Who is this mysterious Gaspar?
Let’s pull back the curtains and get to know the man behind deCYPHER games.
Me when I was a baby. Googoo Gaga.
My Parents moved to Australia from Uruguay when they got married and I was born here. I was an adorable baby.
They bought me my first computer when I was around 9 years old (a trusty TANDY TRS 80) and there began my love of computer games, programming, and all things I.T.
We moved to America around 1985.
I was always one of the weird kids… being a closeted gay, not particularly masculine for a boy, short, small for my age, socially awkward, terrible at sports, nerdy, having Tourettes (and pretty sure a touch of the ADHD) all contributed to my wonderful school years.
I did find a small quality friend circle (Andy, Josh, Faith, looking at you guys *heart*), but I still always felt like an outsider and pretty much always wanted to be home playing on my computer rather than being out doing “normal” kid/teenager stuff.
TV, Movies, Computer Games, Dungeons & Dragons, learning programming, Arts & Crafts, making games and puzzles, and learning about weird stuff like Lucid Dreaming and Ouija Boards became my comfort zones.
you bored yet? (continued below…)
I was insecure, wasn’t popular, never being myself, hated school, hated social situations, yadda yadda yadda. #FirstWorldProblems right?!
In 1994 we moved back to Australia and I remember making a conscious decision to reinvent myself. I started “being more confident” (fake it till you make it right?)… and it seemed to work.
I was the “new American guy” at school so plenty of people were nice to me and I was welcomed into a social group pretty quickly (Trygve, Stuart, John, Ryan, all the church-ey girls, hehe, I’m looking at you). High School in Australia was a thousand times better than American schools.
There were still bullies that tried their best to make my school days horrible (Nick and Luke, looking at you losers) but that’s a story for another day.
I grew into myself, started doing more of the fun teenage stuff I had missed out on in America, and kept developing my skills with computers, programming, software, and I.T.
University was pretty fun, I started coming out to people (who totally accepted me), I started being more my genuine self than I’d been in 20 years. I worked in fun jobs with fun people who liked me for me. I finally started making close friendships and looked forward to going out and being social. I got really into clubbing and drinking and going out dancing.
Surely you MUST be bored by now? (continued below…)
15 year old me being Nigel No Friends. But also me not caring because my computer and geeky hobbies filled me with joy 🙂
18 year old me working as a cashier at Franklins Supermarket
With the rise of bulletin boards and internet chat rooms I finally started meeting other gay guys and made gay friends and got involved in the gay social scene. My twenties & thirties were awesome and I’m so glad I was able to find myself and find my people.
I’ve worked as a cashier in a supermarket, a performing Wizard for kids parties, doing tech support for an Internet Service Provider, customer service and help desk for Vodafone, an assistant to an I.T. Recruiter, an usher and a ticket seller at the cinemas, and then a very rewarding (although often demanding) 21 year stint in I.T. as a software trainer and eLearning developer.
These days I’m enjoying a much more relaxed lifestyle. I work as an NDIS support worker for kids and adults. The hours vary so weeks can go from super busy (and a bit stressful) to super quiet and calm, but I like that variety. On my days off I like to binge the Sarah Silverman Show or Superstore and work on all my fun side projects! or if I’m feeling motivated to make some extra cash, I’ll do some Amazon or Door Dash deliveries 🙂
But going back to my fun side projects, that brings us here… deCYPHER games. I feel like many of my crazy life experiences and crazy jobs and my quirkiness and eccentricities and nerdy interests and hobbies have all led me to this fun time in my life working on this super groovy site.
Hope you find something fun while you’re visiting as well.
