E V E R S C A R

211. Dining in the Dark.

Friday, January 20, 2012 @ 11:10 PM

My very first field trip in ITE and our destination : The Singapore Association of the Visually Handicapped. (SAVH)

Previously known as Singapore Association for the Blind (SAB) [explained later on ... sort of.], is a voluntary welfare organisation, founded in 1951. The association is affiliated to the National Council of Social Service (NCSS) and is an approved Institution of a Public Character (IPC).

Their Mission :

To Help the Visually Handicapped Help Themselves.Help the Visually Impaired help themselves by acquiring new skills and gaining self reliance to cope with the integration into society.

Started the day by reporting to school.

Communication Skills Teacher , Mrs Tan. Uber nice!

Mrs Tan's car which I looks fabb!

Numerous Newspaper clippings of reports of their program to raise awareness. All success stories.

3 of the visually impaired volunteers who served us plus the host of this.

This is where it gets interesting ... And also where my bitching starts.

Beyond the arch is total pitch darkness and it's also where we will be eating hence the program name 'Dining in the Dark.' This program is aimed at educating people on what/how it feels like to be visually impaired.

Let me just say that in my 16 years of living I've never interacted/conversed with someone disabled. It makes me cringe sometimes when I see disabled people, not because I detest or find them repulsive but because the thought of even imagining myself in their shoes freaks me out to the point I want to scream/cry/go insane. The closest I've come to someone disabled is my grandmother who is currently still having demencia and not able to move around on her own.

But today I'm not given a choice of whether I want to be in their shoes or not.

So we soon are brought into 2 separate rooms because there are like 23 of us an each room had 1 & 2 tables respectively. Now upon entering the room, it really is pitch black darkness. It's like wearing goggles with black paint at the front and no matter how hard you try to adjust to the darkness you can't because they've blocked out all possible light... Or so I thought, there were no windows ; it was an enclosed room.

But anyway.

Not even starting to eat or even have everyone sat down yet someone decides to take out their phone for light. This just ticks me off , because they clearly told us to leave our phones outside but I guess some people have no respect. Not only that , if that light was just for you and only you saw it , fine. But did you consider whether other people appreciated what you did? You're being completely inconsiderate and absolutely disrespectful.

Soon we're all sitted and waiting for our food to be served. Again I remind you, we''re being served by people that are visually handicapped. Before food arrives, we're served juice from a jug. And we have to pour it ourselves and of course we're not used to it because we always use our vision to gauge how much to pour. But without vision this is the reaction from various people in my class...

"WAH *UCK SIA HOW TO POUR CANNOT SEE!?"

"WHAT THE HELL , HOW AM I SUPPOSE TO POUR?"

"SHIT LAH STUPID SIA HOW TOO DO LIKE THAT?!"

etc , you get the point?

All being said while the ones who were serving us were in the room.

Seriously how insensitive can you people get? You're going through this for less then an hour whereas people have to go through this every waking moment of their lives. Have you no heart? Insensitive bitches , you can't keep your damn comments to yourself? Or is it because you live such pampered and always get what you which causes you to act like a stupid brat? I won't lie, I myself live quite a pampered life but I don't take it as an excuse to be a insensitive in fact it's all the more reason to be sensitive and humble.

I mean I'm not saying I didn't have difficulty but hell I wasn't screaming to the heavens to strike a hole in the roof for light, I was trying to understand how it felt. I wanted to experience what God apparently blessed me from, but some people can't let others be without letting them know they exactly how they feel. Bitch, you think I really give fuck about how you can't pour juice? I did it fine why can't you? And even if you can't why must you scream it out?

But what happens above doesn't end there. Nope. It goes on for the entire meal; drink , main course , dessert. Complaining all the way.

Main course, complained about how they don't like to eat it and how it's no warmed up.

Dessert , complain about only having 1 scoop of ice cream.

Seriously , Fuck you and you're shit ass complains. You can easily buy whatever 5 star food you want after and not eat what they give you but to go on and on about how you don't like it is plain insensitive and rude.

For fuck sake you're not even paying for this. There are actual people that go there just to experience it and they pay real money to know how it feels. You? Free so it's okay for you to complain? If your argument is because the school makes you do then you're wrong because honey you can do anything you want but to come and disrupt someone else who wants a taste of experience is where you should back the fuck up.

By the end of it I just couldn't take it. I put myself in Serene's shoes (our server) and I just couldn't help but brawl at what she was going through. 17-20 years olds acting like snobby brats. I mean the level of insensitivity and disrespect is just unforgivable for teenagers. I thought when I came to ITE in a higher nitec class I'd have moved on from all this kind of bullshit which I thought only happens in secondary school but I guess I'm wrong. But I'll tell you one thing I'm not wrong about , the characters of the people I judge from orientation day one till now. I was right and I'm reassured of who to avoid now. My judgement of people in secondary school wasn't wrong and now in ITE it's not wrong either.

Serene and Me.

Proof that I cried. Red eyes.

After we'd finish eating and everyone left. I went to look for Serene to apologize on my class's behalf. (even though apologizing would have been the last thing they would do) And I brawled even more imagining what she's going through or at least what I would have felt if I was her. But she was very nice and told me not to cry it wasn't my fault nor my classes because people are who they are, they don't appreciate what they have until they've lost it. Ironically she's never been through that because she's lived her entire life being completely blind but has been able to support herself in spite of her handicap.

Someone give her a medal.

After eating we went on to learn more about other things that visually handicap people use/do. Above, A lady's showing us things that are used by visually handicap people to aid them in daily life. A solid black and white watch which she is holding is to help those with low vision and can only see in extreme colors. There's a talking calculator and clock too. They also have a braille watch!

Numerous awards the association has won over the years.

This one caught my eye because it wasn't like a typical certificate. It had miniature instruments !

We moved on to learning about how visually impaired people study. And here is where I need to stop again.

Because I never EVER interacted with visually impaired people I've also never given a thought to exactly what they go through. All I ever thought was okay, they're blind and they use walking sticks. I never thought about exactly how/when they actually started having problems or what they have to do after they've encountered the problem.

This is a braille typewriter, it's or typing out the braille onto paper. It's actually hard to explain here but because braille uses a 6 cell rectangle to show a symbol that represents a word/letter/number you actually have to press a few buttons together to get the right numbers of cells punched in.

Another new discovery I have is that visually impaired people like Serene who have been impaired since birth are still required to study like normal students. Meaning they have to study English , Math , Science and everything else. AND on top of all that all of it is mostly in braille too. They don't get extension on exams either , they take just as long as we do or test and exams. So can you imagine how much harder they have to work?

This is cool.

What the ...

WHAT?

*DEAD*

Now can you imagine how much harder it is? I know I can and I'm so so so so thankful that I have vision even if it's slightly myopic , as long as I can see I'm blessed.

I am most likely in danger o this.

All in all, I've definitely benefited from the field trip (first time sia, lol ) and I've learned a lot about the visually impaired and the obstacles they go through. I've also learnt that a few of my classmates can be classified as barbarians.

And I am most certainly going to visit SAVH again.

Labels: Field Trip, ITE, SAVH

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