blind – Notes from the Cape

Published February 17, 2024

Louis Braille

Visiting Louis Braille’s final resting place was very special for me. Of course with a blind wife this is because Braille features in my life. At one stage all our CD’s had Braille labels (of course now we hardly use CD’s at all). It is astonishing to think that this man developed a system to allow millions of people to read books again. He in interred at the Pantheon in Paris, which in its own right is a lovely place to visit.

Its also a little ironic that in many areas Braille isn’t nearly as useful as it used to be, especially with modern phones, ebooks, book readers and apps etc. It’s also lovely to see how these tools make it even easier for a blind person to lead a normal life. Lets hope the progress continues.

Travel

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(blind) Street art tour of Salt River

Last weekend Lois and I did something unusual. We went on a street art tour of Salt River. In itself that isn’t unusual. But what was unusual is that the tour guide, Winston Fani, is blind! It literally was a case of the blind leading the blind. Winston recently received his tour-guide certification from Cape Town tourism, and he is the only blind tour guide in South Africa (and possible even in Africa).

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This mural is over 3 stories high

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The “cell phone” is directly opposite the previous mural

The tour lasted about 90 minutes, and he took us on a walk through Salt River where we went past several art studio, some little coffee shops, and some amazing street art.

If you want to find out more about his tours, or even attend (highly recommended), you can contact info@awoltours.co.za, tel: +27 83 234 6428.

Here are a few more photos.