Dialog in the Dark: Journey into Blind Awareness

Photo credit: þä½

“The only way to learn is through encounters.” —Martin Buber

With blurry vision and a semi-paralyzed face, I sit in front of my computer, struggling to write, pausing every few minutes to rest.

I fantasize about being somewhere else, someone else (non-disabled)….and in a completely different moment.

But I know that’s not possible and that what is… simply is…right now.

I’m fighting off a sudden, mysterious and temporary Bell’s Palsy that struck me last week—and brought my life to a virtual halt—and I’m also being transported back in time to another time and place when, for an hour, I was…in complete darkness.

Temporarily and voluntarily blind, that is.

And back then, as now, I felt awkward, vulnerable and a little bit frightened.

Unlike now, though, I chose to have that experience, known as Dialog in the Dark—an experiential tour of the unseeing world. My guide: a man named Claude who’s American just like me, but happens to be blind.

I took this unique journey (in Atlanta, GA) because as a traveler, I want to not just to see the sights, but to understand people and their way of life in the deepest way possible. And while most often, I choose to travel to other countries and other cultures, it made sense to stay right here and see…the world of the unseeing.

Tour in Total Darkness

“You can stand up now,” said Claude, with a gentle and caring voice, which had a Southern accent (to me, anyway, as a Northerner). We’d been sitting on some large white cubes in a room where the light gradually dimmed to total darkness and were now ready to move.”Keep your cane down and follow me.”

I listened closely as my eyes tried to find their way. There was nothing to latch on to, though, so I closed them. And I immediately felt off balance. I opened them and it was the same. Dark. Dense. Inky black. And an immediate sense of disorientation that alternated between claustrophobia and excessive openness/exposure.

I was in a state of culture shock. Not from the sights, obviously, but rather, the absence of them.

“Who all is here?” Claude asked and we introduced ourselves. It was me, my friend Sprite, a family of 4 and a couple others. He told us about his life and how he’d been legally blind for most of it and then eventually, totally blind.

“Reach down and touch the ground,” he told us. And we did, feeling the softness of the grass. Thinking back to that moment, I recall it seeming real and smelling green, but now I’m not sure.

Shopping in the Supermarket

“Notice the rail? Tap it, then use it to guide you to where we’re going next.”  And we were led by it to a section of a simulated supermarket. I bumped into a shelf, nearly knocking over some boxes of what seemed to be cereal.

“Touch everything,” he said. “See if you can figure out what it is.” My hands began to feel the roughness of a pineapple, the smoothness of an apple, the unevenness of wooden baskets and the ice cold steel shelves. I shook things and smelled them when I wasn’t sure and often figured out what I was handling. But not always.

And it was sort of fun—until check-out time.

“What about money?” We followed Claude to the register and imagined the logistics of this in real life. “How hard is it to pay when you go shopping normally?” I asked.

“Very hard,” Claude said. I could sense the frustration in his voice and now, living it, I empathized. One could work with coins because of their sizes, but not with actual currency. A debit card would probably be the way.
photo © 2006 Akash Kataruka | more info (via: Wylio)

Crossing the Street

We then moved on to a busy section of the “city” and approached a street that we would need to cross. I was suddenly overwhelmed by the cacophony of people, cars, horns and other noises. I felt a little claustrophobic and stressed out by it.

I was blind now and needed to cross the street and, as much as my sense of hearing had been heightened, I still struggled. This simulation was suddenly feeling very real.

“Sprite? Where are you?” I found myself calling out my friend’s name several times, wanting to be near her. A couple times, I held onto her sleeve or the back of her jacket for some extra support.

Blind Leading the Blind

Although we couldn’t see, there was nothing to fear.  Claude, who was blind, served as our eyes. He knew the terrain—his land—and led us through it. We were in good hands.

“Um, Claude…where do I go now? How do I get over there?” I asked, tapping with my cane and feeling awkward. “Take my hand, young lady,” he said. I smiled, of course, and then wondered how old he was.

Next, I think (funny how I can’t recall the tour in a linear fashion due to the disorientation), we crossed a bridge. And I got to know Claude a bit more. He sounded like he was about 30 or so and was very warm and giving. He seemed to speak from his heart and to radiate kindness. I could see—no, feel—that because of our encounter in the unseeing world.

Alternative Interaction

I then wondered, then what it would be like to get to know people…blindly….at first. What would happen to judgements based on skin color, clothing, size, etc.? How enhanced would one’s intuition be about strangers?

How much better and more accurate would one be—would I be—if I judged a person’s character on how it felt to interact with them versus how they looked?

“Young lady, where are you?” he asked. I think he sensed and heard that I wasn’t in the right spot. “I’m here, Claude. What next?”

“A boat ride.” I sensed that he was smiling, that perhaps this was his favorite part of the tour.

“Really?”

“Yup.”

Like children on a class trip, we awkwardly made our way onto a boat and felt how easy it would have been to fall. Fortunately, the ramp was set up for the disabled, meaning arm rails and a gradual incline and decline.

Once safely on board, I opened my eyes, checking and hoping for a glimmer of light, but finding none. I closed my eyes again and went within,  reflecting on the current moment and previous ones.

Travel Epiphany

It was, I thought, the darkest dark I’d ever been in, and I’ve experienced some seriously dark nights….in the jungle, the mountains and the desert.

Those were different, however, because there, you might make out some sort of silhouette thanks to the stars or catch a glimpse of a burning ember in a fire just shared with felllow travelers.

In this special wing of a building, in a simulated unseeing world, there was no sliver of light that might slip through.

But somehow, this was travel, too, wasn’t it? Sure I was in Atlanta, GA—in the US—but I’d entered another another realm, dimension in which my allowed senses were fully engaged. I was temporarily in the world of the blind, putting myself in their shoes. Living life as they do.

And just as I was getting used to this other world, we reached our final destination: the cafe. We sat on bar stools (I think) and ordered drinks. Those of us who ordered fumbled for our money and when we took the drink.

Now, sitting and chatting with Claude, I and the others felt close to him. He’d been our guide—he’d shown us his land—and during that, a sort of bonding had occurred. I felt like we knew him and he knew us.

“How do you like your job, Claude?” I asked. Many of the questions had been about the struggles of being blind and of being different. I thought it would be nice to focus on something more positive and what we shared.

“It makes me very happy,” he said. “I’m happy to have a job in which I can teach others.”

“That’s great. Me, too. I’m also a teacher.”

I thanked him, as the others did, and smiled, hoping he knew and felt it. And then, the lights came back on and we saw Claude for the first time. Now, in the other world—the one I lived in—I saw that he was an African American man of about 40 with sweet eyes and a warm smile. The  light from the lamp above us, reflected in his eyes, suddenly seemed inappropriate and a bit jarring.

Fortunately, though, the connection we’d made was unbroken and remained…even as we said goodbye and he disappeared…back into his world…for another dialog in the dark.

Awareness and Gratitude…in the Now

Now, back in this moment—sitting here in front of my computer and straining to see the screen, trying to move my face—I think of Claude and the tour he took me on. Being blind for an hour, struggling with the basics of everyday life, was humbling. So is what I’m going through right now.

But as was the case then, my senses are now heightened and I’m more in the moment. And I’m also more appreciative of simple things I took for granted before—the sound of music, the texture and flavor of an orange, the resonance of kind words, the connection from a warm hug, etc.

The bottom line?

I’m in the moment and just a little bit more aware. And I see the world of the non-seeing, the seeing and their overlapping world and culture a bit differently, thanks to Claude and the dialog we shared in March. In the dark. And for those moments—and this one—I’m grateful.

What Do You Think?

Have you experienced Dialog in the Dark? What was it like? If not, would you? Do you consider this experience a trip of sorts? And how do you see the blind community? Are they another culture or simply the same one, with a somewhat different perception?

photo © 2006 Francisca Ulloa | more info (via: Wylio)

*************

Link Luv

Dialog in the Dark: This is the link to the main site, which explains how the exhibit’s set-up and the mission of its founder, Andreas Heinecke.

Dialog in the Dark for Groups: Here you can find information about group tours, including student field trips.

In case you didn’t know, there are now travel agencies that arrange tours for visually impaired/blind people. Here are some links:

Traveleyes: Special trips to international destinations in which sighted travelers go for 50% off in exchange for “serving as the eyes” for their fellow blind/visually impaired passengers

Mind’s Eye Travel: Offers group tours geared to “sensory discovery”

Photo credit (1st image) goes to þä½ of flickr.