Blind professor badly treated
THE EDITOR: I am a Canadian resident vacationing in Trinidad and Tobago. As a blind person, I travel mostly by taxi and maxi. Recently, I went for a swim in Chaguaramas. It was my fourth visit and I was by now expecting the staff at the resort would be familiar with me. Everything went well until on my way out around noon. I asked the ticket clerk for his cooperation in helping me flag a maxi. The clerk was absolutely uncooperative and ridiculed me by suggesting that I came there on my own and should therefore find my way back as well. Feeling humiliated, I requested a phone to call my friends in the city to send me a ride. The male clerk desisted until a bystander intervened. The bystander in fact flagged me a maxi but the clerk refused a second phone call to cancel my ride. I first came here in 1994 as a graduate student researching historical ties between East Africa and the West Indies. Since then I have made two more visits including this one as a university professor. I have made good friends with several Trinidadians and developed a genuine attachment to this island nation. Trinidadians are perhaps the friendliest people I have encountered, and the clerk at the hotel is just one bad potato who would not colour my feelings about this country. But I hope the hotel officials will understand the abusive nature of the clerk’s behaviour and take this complaint seriously. I hope they will realise that individuals with disabilities have as much rights as anyone else to enjoy their beach facility. And I hope they will understand that giving a blind or other disabled person some assistance, such as flagging a maxi, etc, is a customary business courtesy. FIKRU GEBREKIDAN, PhD St Thomas University Fredericton, NB (Canada)
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"Blind professor badly treated"