I’m sitting in a Saigon café, iced coffee sweating on the table, staring at a dog that looks like it lost a fight with a box of highlighters.
Its ears are electric pink. Its tail is the color of traffic-cone orange. The poor thing keeps trying to crawl under a plastic chair as if the furniture might save what’s left of its dignity. A teenage girl squats next to it snapping selfies, cooing in Vietnamese. The dog looks at me with the hollow expression of a creature that has accepted its fate.
And I’m thinking the same thing I think at least once a week here: Is this autism… or have they cracked some code the rest of us are too repressed to see?
The West Lost Its Playfulness Somewhere Along the Way
Back home, if you dye your poodle pastel, people assume you’re either a Real Housewife with too much time or you’re one bad day away from making the evening news. In Vietnam, Thailand, Japan – half of Asia, really – it’s Tuesday.
I don’t mean that as an insult. Honestly, after years bouncing around the region, I’ve started to envy it. We grew up being told “act normal,” “tone it down,” “be taken seriously.” Somewhere we decided seriousness equals maturity. East Asia never got that memo – or they read it and used it to wrap dried squid.
So let’s take a little tour of the habits that make Western visitors clutch their pearls. Maybe by the end we’ll figure out who the real weirdos are.
Exhibit A: The Neon Dog Phenomenon
First time I saw one I genuinely thought the animal was dying. Patchy fur, strange colors spreading from the extremities – my brain went straight to gangrene or chemical burns. Then I realized every groomer in the city offers “creative color” packages starting at ten bucks.
Owners don’t do it ironically. They do it because it’s cute. Full stop. The dog’s opinion is apparently irrelevant. I’ve watched grandmas parade their fluorescent Pomeranians like living cotton candy and accept compliments the way New Yorkers accept fashion praise.
It’s the same impulse that makes people dress Chihuahuas in tutus back home, except without the self-consciousness. There’s no “I’m being extra” wink to the camera. They’re dead serious about the cuteness.
Exhibit B: Hello Kitty Takes Over an Entire Airport
Picture this: you’re boarding a domestic flight in Japan and the gate says “Hello Kitty Airport.” Not a themed gate. The whole airport. They renamed it for six months to boost tourism.
The boarding bridge has her face painted on it. The baggage claim has murals of her dragging a tiny suitcase. There’s a Hello Kitty café, photo zones, limited-edition plane livery. Grown adults – salarymen in suits – line up for pictures.
In the West we’d call that unhinged. In Japan it’s a regional marketing strategy executed with military precision.
“Kawaii is not just aesthetics; it’s a survival mechanism in a high-pressure society.”
– Cultural anthropologist, paraphrased
There’s truth in that. When life is nonstop work and social obligation, surrounding yourself with aggressive cuteness becomes rebellion. It says: I refuse to let the world grind every drop of joy out of me.
Exhibit C: The Land Where Penises Bring Good Fortune
Now we arrive at Thailand, my personal favorite.
Westerners tend to think of Buddhist countries as serene and sexless. Then you stumble into a shrine covered in wooden dicks of every size and the cognitive dissonance hits like cheap whiskey.
These aren’t jokes. Devotees buy them, dress them in ribbons, leave offerings. Fertility, luck, business success – the phallus covers all bases. I’ve seen little old ladies gently rubbing the tip of an oversized carving while whispering prayers for their shop’s prosperity.
My ex-girlfriend’s mother kept a palm-sized one behind the counter of her clothing stall. Every morning she’d tap it three times “to wake up the luck.” Zero irony. Worked too – woman ran that place like a cartel.
Compare that to the average Western attitude toward genitalia in public and you start to understand how deep the cultural prudishness runs. We hide it, shame it, or turn it into pornography. They turn it into a good-luck charm and move on with their day.
So Is It Autism or Enlightenment?
Here’s where it gets interesting.
From a strict Western psychological lens, some of these behaviors tick boxes: hyper-focus on visual detail, resistance to social norms about “appropriateness,” intense special interests (Hello Kitty collectors, I’m looking at you). But labeling it pathology misses the point.
What looks like social blindness might actually be social freedom. They’re not failing to read the room – they’re deliberately redesigning the room in colors that make them happy and telling anyone who complains to pound sand.
- No apologies for liking what they like
- No embarrassment about enthusiasm
- No need for performative “cool”
In a way, it’s the opposite of autism as we usually understand it. It’s radical self-permission.
We could learn something. Imagine a world where you could paint your dog neon just because it sparks joy, where airports looked like toy stores, where fertility symbols sat proudly on the dashboard bringing luck instead of shame.
Maybe the real autism is needing everything to look “normal” all the time. Maybe the enlightenment is saying screw your normal and living in technicolor.
The little orange-butted dog finally gave up hiding. He trotted out, tail wagging despite everything, and licked the girl’s hand. She squealed. He looked almost… proud.
And for a second, watching them, I thought: yeah. I think I get it now.
