However, this wasn't the normal golden arches from home.  Instead, we found that our orders were placed electronically from a large vertical touch screen and then the order was placed by machine and picked up when you saw your number appear on a digital screen above the cash register.   This seemed different from the screens in Wawa at home because there was no human interaction for meal preparation except when they put the meal in the bags.  We then headed off for a morning of coding at BSD.  The project work is getting more and more interesting.  There was a good deal of excitement as they all emerged from the lab for lunch. Today, we had sushi and sashimi ...

This morning started with an early departure for BSD on our own with no help from our hosts and arrival at 8am.  We sat around the conference table with our breakfast that had been ordered the night before via "What's App".  We had an organizational meeting about the day and a brief overview of the itinerary for the remainder of the week. And, then the work began with the students heading off into one of the lab spaces to begin their three hour class. A brief break about halfway through and then a return at the end of today's class just in time to head out to lunch at what the office staff affectionately refer to as the Blue Door Cafe (because it has a blue door).  We had pre-ordered the lunches and they were all set for us when we arrived.    In 30 minutes we had enjoyed a wonderful neighborhood cafe lunch with a number of other locals to add to the atmosphere and then we were back to the office to pick up our backpacks to jump into a coach that was wait...

This morning we had a more leisurely start to the day and gathered in the lobby to walk to the BSD office for our breakfast meeting.  A box breakfast included scrambled eggs, toast and juices.  We then set off to catch the tram (using our electronic Octopus Card for entrance to the tram and the bus)  that then took us to the bus station for a tour bus ride through the southern section of Hong Kong and then under Victoria Harbour to Kowloon where we drove by many sites including the major universities, the old city of Kowloon, the plant market filled with flowers, trees and plants for every occasion.  We got off the tour bus at the large shopping mall making King of Prussia look like a general store.  The mall is nine floors of shopping bliss!!!.....at least for folks who like malls and who like shopping.  Everyone had some time to go over in small groups to explore around the mall.  We met back up after some purchases for a lunch of real Chinese d...

Sunday, November 11th Very few of us have traveled in one flight for 16 hours in the past.  This was a new experience.  Because we were advised to take a 1am flight we found, with great pleasure, that the airport was quiet, the security check-in system was smooth and the TSA attendants were quick with a joke. We had much  of our terminal to ourselves for a number of hours and used the time to consume mountains of junk food and use many of our digital devices.  We easily loaded into the plane and were soon off into the friendly skies. Amazing was the level of calm in all of our travelers.  They settled into their seats very quickly, spoke with a few folks around them and off we went.  The routine of movies, video games, more snacks than I am capable of counting and intermittent sleeping easily got us through the first nine hours.  When the realization hit that we still had seven more hours to do, we dug down deep for a bit more sleep and more mov...

Tuesday, November 13, 2017 First, we need to celebrate the report this morning that almost everyone said that they got a good night sleep and that the jet lag did not impede their getting some solid sleep last night.  What troopers we have!!! This morning we walked from the hotel to the BSD office to begin the day with a breakfast meeting.  Even though we just stayed for the time to have breakfast and meet some folks from the Island School (we will spend more time with them later this week), we headed out about 9:30 to ride the tram, to the bus station to board a tour bus that took us around the northern section of Hong Kong Island and then head over to Kowloon. It pretty much rained throughout the day but it never seemed to dampen our enthusiasm for all that we saw today.  The umbrellas that were in each of the backpacks that were gifted to us by BSD yesterday came in very handy.  We also got kleenex tissues and hand sanitizer and a water bottle in the backpacks...

Practice for Hong Kong in Chinatown - October 17, 2017 At dismissal at the end of the day on Tuesday, our five student travelers, Mr. Sager, Mr. Geary and I traveled into Chinatown to get to know each other, experience some smells and sounds of a Chinese cultural area, and sample some local cuisine. We met up with a tour guide that Mr. Geary connected us with named Jamie Shanker.  While her full time job is as a lawyer for a not-for-profit in Philadelphia, she also enjoys giving tours of Chinatown because she enjoys the food and sharing her knowledge with others who want to learn. After introducing us to the Friendship Gate in the oldest Chinatown in the US.  We learned about the small shops and how each of them maintain a business in the community.  Our first samplings were eaten on the sidewalk because street food is something we will see a good deal of in Hong Kong.  A pork bun which is a sweet bun with the shredded pork and the sauce, strips of bbq'ed pork ...