Deaf FTers?
 

Hi... I'm new to FlyerTalk and was wondering if there are other Deaf FTers out there? How many of you are out there?

I'm one.

Count me in. =)

Me 2.

I;m only partially deaf - does that count? Can't live without my HAs.

Audrey

not deaf but I teach high school and use BSL (badly) when I have hearing impaired kiddies in the class

Is deaf and works in the airlines.

I'm neither deaf nor hearing. I'm moderately to severely (and profoundly in two frequencies on the right) hearing impaired. I lost my hearing due to ototoxicity during cancer treatment 10 years ago, I was 19. But I wear high power hearing aids, and have been mostly just fine since.

I am an ASL student, beginning my 2nd term shortly. My girlfriend is a language geek so we're taking courses together.

Anyone else hearing aid wearers, or have cochlear implants? This should probably be it's own thread, but I'll start here for the moment. I'm curious about others' experiences with getting exit rows on aircraft. BA flat out denied me on a PHX-LHR flight upon noticing my hearing aids. Other times, I've gotten bulkhead rows by the door on a 744 with no trouble. US, UA, and AA have never given me trouble. All the FAA requirement says is that a passenger in the row must be able to hear oral instructions, as far as I know. I can hear them quite well with hearing aids, even in noise or chaotic environments.

They have moved me from the exit rows because of my deafness. They did ask if I could understand.. I said yes.. then she said, "Through the P.A.?" Ah, nope... off I went.

Never been denied though!

Can you hear anything without them? I was a hearing aid user and sometimes batteries die at the wrong time, or sweat causes them to not work well, or they even get knocked out of my ears on occassions like plane crashes. If any of that happened could you still hear well enough? I think if you're honest, it does kind of make sense, just a little bit.

I am only moderately impaired on the left, the severe to profound is on the right. If it's a male voice, I'll most likely hear it, certainly in my left ear. Female voices are much more difficult, so speakers need to be loud - not exactly a problem in an emergency.

And I always manage to hear my girlfriend nagging me in the mornings before I "put my ears on" - but maybe I'm just trained like Pavlov's dogs to respond to that? Don't tell her I said that.

They don't know that much about hearing loss, and that there are varying degrees of loss, so it's not a surprise that they act that way, when seeing your aids.

My hands are sealed. ;)

You're a funny guy these past 2 days, DeafFlyer, between this post and the weatherman post on OMNI, I had two good laughs.

Bobette

I'm not deaf but my my wife has a cochlear implant and works in her school district with families of young children that have a hearing loss. I've done decades of philanthropic work with the deaf and hard-of-hearing.

I decided on my handle because while my wife is verbal with her CI, we enjoy signing.

Heya,

Good to see some Deaf people here! :-)

My name is James and I'm from New Zealand.

I mainly fly on QF for domestic flights within NZ. That oficially makes me a traitor for not flying NZ, our national carrier! *winks* My reason for flying QF is because of their fantastic rewards programme and cheaper fares. DJ (Pacific Blue -- an offshoot of Virgin Airlines) has just got on the scene here and so far they're quickly gaining a reputation for delays -- the majority of their flights seem to depart >30mins late including my most recent DJ flight departing 1h45m late!

Anyway QF are pretty good at keeping me informed when things are not going as per schedule. One such instance was the time there was fog at AKL airport putting all flights in/out of the airport on hold. I asked one QF guy what was going on and he kept me informed throughout the whole thing -- basically just every 30mins or so relaying what was being announced over the PA etc regarding my AKL-CHC flight. The flight eventually departed about 3 hours or so behind schedule, not that I blame QF for an act-of-god event! ;-)

Another nice thing about QF is that some of their staff know a bit of SL. One time I checked in with a group of Deaf people going to AKL from CHC. When we completed our checkin the lady informed us our flight was 20mins late (due to late inbound from ZQN) and signed 'thank you' to us. A nice touch I thought!

NZ on the other hand could do with improvements, from what I've heard from other NZ passengers. One instance was when a Deaf friend and an interpreter was checking in to a NZ domestic flight to CHC or WLG. They were talking to each other (in SL obviously) and the check-in agent, for some reason, did not like this. She basically asked them "to stop moving your hands"! Of course my Deaf friend took exception to this. Fourtently nothing too bad came out of this -- but does make the point that check-in staff need better Deaf Awareness training.

But on the other hand all QF check in staff in New Zealand are provided by NZ then surely they all receive the same training (apart from QF specific training for those working at the QF desks). Seems odd to me that the people at QF desks deal with Deaf customers better than the ones at NZ desks -- surely NZ would put their best staff on their own desks and put the crap ones on the QF desks. Obviously this is not the case!

Another story with NZ was when I was on a AKL-WLG-CHC flight. Upon stop over in WLG me and my friend chose to stay on the plane to avoid missing it when it departed to CHC. This women came up to us and yelled in loud voices "ARE YOU DEAF?"! I said yes, and no need to yell. She asked if we required any special support. "Um no, thanks" with an akward smile was the response.

I understand that they want to make sure that we are comfortable etc, but I don't really see how Deaf passengers need 'support'. We just need to be informed when things don't go to plan (such as coming and see me personally if the plane is diverted due to weather issues for example) and that's about it.

Same flight as above I noticed my boarding pass had the word "DEAF" on it, and I eventually discovered pretty much all my subsequent flights with NZ had the comment on my BP as well. So far NZ is the only airline to do this -- BA/DJ/EK/QF all do not do this in my experience. Do any other airlines do this?

Some of my Deaf friends swear by NZ despite the above stories, which I find utterly amazing, but I'm slowing converting them to QF! Usually just one QF flight does the trick -- and they're hooked forever!

I recently flown on QF/BA AKL-SYD-LHR//LHR-MAD//MAD-LHR-SYD-AKL. The only issues I had was on a BA flight back to Australia between LHR-SYD via BKK. At BKK I got off the plane and did not bring my carry on baggage with me. Since I could not hear the PA I did not realise that I was supposed to bring it with me. What happened was that when the cabin was being cleaned they took my bag away. Fourtently when I reboarded the plane I discovered the lost bag and promptly informed a FA who explained the rule to me and ran off to find the bag. She arrived back about 5-10mins later (rather red in the face and panting!) with my carry on bag! I apologiesed -- and said that I had learnt a very important flight lesson!

That happened to me once on a CHC-AKL flight -- can't remember if it was a NZ or QF flight. I was preassigned a exit door seat for some reason. Fourtently I didn't mind which seat I got since it was a spacious 737 so I just swapped the seat with my mum. Mum got the exit door seat and I got the one next to it. Can understand how annoying it would be for a tall Deaf person though!

Hope my post had lots of food for thought.

Merry Christmas,
James

Welcome Kiwisurfer,

I have a good friend who is from NZ and is Deaf. He is living here in US. I agree fully, that being Deaf doesn't really require much in the way of "special support.

Please forgive my ignorance, I'm still a new student of Deaf culture. How do you and your friend communicate with each other? And a related question for you or anyone else - is the sign language in NZ and Australia the same or similar to BSL?

My girlfriend has such a knack for languages in general (fluent French, muddles along in Spanish & German, and blows me out of the water with ASL) that I'm going to try and pick up a BSL and a French sign language book in the next two weeks while I'm abroad. Thought it might be fun to at least know the very basics, especially fingerspelling, in more than one language.

LSF (French) is closer to ASL than BSL. ASL and BSL are very different. Australian (Auslan) is very similar to BSL and they can converse with each other easily.

Ok. I'm learning ASL through my local community college so I'm aware of the origins of ASL with LSF as well as what the names Gallaudet, Clerc and Epee mean. Good to know that Auslan and BSL are similar.

I seem to recall seeing an Irish sign language book last spring in Galway which had ASL style one-handed alphabet. I would have thought this would be more closely aligned with BSL. Then again,there's that hate-hate relationship with the British so perhaps not? :)

I have encountered Scots who used one-handed fingerspelling and they came from a very small school in Glasgow. It's not consistent throughout the UK. The Irish "H" is different from ours, but the Scots had the same "H" as ASL. I will never understand the UK.

Easy. He knows ASL. I don't know NZ signs but I have been under the impression it is similar to Australian Sign Languge, which is simiilar to BSL. I'm sure Kiwisurfer can confirm or not. I know Danish Sign Language plus many international signs though. I love international conferences with multiple signed languages used.

The UK seems quite consistent to me -- all the people from the UK, including all England, Ireland and Scotland, that I've met use the standard BSL/NZSL/Auslan two-hand alphabet.

NZSL and Auslan are based off BSL with lots of regional variances. Hence Auslan, NZSL and BSL users can easily communicate with each other. There are a few significant differences but it's quite easy to understand and learn BSL/Auslan if you already know NZSL like I do.

I went to the WFD Conference in Spain in July -- did any of you go there?

Regards,
James

I think Wiggums did. I didn't go to it, but I have been to other international meetings.

Can anyone suggest some good sites or message forums pertaining to the international Deaf community? At least a handful of you are clearly well versed as well as well traveled when it comes to this topic. I'm fascinated by it all.

Yeah, I did go to WFD in Spain. Probably the only deaf who flew in "F" on LH with another friend. I felt bad because some were like, "You're in First?!"

I used points for that trip to WFD - stayed at the Westin Palace and got a huge suite. It's all on video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KABgnmwutaw

Sorry I used ASL... I hardly know BSL or NZSL or Auslan.

In regards to Scotland, it was only two people I came across at the deaf Birmingham Film Festival a couple years ago who were using one hand alphabet. Both said they came from Scotland and they were able to use two hands, but preferred one hand. I even slowed down whilst signing with one hand alphabet, but they both said they had been using one hand at a school in Scotland so were accustomed to it and told me to speed up.

I've never met an Irish using two hand alphabet, all I've met used one. Maybe it's North Ireland you're thinking of? I have seen some use one, some use two.

I know there's the Deaflympics in Taipei, Taiwan, that takes place on September 2009.

And I understand there's a "Deaf History International" that has long taken place in Europe. For 2009, it is now taking place in RSA. I will absolutely not step foot in RSA until they stop the slaughter of white farmers. It's nauseating.

I think you are right that it is Northern Ireland that uses 2 hands.

Me, too. I am normally deaf & hard of hearing. I am learning more English skills instead ASL. I can hear good from my left ear but, isn't right ear is terribly. I can speak very well myself but, I am not aware that I can't sign very often. That's why I learned more communication skills but, it is improvable more English skills during the tutoring from my teacher. It's importance that I am learned more English skills than ASL.

Although I know ASL very well, I was raised learning English. I'm grateful for that :)

Not deaf, but love this interesting thread. I took ASL at Mesa CC in AZ to "keep my calendar year" at ASU when I needed to take some time off to help my family. The class was fun and I got an anecdote from the experience published in Reader's Digest.

Resurrecting slightly old thread. But then it's a quiet forum, so hopefully no one minds. :)

Just thought I'd say I got an A on my final in ASL 102 class. Hope I get an A overall but my grade will suffer - blasted IT work had me miss more class sessions than I should have. Understanding instructors are great, though!

In July, I'll be heading up to YEG for a little over a week. Part of that time will be spent participating in an ASL Immersion program on the U of Alberta campus. Should be fun!

Might also go in late June with an interpreter-in-training friend to the DBC (Deaf-Bilingual Coalition) convention in Milwaukee. Anyone here going to that?

I won't be there or anything, but I wish you much success with your ASL studies.

I need a little advice. I have a friend who is deaf. She wants to go to Istanbul by herself. She flies alone and does not seem to have any difficulty. Because I travel there often she has asked my opinion. I have given is much thought, but because I can hear I cannot identify with what barriers she might experience.

At first I thought that since we did not speak Turkish and managed that it would not be a huge problem if she could not hear at all because she does not speak Turkish either. Then I became concerned about what she would do in an emergency. I thought perhaps she could prepare a phrase book in advance using a person with Turkish language skills. She could then just find what she needs to ask and let someone read it. My experience is that most Turkish people take you by the hand and lead you to whatever it is you want, or they give you a seat and go get it themselves. I do not think she would need to "hear" a response to communicate.

Am I over-simplfying this situation? What difficulties would any of you anticipate she might experience?

If she is an experienced traveler then I think she will be all right. I've never been to Istanbul so I'm not sure what it would be like there.

My wife and I are both ASL interpreters here in Kansas City, but we also do a large amount of international travel for work. We have found that Deaf people can communicate their needs just fine to people in foreign countries, but the people that we see are the Deaf that are fully integrated into both the deaf and hearing culture.

We also have a deaf blind friend that gives speeches for the helen keller institute and flies often to her engagements. I always tease her and tell her I am going to put her on the wrong plane on purpose and have her end up in the middle of Africa!

Late to the thread! :)

Bilateral otosclerotic here; severe HL on the L side, formerly moderate/severe on the R side, largely corrected by stapedectomy in '96.

Planning another stapedectomy this fall to address the L side.

Fingers crossed!

Cool thread. This is what makes FT great.

Reaaaaally old thread, but I am a brand new member (first post!) and was thrilled to see a Deaf connection here. My husband is deaf and I am an interpreter in Seattle.
Happy to see you all on here!

I'm happy to welcome you as well. ^

Welcome to Flyertalk, mollsworth!