Greece
participants
The aim of this activity was to raise awareness about the importance of sight and people with sight problems on the occasion of World Sight Day.
We invited the Regional Blind Association of Crete and we were honored to have the president and the vice president with us. They were willing to answer our questions, share their stories and give us some information about sight in general . They showed us some of their interesing and different games they use to play in their association , such as chess for blind people and cards. Furthermore, since one of our ESNers has been taught the Braille writing system, we showed them in cooperation with the association how people with this disability write and read.The participants had the chance to type on their own. Then, we played some games for the students to understand how these people feel and what they need. For instance, one game was dancing latin, blindfolded and in pairs. An other game we played was letting the blindfolded participants guess from which place different sounds, such as a squeesed bottle, come from and what they are.
Everyone was surprised and satisfied about this event because they gained insight about the daily challenges visually impaired people face. They got to feel, how it is to orientate themselves and other objects without being able to see and thus they became more aware and senstitive towards disabilities. Since the participants were international, local students and university professors, the event reached a wide audience. Our guests from the Regional Blind Acossiation of Crete were extremely happy about our initiative to organise this event since they got the chance to deliver the messages they want people to know. The main messages were accesibility for everyone and that blind people should be treated as every other person.