Not seeing is believing

Enter­ing the world of the blind with a field trip to Dia­logue in the Dark.

By ELEANOR YAP

You and I see. We see the vivid greens on the trees and the colours and shapes of flow­ers. We see the faces of strangers who pass by and we enjoy watch­ing their inter­ac­tions as we sip our cof­fee. We see an empty seat on the bus and we smile with glee at hav­ing a seat to enjoy for half an hour. 

What if … we couldn’t see and we lived in a world of darkness. 

Dia­logue in the Dark is a social enter­prise located on the Ngee Ann Poly­tech­nic cam­pus. Vis­i­tors enter a com­pletely dark envi­ron­ment that sim­u­lates the every­day world. Deprived of sight, their other senses take over as they are led through the expe­ri­ence by a blind guide. It’s an expe­ri­ence that breaks through the stereo­types, fears, avoid­ance and prej­u­dices between abled and dis­abled people. 

After a short ori­en­ta­tion ses­sion, a bunch of my NVPC col­leagues and I entered an area (I can’t even tell you how large or small it was) that was pitch black. It was a new sen­sa­tion to be sight­less, and I was to say the least, ter­ri­fied. I wanted to lessen my fear as much as pos­si­ble. My first reac­tion was to sand­wich myself between two col­leagues. I needed a safety net, but some­how I ended up in front. If you ask me to take the lead on a writ­ing project, no prob­lem. To be the first to lead our group into the unknown, I felt scared… but not scared enough to back out.

We were each given a long cane. We were told to keep it close to the ground and swing it from side to side to feel our way for­ward. That was all we had, and yes, our non-​visual senses for one hour! My heart beat faster as I led the way, tap­ping with my cane, feel­ing the wall with my left hand and tak­ing very small steps.

We were told there were no stairs and it was safe. No one had fallen … not yet, that is. I was already think­ing to myself – I would make his­tory! It would be me! Each step for­ward was a huge chal­lenge, fur­ther into the unknown. I was scared of falling, not know­ing what to expect. I couldn’t even see my hand in front of my eyes. 

We had one guide to the nine of us. Kelvin had been visually-​handicapped since birth. We were all enter­ing his world, his ter­ri­tory and he knew it well. He was respon­si­ble and he did not leave any­one lost or lin­ger­ing behind.

My other senses took con­trol – the touch and the smell. It was a whole dif­fer­ent world. I could hear the birds. Lots of them. Spar­rows, said Kelvin. I can’t vouch for that; I thought they were finches. 

We got on a boat and took a ride down the Sin­ga­pore River. We could feel the sprin­kle of water and the cold wind against our faces. Our guide told us we passed the Mer­lion, and I can’t vouch for that either, but I could hear the dis­tinct dif­fer­ence that we were not on the river any more and now closer to the shore. 

In one area, we touched huge let­ters on a sign to deci­pher it. I whisked by leaves and had no clue if they were from a tree or a plant. I touched a small water­fall and won­dered – where the heck were we? I missed the statue of Sir Raf­fles Stam­ford that every­one else was chat­ter­ing about, but I was never good in the dark! 

As we fol­lowed the trail, we touched all kinds of things like life jack­ets, a car and a bicy­cle. I appre­ci­ated the famil­iar­ity but wished the lights were on and I could admire them. We even got to press a traf­fic light and feel what it is like for a blind per­son to cross the road.

And then we came to the coffee-​shop, and each of us bought a snack and a drink. It was a chal­lenge to use money with­out being able to count it. My sense of taste came alive with the home-​baked crispy choco­late chip cookie and sev­eral fond mem­o­ries of cook­ies came to mind. 

As we sat, we asked ques­tions of our guide and there was no holds barred. Should we say ‘blind’ or ‘visu­ally impaired’? Why do some blind peo­ple wear sun­glasses? Why don’t you get a guide dog? What do you do for fun? How do you feel when you walk into a new place? We wanted to under­stand his world. 

We were thrilled to dis­cover that Kelvin was a celebrity – his blind­ness had not stopped him from com­pet­ing in Sin­ga­pore Idol. Kelvin said he was luck­ier than those who had lost their sight after being able to see. He felt that with noth­ing to go by, he could be more cre­ative in his mind about what things in the world looked like.

The hour flew by and we finally emerged, daz­zled by the light out­side. Our bus was wait­ing but we all lin­gered on. We had all learned some­thing new, become more empa­thetic and knew we would be more under­stand­ing the next time we saw a blind person. 

The expe­ri­ence for me was huge and one I will not for­get any time soon. I wish more mar­gin­al­ized groups like the dis­abled or even the elderly could be the focus for sim­i­lar Dia­logues so we can develop empa­thy for them too. We may have been robbed of our sight for that one hour, but really, it was the dark­ness that got us talk­ing and see­ing things a whole lot clearer. 

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ABOUT DIA­LOGUE IN THE DARK:

Dia­logue in the Dark, which was founded by social entre­pre­neur Dr Andreas Hei­necke, is essen­tially a walk­ing tour of var­i­ous sim­u­lated envi­ron­ments in com­plete dark­ness, led by visually-​impaired guides. It offers an unusual but effec­tive plat­form to raise aware­ness and allow inclu­sion of every­one regard­less of race, class, reli­gion and dis­abil­i­ties as these are no longer vis­i­ble in the dark. The con­cept is sim­ple, yet pow­er­ful and the expe­ri­ence profound.

The Sin­ga­pore expe­ri­ence offi­cially launched in April of this year and is sup­ported by the Min­istry of Com­mu­nity, Devel­op­ment, Youth and Sports, Man­power Staff Ser­vices (Sin­ga­pore), National Her­itage Board, Ngee Ann Kongsi, Lee Foun­da­tion, Pure Eddic­tion and YEO’S. Dia­logue in the Dark Sin­ga­pore is the first in the world to be set up in an edu­ca­tional insti­tu­tion, and it pro­vides a hands-​on expe­ri­ence in social enter­prise for the stu­dent vol­un­teers who mange it. It employs 14 guides from the age of 21 to 56 who are visually-​impaired. For more infor­ma­tion, go to www​.dia​logueinthedark​.com​.sg.

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ABOUT DIN­ING IN THE DARK:

Want to dine in the dark and at the same time, learn about the chal­lenges faced by visually-​impaired peo­ple? Organ­ised by the Sin­ga­pore Asso­ci­a­tion of the Visu­ally Hand­i­capped (SAVH), Din­ing in the Dark gives a sighted per­son a chance to expe­ri­ence what it is like to be blind, with­out the use of blind­folds. Only avail­able for lunch on week­days and week­ends, patrons get a choice of three set meals from fish and chips to chicken nuggets.

The idea, which orig­i­nated from Blind­ekuh (Blind Cow) restau­rant in Switzer­land, has blind and visually-​impaired peo­ple as serv­ing staff. At Din­ing in the Dark, specially-​trained SAVH clients are wait­ers and kitchen helpers. 

Reser­va­tions are pre­ferred if you are inter­ested in eat­ing at the restau­rant. For more infor­ma­tion, go to: www​.savh​.org​.sg/​q​l​_​d​i​t​d.php.