Wednesday, December 1, 2010

BlindSight movie

Tonight I attended a Damn good movie night in Park Center hosted by Dr. Davis. The movie of choice was title BlindSight. This movie was centered towards individuals with visual impairments and most of which were completely blind. Erik Weihenmayer was the first blind man to ever climb Mt. Everest. He was the focal point of the movie because he was contacted by a woman in charge (Sabriye Tenberken) of running a school in Tibet called Braille Without Borders. This is an underdeveloped city in Asia that has a plethora of individuals who are blind. Sabriye wrote Erik a letter explaining to him the situation of their school and how much of an inspiration Erik was to her students who are blind. Erik thought it was not enough to just show up at that school for the students but instead planned a trek into the Himalayas to climb a high peak. The students were thrilled to do this adventure and be like their hero Erik. For most of the adventure the students did well but when the elevation got higher the students began to be sick and they could not reach the top of the mountain. Erik stated at the end of the movie that the friendships he made and being around the students was an amazing experience and was much more important than actually making it to the top of the mountain.

I believe that this story is a true story of triumph. In Tibet, people who are blind are seen as possessed by some entity and there blindness is frowned upon and they are excluded. It is important to make a film like this to show that individuals with disabilities can be just like and do similar things than individuals without disabilities. Just because they may do things differently doesn't mean that they can't do anything. I would advise anyone to watch this movie because it is very inspirational.

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