My Encounter with a Multiple Personalities Person

What prompted me to write this article was this video featured by The Oprah Winfrey Show on youtube - a mother who has 20 different personalities.



Mine was a story of my personal encounter with a guy during my uni days who has dual personality. This was back in England. And during this period of time, I met a guy who was studying in the same university as I. Let's call him Jim (not his real name).

Jim was originally from Hong Kong and was a devoted Christian. I met Jim in a cell group hosted by campus students in one of the random student houses. I wasn't a Christian, but I was attending a lot of cell groups and went to church because a group of my friends in the UK were from church.

Jim was an amazing guy, extremely friendly and was always willing to lend a hand. Whenever there's a house party and he's invited, Jim would always stay back and help the host clean up the mess and wash plates. That's the kind of guy Jim was. I was new in town, and somehow we just became good friends.

Now I always knew Jim has a crush on this girl for the longest time, whom I had never met, but this girl was never interested. He always made sure her identity was not revealed. Sometimes I would probe him for more info or just plainly encourage him to go after her simply because I cared about him a lot as a friend. There were days Jim would tell me the amazing characteristics of hers and what made him fell in love with her in the first place.

And I know for a fact that the girl wasn't me, in case you're wondering, because he has been in love with this girl for the last 5 years he was studying and living in the UK, and I have only met Jim for a few months when I knew about this mystery crush.

This went on for about couple of months, then one day, Jim came to visit me looking dejected. Turned out the crush of his has gotten herself a boyfriend. That evening he revealed to me a secret that he has been keeping from many of his friends in the UK. You see, Jim has dissociative identity disorder, or more famously known as split personality. Which is not to be confused by bipolar.

Facing with such a controversial psychiatric condition, I took in the news with a pinch of salt and just listened to him while Jim carried on explaining about his other personality. The reason for his telling was that he feared that his other personality was to surface soon because it had been occurring frequently. And whenever this other personality of his surfaced, Jim would disappear, and when Jim surfaced again, he would have no recollection of what happened when Jim was 'asleep'. However, it was not the case the other way around, this other personality have a clear recollection of whatever that's happening in Jim's 'awoken' life. He went on to disclose that the last time the personality surfaced, he was but a 14 year old teenager.

That night, I learnt that this other personality has a name, till today, this name stuck, whereas the name of the main personality 'Jim' has faded in my memory. The name was "Ka Fa Kiong" (in Cantonese naturally). Jim warned me to be weary of Ka Fa Kiong, and that he was a dangerous person. Ka Fa Kiong was everything the opposite of Jim, he was mean, a prankster, violent, selfish, has absolute disregard for laws and a flirt. Ka Fa Kiong hated christianity and called Jim foolish for being in a one sided love for so long, he also despised the said "crush" with a vengeance and hated Jim for being the weak goodie two shoes that he was. Ka Fa Kiong was the perfect alter ego of Jim.

After that night, Jim disappeared for two whole weeks from my life. His phone was uncontactable, there was no social media back then. As a foreign student living in a world without whatsapp or Facebook, and with little credit on our phones most of the time, when we want to meet a friend, we knock on their door. So one late afternoon after two weeks, there was a knock at my back door.

And there stood Jim, looking disheveled, with his old bicycle. There was something about Jim that moment that felt different. I greeted Jim like how I would normally greet him. But the person stood there in the kitchen, with a smirk on his face, and told me cooly that he's no Jim. I've never seen Jim smirk, and he exuded a sort of confidence that was never present in Jim.

He announced that I should know who he was. I stared blankly at him. For some reason, I calmly replied "are you Ka Fa Kiong"?

He smirked again.

I didn't believe him despite his acknowledgement. I was so sure I was being pranked, and Jim would suddenly declared it was all a joke and that it was him after all.
But that didn't happen.

Ka Fa Kiong told me Jim was on his way home when he (Ka Fa Kiong) took control, he encountered a drunk guy in broad day light cursing around (typical England) and while the drunk took a swig from his bottle, Ka Fa Kiong took a step forward and punched him (or shoved his bottle into his mouth). Blood immediately poured from his mouth as the drunk fell to the ground, then he allowed Jim to surface, Jim 'woke' to a drunk guy with bloody mouth screaming in pain on the ground, he called the police. What followed was probably Jim faded right after the police phone call and Ka Fa Kiong came knocking at my door with injured knuckles.

Now I don't know why Ka Fa Kiong looked for me, he would visit frequently and then disappeared for weeks. I found Ka Fa Kiong alluring even when he and Jim both (I started referring them as two separate person by now) warned me about the bad person that he was; I believe it was part naivety and part curiosity that got me closer to him. I would asked him questions about his past, Jim's past, how he came about, how he felt when he was 'asleep' (it felt like resting on an isolated island apparently). Our conversations mostly revolved around my questions to him; and Ka Fa Kiong, with his usual smirk, would always answer me without reserve.

One day, while chatting in my room, he pinned me down on my bed and told me I was being too comfortable around him, he mentioned that I have forgotten he was a dangerous person, and then he kissed me. It took me by surprise, while still in a daze, and not exactly knowing what followed, Ka Fa Kiong left shortly after.

The next time Jim came around my place, I spoke to him about the kiss, this time it was Jim's turn to be shocked. He said (in Cantonese), half seriously, half teasingly: "You're in trouble, he likes you." Yet strangely, despite the violence he could perform, I always knew Ka Fa Kiong would never hurt me.

Now being attracted to a person with dual personality was a very confusing thing. Jim was in love with someone else, Ka Fa Kiong was just a vagabond at heart. Whenever either of them was around, I would become more and more attracted to this person with the same face, same height, and same voice standing in front of me. However I would always look forward to when Ka Fa Kiong visited, feeling a little guilty at the thought. After all, Jim was the dominant personality and in order for him to be completely cured, his other personality had to go. Perhaps it was the mixed signals, that night while chatting, Jim kissed me, sensing me wanting it. I kissed back. Our rendezvous became more frequent after that.

After not showing up for a week, Jim came by and said he was going to confess to his long-time crush. I listened and gave him my blessings. When Jim walked out the door that day, I didn't know I was never going to see him again.

By the time Ka Fa Kiong showed up next, weeks or months have gone by. It was the longest period either of them has disappeared. Ka Fa Kiong came to say goodbye, I was taken aback. When asked why, he explained the foolish Jim has confessed and finally got into a relationship with his crush, but it wasn't long before his crush realised they were not suitable and called it off. Jim sank into depression and decided to 'dive' into himself for good. Which meant Ka Fa Kiong was being forced out, permanently. The free spirited volatile Ka Fa Kiong was not going to stay around, he didn't tell me where he was going, but only said he would not be tied down. "Jim was stupid, and good riddance (to the crush)" he said. Then he was gone, too.

Till today I didn't know where Ka Fa Kiong went to. Did he go travelling? Did he get out of the small town that was Hull? Did he hurt anyone or break any law? Did he get into trouble? Did he go to classes as usual? I never saw him again. And I knew from church friends that Jim stopped going to the church, he has vanished together.

Life went on and I graduated. I came back to Malaysia and started my life here. Couple of years has come and gone before I heard from Jim again. And it was in the form of MSN messenger. Turned out he has returned to Hong Kong after staying back a year or two after I left England. He also informed me the bicycle I left behind to his housemate for safe keep (I thought I was going back to England to further my Master study) has been safely passed on to his trusted friend. I never did go back for that beloved bicycle of mine.

I asked him about Ka Fa Kiong, and Jim said he has never heard of such a name, let alone such a person. It took me aback. Was Ka Fa Kiong a complete fragment of my imagination? Did Jim lie about not knowing the existence of Ka Fa Kiong? Has he lost his memory? Why would he lie? What was there to hide? It wouldn't be the first time guys lie about something petty.

We never spoke again after. When MSN became obsolete, we lost complete contact.

The memory of Jim and Ka Fa Kiong cut deep. Sometimes I feel that entire section of my university life was pretty transient with no one to prove its existence. But I know for a fact both Jim and Ka Fa Kiong were very real and they were a big part of my uni life.