Completely in the dark to help blind

INLSA

Nompumelelo Khanyile teaches Qiniso Khwela sign language at the KZN Blind and Deaf Society School. Funds raised from Dinner in the Dark will go towards this school. Picture: Sibusiso Ndlovu

A unique culinary experience has been planned as a way to raise funds and awareness for the blind. The evening will include a full three-course meal and live entertainment – which will all be conducted in complete darkness.

Organised by the KwaZulu-Natal Blind and Deaf Society, the event, dubbed A Dinner in the Dark, will be held on September 15 at the Coastlands Umhlanga Hotel in a bid to raise money for Blind Awareness Month in October.

Guests will enter a pitch-black dining room where they will be guided to their seats. They will then be served a three-course meal, giving them an experience of what it is like to be blind.

“The event will give diners a unique culinary experience, as food tastes very different without visual cues to accompany it and only your mind telling you what the food on the plate looks like,” said Shamila Surjoo, the society’s fund-raising director.

“For sighted individuals, it will increase appreciation for their vision, after they try to perform simple tasks without their sight.”

A table for 10 at Dinner in the Dark is R5 000. Funds raised will go towards one of the society’s training programmes, where blind students are trained to work in the tourism and hospitality industry.

Funds will also go towards supporting the SA National Council for the Blind’s Eye Care Awareness Month in October, which aims to provide up to 600 people with free cataract surgery.

The council’s Bureau for the Prevention of Blindness is planning several cataract blitzes to reach under-serviced rural communities in the country.

Each cataract surgery will take about 30 minutes, and will form part of the campaign to raise awareness around eye health and the prevention of avoidable blindness.

According to the bureau, 75 percent of cases of blindness are avoidable, either through prevention or treatment.

To book a table at the Dinner in the Dark event, call Shamila Surjoo at 031 309 4991 or send an e-mail to surjoos@nbds.org.za