"Wish," the girl replied back loud and clear.
"Good, Wish will be the last one in line. Everyone must check that Wish is with all of us when you get in there. Wish, you must reply to the guide in there. Everything understood?"
"Yes," everyone understood.
Don continues, "Ok. Let follow me in line. To your right, there is wall. Walk on your right. You will use your hand to feel the walk and guide your way. You hold your cane on the other hand. You can switch your hand for holding the cane if necessary. It is getting darker and darker as we walk in. And you will not see anything."
I felt it's getting darker and darker until I did not see a thing. I walked with my 7-year-old daughter at my front. My left hand held her left hand, in her hand is the cane. I showed her how to wave the cane and felt what is in front of us. My right hand felt the wall along as we walked. All the teenage girls walked in line right behind two of us. I could feel someone's hand on my back. Now we only used our hand feeling the wall to guide us in. The wall suddenly ended and make a 360 degree u-turn. We walked following Don's voice until the wall guided us to our left into a room.
The girls yelled, "Wait for us!"
Don asked, "Wish, are you here? Please let us know."
"I am here!" She replied.
"Ok. Let's stop here. In front of us is a room. We will get in there." Don explained. "Please walk slowly from the wall and now you will use your cane. Walk towards my voice."
I led my daughter and the group into the room towards Don's voice, still my hand touching the wall. With wall on my hand, I felt safer. Everyone was in the room. Wish was the last one entering the room and replied to Don's call.
"Ok. Now I like you to meet Mr. Arm, our guide. Arm will take all of us from now on and guide us into the world of the blinds. I will have to leave all of you here. Please enjoy the journey. Good bye everyone." Don said and walked away quietly.
Someone clapped hands to get our attention. It was Arm. "Hello, everyone. My name is Arm. I will be your guide in this exhibition called Diaglogue in the Dark. This show will take us about an hour or so. Please walk slowly to my voice. You will find something. Can anyone tell me what it is?"
I walked with my daughter towards his voice and my cane hit something on our right. I knelt down and felt something soft, cold and leather-like material. It is a couch.
"I found a couch here on our right." I told everyone.
Arm responded, "Ok. Someone has found a couch. Please have a seat and we have enough space for everyone."
I sat down and moved until I felt the couch has ended. I lift my daughter on my lap. The teenage students all sat down besides us.
"Does Wish have your seat?" Arm asked. "Yes, I do." Wish replied.
Arm continued, "Already. Now let's introduce ourselves so that I know who you are. How many of us there?"
"7." the students all answered.
Arm suggested, "The first name please."
"Jatuporn and little daugther, her name is Yoon." I replied.
Arm responded, "Yoon? Ok. Please allow me to call you Daddy and Yoon. The next one please."
His voice is a little bit high-pitch. Couldn't tell how old he was.
The students, "Ploy", "Jib", "Bee", "Pim", "and Wish."
Arm repeated the names slowly, "Ploy, Jib, Bee, Pim and Wish. I got all your names."
He continues, "First off, let me introduce you to Diaglogue in the Dark just a little bit. It is an exhibition that you will never see with your eyes. It provides opportunity for people to explore the world of the blind. After everyone experiences the exhibition, we hope that you will understand how the blind lives their life. How they relies on themselves, how they adjust their lifestyles, if they have more difficulty in life than any other normal people. The Dialogue in the Dark happened the first time in Germany. The idea was initiated by Mr. Andreas Heinecke when he believed that people would learn more efficiently by experiencing it, not just by being told. It became very popular and spreaded throughout the world to more than 160 locations in more than 30 countries. And this is the only Diaglogue in the Dark in Thailand."
We listened quietly to Arm's story of Diaglogue in the Dark. "Does anyone know what room we are in now?" Arm asked as a question.
"Living room," Ploy answered. "Family room." Jib added.
"Exactly, very good, the first room in our home that I take you in is our living room or family room. We just walked in to a blind person's home." Arm responded and paused.
Then Arm told us to get up and walked over to the wall on our right. He told us to walk on our right feeling the wall as our guide. We heard bird chirping, louder and louder as we continued walking. We also heard water fall. Arm told us to practice listening while we walked. He kept asking what we heard. How did we feel the floor with our feet. Was it soft? Was it hard? Was it rough? We continued walking until the wall disappeared.
Now I felt like I was in the middle of nowhere as I stood with my daughter without anything except a cane to hold on to. I stopped there didn't know where to go until hearing Arm clapped his hands. "Please do not stop. Continue walking towards my voice. Does anyone find anything. Daddy? Yoon? are you ok? You are the bravest girl I ever see."
Yoon was very quiet than her usual, but she was not whining or anything. She was very brave as I knew her. I led her in with my hand on her hand waving the cane in front of us. We felt a step.
Arm continued, "There is a step in front of you. If you find it, you just walk up-step."
"We found the step. Do you notice the step, Yoon." I asked my daughter and tried moving her hand with the cane. "It is higher than where we are so it means there is a step in front. Just step on it to where our cane points to, ok?"
She seemed to understand what I explained to her and stepped over it. I stepped after her with my right hand waving around trying to find something to hold on to. I still felt not ready to walk without a wall. The students walked behind us in group. Now the line we formed outside has vanished. Everyone told each other things that they found. We talked and kept talking. Seemingly this was only way we could find ourselves that our company was still with us.
Finally, I found .... After I waved my hand for a while. My feet were a little bit shaking as well as my body.
Picture borrowed from http://www.travelpod.com/travel-photo/judeabrown/1/1278105833/a-hanging-bridge.jpg/tpod.html
*****************************************************************************(to be continued...)
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