Published in The Mystician 84.2, Page 3
Bop it, twist it, record it.
Since the beginning of 2022, Cain Kaiser, 2nd year Graphic Design and Communications student, has been releasing episodes for his own pre-recorded podcast- “Making a Cain-ection: Sharing My Story”. When a friend of his suggested the idea to him, he took it as a chance to tell more people about his experiences. Later that night, he went back to his Werner Hall, whipped up a piece of cover art with one of his programs and started recording his first episode telling his story about his life with Autism and the experiences it brings.
“I thought about it for a couple hours and then I was in my room at Werner after we got done at the pizza place and he's, and he knocked on my door, he wanted to hang out. And it's like ‘I can't right now I'm making a podcast,’” said Kaiser.
Kaiser explains in his first episode that he was diagnosed with High Functioning Autism at the age of four in Grand Rapids, Minnesota. Throughout his life, Cain said he was bullied as a child due to the fact people had no idea what Autism was. Due to his specific hobbies, he was misunderstood by his peers and his school. He also added that due to his stutter and the problems pronouncing his s’s, he had a problem communicating with others.
“My brain learns in a different way,” Kaiser said.
During his podcast, Kaiser discusses his different interests and hobbies he has had with Autism from his early years all the way into college. From his time in The Dakota Girls and Boys Ranch during Freshman year to his time with his favorite dog, Alex, that died of leukemia in 2020, amongst other experiences during his school years. On Sept. 13, Cain started his second season. He plans to talk about the pets he had throughout his life, the dreams he had and his Bop It collection in honor of the inventor's birthday.
“It's something to do when I'm bored because I do get bored a lot,” Kaiser said. “But it's also a way to spread awareness and build understanding. Like, If someone wants to listen to the podcast, they can hear my life experiences and the struggles that I've had and how I've been able to cope with them to build better understanding and like ‘Okay this person has autism. How can we approach it and how can we understand it better?’ So it's kind of getting to know autism from a different perspective”
Aside from his podcast, Kaiser has also had a YouTube channel. His channel was created in 2020 and now has over a thousand subscribers. His highest viewed video has over 70 thousand views.
Most of his videos talk about his Bop It collection. Kaiser has many different Bop It toys from varying regions around the world. He brings out one of his 30+ Bop It toys and gives it a thorough review in his videos.
Kaiser’s fascination for Bop It toys started when he was little. He started collecting them in 2009. He also knows a lot about the inside mechanisms of the toys, such as that each device has its own certain pitch due to a special “crystal” chip inside the motherboard.
Cain is part of a Discord group with people from Hasbro, along with a few voice actors. This group includes Mike Pollock, voice actor for the modern Sonic games, multiple voice actors for the Bop It toys and Dan Klitsner, inventor of the Bop It. Kaiser plans to add more members to the group. Kaiser said that he wants to plan an interview with Klitsner for one of his future episodes.
Aside from planning future guests to interview, Kaiser wants to bring more awareness about Autistic adults in the community. He said that with the help of his Junior High superintendent, he plans to make a proposal to the North Dakota Department of Education to talk about Autism during health classes. He also said that with enough funding, he wants to create a support group for autistic people over the age of 18 he calls “20AUT1.”
Kaiser said that since he has always been a very open and social person, he’s always tried to spread awareness of Autism. He celebrates Autism Awareness Month duringApril by engaging with the community.
When it comes to himself and his disability, Kaiser said that there is a quote that he likes to follow from Stuart Duncan: “Autism isn’t a disability, it's a different type of ability.”
“Making a Cain-ection: Sharing My Story” can be found on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Audible and Podpage.
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