I have
recently been on holiday to Spain and I found it quite interesting how
attitudes vary towards sight loss.
I read
before we travelled that the airport do a pink lanyard, which shows staff that
you, or somebody in your group, may need extra help. I considered this, but I thought I would use
my guide cane so they can see that just like they can see a pink lanyard. It
said online to look out for any pink areas, as these are help zones for any
passengers that have any questions or are struggling to find their way
around. So it all sounded really
positive.
When we got
to the airport however it was a completely different story. When we were in the check in area it was like
me and my white cane were invisible. Other passengers were constantly knocking
into me and we just checked in as normal. It wasn’t until we got to security
that a man actually noticed me and checked we were all ok. He said that we should have all asked for a
pink lanyard so that they would know that we needed extra support. I never
really thought about it this way before, but if I had got a lanyard then they
would have known that I was there and that there is somebody coming through
that will need help. So they would actually look. Now that I have seen it that way, next time I
will definitely get one. But I still think
my cane was pretty obvious. When we went through the body scanner, I really
wasn’t sure which way I was going. With
all the machinery and people around it was hard to see which way to go. I tried
to follow my Dad who went through first, but it was still hard. My cane had to
go through the hand luggage scanner which I do understand, but it meant that I
couldn’t use it to guide me. I always have a person or my cane guiding me, so I
felt quite strange and anxious. I was the only one of us that didn’t beep. So
my Mum and Dad were taken to one side to be searched. The man on the scanner
made a point of telling the body searching staff that I was with them but I
hadn’t beeped. I tried to move nearer to my Mum and Dad to get out of the way
and they wouldn’t let me anywhere near them. I was just stood, not really sure
which way I was going or not going until they had finished. I was just kind of
stood in the way.
After we had
finished in security we had the fun job of finding the gate. We looked around
for the pink zones that were mentioned. Eventually we found a pink machine that was out of order. Not very
useful at all. That was the nearest thing we saw to a pink zone.
Getting onto
the plane was amazing! We had to go up the stairs and not an air bridge which I
really don’t mind. It’s not the same getting an air bridge. I love going
outside and seeing a massive plane. I was so excited. I walked up the stairs at
my own pace, trying to concentrate on where I was walking and staring at the
plane both at the same time was quite difficult. But I didn’t feel rushed by
anybody which was nice. A lady from the cabin crew was stood by the plane door
trying her best to help me onto the plane and I accidently headbutted her!
Oops! I apologised and she was fine… I hope. But there was an announcement
before we took off about their friendly behaviour policy. My Dad was joking
saying that they only played that announcement because of me.
When we
landed in Alicante, the staff saw me with my cane and let us straight through,
while everybody else had to queue around barriers. Straight away we all
thought, that is so different to the airport at home. This was one of the few
moments where my sight loss came in useful. I smiled as we walked past them all
feeling very pleased with myself.
However,
while we were actually on holiday, I found a lot of things not very accessible.
Hardly anywhere had accessible toilets and the few places that had ramps where
very narrow wobbly ones that were just placed over steps. Again, completely
different to at home, but in the other way. People just didn’t seem to
understand or recognise what my cane was for. I am not sure whether they are
actually used in Spain or not, but even other tourists just ignored it. I
wasn’t really after any special treatment, just a bit of space to get around. I
did have one positive experience though in a wildlife park. We went to see a dolphin show and they let us
sit on the front row. It was still hard
to see and we got quite wet, but it was very nice for them to let me do
this.
We also went
on a coach trip to Valencia. The travel rep was very nice and had saved some
seats for us near the front of the coach. However when we got to Valencia she was supposed to be taking us to the
meeting point for coming back and everybody left us. We couldn’t catch up and
lost them very quickly.
We all
really enjoyed our holiday, but the support for visually impaired people was
very unpredictable.
