Any Questions?

00:06 S1

This is Studio 1 on Vision Australia Radio.

00:19 S2

Hello, I'm Sam...

00:20 S3

And I'm Lizzie.

00:21 S2

And this is Studio 1, your weekly look at life from a low vision and blind point of view - here on Vision Australia Radio.

00:27 S3

On this week's show...

00:28 S2

How do we create these shows? Well, we do it by asking a lot of questions and a lot of very standard questions. So this week we're asking each other these same questions.

00:39 S3

As we always say at this point, please do get in touch with the show whether you have any experience with the issues covered on this week's episode of Studio 1, or if you think there's something we should be talking about. You never know - your story and insight may help someone who's dealing with something similar.

00:54 S2

You can email us, studio1@visionaustralia.org - that's studio number one at Vision Australia dot org.

00:59 S3

Or perhaps you can drop us a note on our Facebook at facebook.com slash VA Radio Your network.

01:08 S2

Hello, Lizzie.

01:09 S3

Hello, Sam. How are we today?

01:11 S2

Oh, I'm cruising along. We're coming close to the end of the year, and, well, I'm very, very busy as well, because the stuff that needs to be done when we're actually not here.

01:23 S3

I'm good as well. Sam, you know, same old, same old riding my bike and, you know, doing the same old stuff you.

01:30 S2

You were saying to me on... earlier on that the hot weather has a different effect on you than it might have to other people out there.

01:37 S3

Yeah. So I don't really sweat as much as the normal person. This is due to my ichthyosis. It's a skin condition, basically, where there is a lack of vitamin A, I believe. And so there's a thickening and scaling of the skin. And unfortunately, this means that while I do sweat, it's not as much as what, you know, say you or, and you know, the normal person would sweat. I don't sweat as much. And when I do sweat, it's very salty. So as a result, I can't cool my body down naturally, and my heart rate just keeps on increasing until either I pass out or find a cool place to hide. So yeah, summer is not fun for me at all.

02:16 S2

So all you want for Christmas is a wading pool, I'm presuming.

02:19 S3

All I want for Christmas is not to have to go outside - but unfortunately, I know I'm not going to get my wish.

02:25 S2

So anyway, this week's show is a [?bottle] episode. Really, it's just the pair of us chatting away. So, dear listener, be patient with us. There is a reason behind this and that is because it's a call to action. We want you out there to be involved with what we do. Our show is different from the others in the fact that our listeners are our guests and they are our experts. So what we are doing is asking each other the standardised vox pop questions that you, the listener, might be asked if you decided to volunteer to be part of our show as well. And I mean, this has been your domain, Lizzy, for most of this year. And how have you found getting out and asking people some very boring questions.

03:09 S3

I love it, to be honest. I mean, I get to do most of it over Zoom, so there's not much going out and about, sadly. But you know, you meet new people, you learn lots of new things about people that you thought you knew. And my question to you is, Sam, do you think that we're going to find out stuff about each other that we didn't know?

03:27 S2

Very likely. I mean, we've got a good 20 or so questions that we tend to ask, and sometimes we'll change them around and make a few differences here. Or sometimes... asking one question leads to another question. So it should be interesting to see what happens. I mean, we try. Me and Matthew tried this about, oh, just over a year ago, I believe, and it was a fairly decent episode. In fact, we ended up running over time.

03:54 S3

Well, I don't know, Sam. Like, I feel that we ask people these questions all the time and we get their opinions, but do we know what each other's opinions are or what each other's life experiences are. How well do we know each other? I reckon we should title this show. How well does Sam and Lizzie know each other? Because I think we're about to find out.

04:15 S2

Indeed we are. All right, so I'll kick things off.

04:18 S3

Right.

04:21 S2

How have you gone, finding work?

04:23 S3

Shockingly so. Up until recently, when I started my work with you and with Vision Australia Radio, I had only ever been employed voluntarily. So I had volunteered for Beyond Blindness. I was a leader in their music group, and I was also a leader in their Tech Corner program, which was a weekly hourly program that had people meeting at Beyond Blindness to learn about adaptive technology. And they could come to me or Sean, who we interviewed a couple of weeks back and find out about how to work their iPhones and computers and such and such. 

05:00 S2

For the listeners interstate... what is Beyond Blindness?

05:02 S3

So Beyond Blindness is an organisation that seeks to provide social services to people in the metropolitan and regional areas of South Australia. They also provide some financial assistance and subsidies, but mostly its social activities, and I've been a member with them since 2013, and I've loved every minute of it.

05:23 S2

So they used to be called the Blind Welfare Association. That's right. Yes. So the useful thing sometimes was if youcome in from another state or something like that and you are absolutely skint, broke, they can...  often help you out to get settled. So that's... worthy work. How much value do you think volunteering has?

05:44 S3

A lot. I mean, I think we covered this a while back, but if you can put down on your resume or your CV that you've done volunteer work, it shows employers one of two things. One, that you're a really good person, but number two, that you're willing and committed to go through with work. You've got a high work ethic And you know you're willing to take orders even if you're not being paid for it and you're willing to carry out that sort of work.

06:10 S2

Now, has your disability do you think affected your ability to find work?

06:16 S3

No, no, I don't think so. I think not in the sense of actually going to jobs and applying, because I haven't really done a lot of that, but more in the sense of the barriers and obstacles that I perceived there to be. And there wasn't as many like I remember when I applied for this job, obviously I had a lot of help, but my disability didn't come into it at all, and I actually haven't found that my disability has affected my ability to work much at all, especially now that I've got all my technology and things set up.

06:48 S2

And just with that mentioning technology, then the watch starts talking. Yes.

06:53 S3

Oh, sorry about that.

06:55 S2

All right, your turn.

06:56 S3

Okay. Am I asking you employment questions?

06:58 S2

Asking... you anything, anything you want.

06:59 S3

Oh, okay. Cool.

07:00 S2

Okay, so pick a pick one of the standard questions.

07:02 S3

And, Sam, Tell me about your ability to use makeup. How have you gone with that?

07:10 S2

I've never really tried. I mean, I struggle with lip balm.

07:18 S3

That's fantastic. No, but serious question now, when it comes to shopping for clothes and, you know, preparing outfits for the day, how do you go about coordinating, especially when it comes to colours and patterns and textures?

07:34 S2

I tend to be extremely boring. That's the big thing that I've learned is if you go with black and white, you can't go too far wrong. Otherwise, my other option is to pick the biggest, most colorful shirts possible that can't possibly go with anything at all and just... live with the look. That's that's my philosophy, really, is find stuff that either doesn't clash or find stuff that clashes with everything. So at least if I have a nice colorful shirt on in a pub or something like that, people can find me.

08:08 S3

That's great, I love that. Now on to the dating scene, because I haven't asked you this question before. Okay, but what's been your experience with dating? And do you find that your vision impairment has affected your ability to date or to attract partners?

08:25 S2

I'd say yes, definitely. I had a lot of very dry spots throughout my 20s, and well, I was sometimes in demand and then sometimes it would just disappear altogether and there'd be years of absolutely nothing happening whatsoever. But, um, luckily enough, me and my wife Heidi found each other and we haven't looked back since. So if I ever have to go back into the dating scene, I think I will become a Buddhist monk or something like that and just find myself a nice monastery to reside at for the rest of my life.

08:58 S3

I love that so much. How old were you when you started dating Heidi?

09:02 S2

Oh, I was 29.

09:04 S3

Okay, there you go. So your whole 20s wasn't a complete disaster then?

09:07 S2

Not necessarily. No. And yes, there were some ladies out there who I was involved with for a while... and if anything, I think sometimes it made it worse because it was a case of, okay, all right, we had some fun for a little while, and now it's over. And what's wrong with me?

09:26 S3

Oh, I think we all have that question, Sam. Like, my heart bleeds for you, mate. That's nothing wrong with you.

09:32 S2

So. All right, I'll ask you the same question.

09:35 S3

Right.

09:36 S2

Dating?

09:37 S3

Yes. Well. Yes.

09:41 S2

That's the sound of silence. But between now and then, please do get in touch with the show. Whether you have experience of any of the issues covered in this week's episode of I'm Losing My... I've got to learn to breathe.

10:00 S3

Better question.

10:03 S2

My bad. And... I'm on mute. I'm okay. Yeah, I'm offended by my question. Julie sent in a little a nice little message after the jury duty show. And what she said here is.. thanks... myself, I myself have never been called up for jury duty as of yet, but look forward to the day that I am. I find court cases and proceedings utterly fascinating.

10:31 S3

That's what I said. That's not what she said. No, what? That's what I said. That was my comment. 

S2

Well, hers was above that.

10:39 S3

Oh my apologies. Are they going? No, I'm pretty sure that's what I want. Okay. All right. So I do apologize. We're off to fit.

10:47 S2

We're off to feck!

10:50 S3

Feck off!

10:51 S2

All right, all right. All right, all right.

10:59 S3

Well, dating. Well, I've had quite a colorful dating career. As it stands, I have been in the dating scene since my teens and unlike you, I have had plentiful dates. Sadly, they weren't all great. I've been in several long-term-ish kind of relationships and obviously I've had like a lot of flings, seasonal sort of thing, and I found that generally my disability did impact my ability to date, especially sighted individuals. Obviously, people thought that they needed to dote on me or to wait on me or to do absolutely everything for me. And despite my insistence that this wasn't the case and I could look after myself, they would continue to do so and then burn out. And, you know, obviously the relationship would die a very painful death because they couldn't accept that they didn't have to do everything for me and therefore needlessly put themselves through hell trying to do everything for me. 

I have had one sighted partner, though, a girlfriend. A couple of years back. And, you know, she was pretty good in recognising that I was independent because we actually met while I was out and about at Salisbury train station. So there you go.

12:16 S1

This is Studio 1 on Vision Australia Radio.

12:24 S2

Okay. This is one of my favorite questions, right? What can you see and how do you feel when somebody asks you what you can see?

12:34 S3

I can see zilch, nada, nothing. I can't see a speck of dust. How do I feel? I don't mind it, really... bbecause I don't look blind. I'm not the stereotypical blind looking person, and I know we've we've touched on that topic in the past, but, you know, I dress very well. I carry myself with confidence. I speak well, I'm not hidden in a corner, like all the stereotypes that people have about blind people. So when people ask me, oh, how much can you see? I just see it as an opportunity to educate them and, you know, let them know that the blindness is a spectrum as everything is in life. And I just happen to fall on one extreme end.

13:19 S2

You've never had sight at all either, have you?

13:21 S3

No. I've had instances where I've thought I've seen light, like there was a thunderstorm about ten years back, and we were driving home from dinner and I swear I saw the lightning. But this is so rare that I'm not sure if it's. I'm not sure what it could be contributed to.

13:38 S2

All right. Your turn.

13:40 S3

Okay. What do you like at cooking in the kitchen?

13:44 S2

I like cooking, I'm in our household. I am the main cook. So, there's certain foods that I like to eat, and therefore, there's certain foods I like to cook. And I started pretty much when I was about 8 or 9 cooking. So just basic, standard things... went through the various, types of egg, as it were. So started out with poached eggs and we were eating poached eggs for quite some time, all the way through to omelets and... fried eggs and various eggs. So yes, I got very good at cooking eggs for a while and then moved on to frying things and... finally on to things like... stews and casseroles and stir fries and all sorts of stuff. So I really enjoy it. I... found the only way I could eat certain things that I like, really, was to cook them in the first place. So any time I've been in a live in relationship with anybody, I've been the cook.

14:44 S3

So what's your favorite food, Sam?

14:46 S2

Oh, I love a curry. I do love a curry.

14:48 S3

Oh my goodness. Okay, you and I have so much more in common than I thought. I love that so much.

14:54 S2

I enjoy a food that when I bite into it, it bites back at me.

14:57 S8

Oh, yes.

14:59 S3

Okay. Goody goody goody. You need to meet my papa. Papa, if you're listening, make me a curry, please. That I can take into Sam and make it a bite. Pretty please. With sugar on top.

15:12 S2

In fact, I mean. Yeah. So my relationship with chili now has gone to the absolute nth degree. So... I find it very hard to be surprised by something. I will quite happily munch into a vindaloo from in an Indian restaurant. And yes, I ended up having to wrap a towel around my head to stop myself, stop the sweat, but...

15:35 S3

Stopped myself from exploding.

15:36 S2

But as far as cooking goes, I love cooking. The Thai style curries myself. So lots of coconut milk and things like that. And yeah, they're easy to cook as well. So that's really give me something easy. And yes, that's what I do. What about yourself?

15:53 S3

What am I like at cooking? Well, I'm the same as you. I started early, for me, it was tea and toast. So I was eating tea and toast for breakfast for a very long time. English breakfast. milk, two sugars. I think I lived on that for years. And jam on toast. Obviously. Then I learnt to make omelettes as well because my mum had. I don't know if you remember those, those contraptions. It was like an omelette maker. It was sort of like a sandwich press, but for omelettes. And they had like the two leaf shaped sides, like halves. And you could make two little omelettes out of it. So I used to make them with onion and capsicum and stuff and never cleaned the omelette maker. 

My mum was mad at me for that for a long time, but I really am good at cooking stews and casseroles and curries as well. I'm not so good at making steak, absolutely dreadful at making bacon. The last time I made bacon, I burnt myself something awful.

16:46 S2

Or burnt offerings.

16:47 S3

Mm. Yes. Literally my my whole side of my thumb was burnt. And I can't fry an egg to save my life. I can boil eggs, I can poach them, and I can definitely whip up a mad veggie scramble. But as for frying, forget it. I can't do it.

17:02 S2

So, the other side of that question is, have you had any spectacular mishaps in the kitchen?

17:11 S3

Before we I answer this question, am I allowed to say one of Stephen's that happened the other day?

17:18 S2

I think, uh, he's not listening, is he?

17:21 S3

He might be. Stephen, I'm gonna dob you in. I'm sorry. But. Okay, so the other day, we were using... a strainer to make to strain some vegetables, and I had, I'd sworn that I turned the stove off after cooking the vegetables in the pot. Anyway, Stephen put the pot and the strainer with the strainer on top of it, on back onto the stove. That was clearly still on. And we're about halfway through eating tea and I'm... Babe, can you smell that? It smells very like chemical and electrical. And the next minute he the smoke alarms going off and things are chaotic because he's left the strainer inside the pot and it's melted all the inside of the pot and the oh my goodness, it was horrible. We had to throw out the pot and the strainer.

18:07 S2

Well... I had a popcorn mishap recently.

18:10 S3

Oh. What happened?

18:11 S2

I like making popcorn. I in fact, I bought some lovely seasoning. Now that you can make various different flavors and stuff like that. Oh, you got some too. But the problem I have is... and up until recently, I've... always had these lots of unpopped corn.

18:27 S3

Yes. Me too.

18:28 S2

So I decided to add some more oil and a little bit more butter and hopefully pop the unpopped corn. Anyway, about, oh, a couple of minutes later as the thing, the thing it basically just burnt. So I have this nice stainless steel pan that now is never going to be the same again because it's got these... pock-marked unpopped corn marks in the bottom and yes, same... same as you said. Yes, the smoke alarm went off and all that sort of stuff. And Heidi basically said, Never do that again.

19:07 S3

You know, I laugh because, you know, in hindsight, it's hilarious. Like looking back at it, it was so funny. But at the time it was terrifying. I thought maybe the air fryer was like something had melted inside of it, even though it wasn't on. But you know, Stephen, you one of.

19:26 S2

The big problems is because we're not visually orientated. Mm... and a normal sighted person will probably look over and go, Oh I've done that. Whereas out of sight, out of mind.

19:37 S3

Exactly. It is so true.

19:38 S2

I mean I've yeah, it's often been a good way for me to get rid of some of my cheap cooking utensils is yes, leaving something on and it's like, Oh, whoops... that used to be a stirring spoon.

19:51 S3

Mm. I mean, I set a tea towel on fire once. That's about the worst or scariest that I've had.

19:58 S2

Have you ever tried to, ever nearly poisoned anybody?

20:01 S3

No no no. I see my disasters don't tend to come out in the in terms of what I cook, but  more in terms of the mess I leave behind. So, you know, the burnt pans or the, you know, broken utensils or whatever it tends to be. But yeah, it's not so much what I cook. It's how it happens. That's more the demolition process, you know.

20:24 S2

All right. The next question. Public transport. Have you had any frightening or strange experiences taking buses or trains?

20:33 S3

Yes, I've had a strange one. I was on the way home from work. This was a couple of months back. You'd seen me to the bus stop. I got on the bus and the driver, I don't know, I don't think he was having a very good day. And he's cursing and swearing at everyone and everything that's going on. And he's like, This city's full of savages. And I was just sitting there like, Am I sure I really want to be on this bus right now? like, this guy sounds quite unstable, and I'm scared. But apart from that, not really. I mean, I've had strange people come up and try to talk to me, but nothing as strange as that, really. I have to say that that was very surreal.

21:18 S2

Do you have any tips for... you know, the use of public transport?

21:24 S3

Well, for me, Move It is my best friend - the mover app. It's brilliant. It tells me everything I need to know as far as buses and trains and trams. And when they're arriving. This is going to sound really weird, but if you're a female and you have a guide dog, perhaps don't wear a dress because... or a skirt, it's really. It's quite essential... usually we put our guide dogs sort of between our feet and we, you know, keep them there to guard them and stop them from sliding forward. And it also gives us easy access. We can put our feet out in front of their feet if people are travelling through. But if you're wearing a dress or skirt, obviously you can't do that. So that's my unconventional tip.

22:04 S4

Okay. There you go. Your turn.

22:06 S3

Okay. When it comes to navigating unfamiliar areas, what sort of mobile apps do you use? Or GPS aides.

22:15 S2

So I tend to just use the good old stock standard Google Maps myself. So the I have an Android phone and it coordinates quite nicely with the app there. So I find it very handy. For example, if I'm taking a bus I've never taken before, or at least I know where I am there as the thing follows it around. And also, yes, you can see which road you're on and things like that. I initially when I moved down to Adelaide here, I actually bought a UBD street directory and would carry the damn thing around with me. So that was my way of finding my way around. 

I didn't have the same problem in Darwin because I'd always lived there, so it was a case of I'd know my way to somewhere I wouldn't necessarily know what road I'm on. I was on because I couldn't be bothered shimmying up the signpost to read the street sign, but at least I knew how to get somewhere and things like that. So how to get to the various workplaces I'd gone to? How to get to my favourite shops and things like that. And of course, how to go from... my mother's place to my grandmother's place and things like that. 

So but definitely in Adelaide there was the old style UBD, which would just come out at random times when I realised I didn't know where I was. But it's so much more handy having this these mobile devices where all you need to do is open up a map app and there it is. And you can zoom in, you can zoom out and things like that.

23:41 S3

Yeah, I have to say, technology is a real lifesaver. Okay, so this is a bit of a different question. And I'm going to have to think of how to reword this when it comes to socialising with unfamiliar people. Do you feel that your vision impairment affects your ability to socialise or start conversations?

23:58 S2

Yes, very much so. And I think one of the problems is sometimes there are people I know there, but unless they actually say hello or something like that, I don't know who I know and who I don't know. So it's like, yes, you might introduce yourself to somebody and they say, oh yeah, we met, you know, two weeks ago. And I was like, oh, that's nice to know now... and... I think it's a very common thing with... vision impaired people is that it's just easier sometimes to just sit in the background and let things evolve than to be out there and to introduce yourself and to strike up conversations because, yes, you don't know who you're talking to, really. And I think also you're not going to necessarily know if you've met them before or if they're going to meet them again.

24:47 S3

Yeah. And see, this is why I find it useful to have a dog or found it useful to have a dog. Because people see the dog and they're instantly attracted to the dog. So, you know, it makes things very easy for me. I don't have to do any of that navigating and introduction process, it gets initiated for me.

25:06 S2

What I used to like, though, is awards nights, because you'd be on a table full of people, and there were a lot of people you'd never met before or anything like that, and all you just did is introduce yourself. And it was just this artificial situation in a way. But you could actually then... talk to people and get to know who they were and, yes, what sport they did and things like that. And sometimes I got to know quite a lot of politicians and local mayors and stuff like that through sports awards. Yeah.

25:34 S3

Speaking of awards nights, when we went to the South Australian Community Broadcasting Awards, we were on table with people we didn't know exactly. We did really well. Oh, we won the quiz. Oh, table eight for the win.

25:45 S2

Yes, exactly. And that does help. And that was... indeed a very good good night. I mean, how was your table at the Community Broadcasting Association Awards, the national ones?

25:55 S3

That was a lot more hectic because there were a lot more tables and a lot more people. And the place was loud, so I had. Yeah, Pam, Conrad, Nick and myself. And then we had some people that Conrad knew on the table. So I mean, we sort of I was sort of stuck talking with Pam and Nick because I knew them and I wasn't feeling very well that night. So I found it really hard to socialise in general. I was just feeling really overwhelmed. And I actually had a migraine, so...

26:23 S2

Well, dear listener, this is the type of question we'd probably be asking you if you decided to volunteer and... be one of our Choir of Angels. All you need to do is email us... what's the email address again?

26:36 S3

Studio number one at Vision Australia dot org.

26:40 S2

And... yes. Or if you see our... notifications on Facebook, then just drop a note and say, yes, I'm interested in... you know, coming on your show and telling us what you think of things and what your experiences are.

26:53 S3

Exactly.And then either Sam or I will get in touch with you and we'll sort something out. Is  that our 28 minutes?

26:59 S2

That is our 28 minutes.

27:00 S3

No way.

27:01 S2

Well, that indeed is a wrap. Next week we are going running. South Australia is trying to initiate its own chapter of Achilles. And so we thought we'd go out and have a look and see what it's all about. And I'll get to learn what Lizzie is like running.

27:21 S3

Oh, boy. Perish the thought. But between now and then, please do get in touch with the show. Whether you have any experience of the issues covered on this week's episode of Studio 1, or if you think there's something we should be talking about, you never know. Your story and insight may help someone who is dealing with something similar.

27:38 S2

You can email us at studio1@visionaustralia.org - that's studio, number one at Vision Australia dot org.

27:44 S3

Or you could look us up on our social media, whether that be Instagram or Facebook. Just search for VA Radio Network. We want to hear from you.

27:53 S2

Bye for now. Bye.

27:55 S1

Vision Australia Radio gratefully acknowledges the support of the Community Broadcasting Foundation for Studio 1.