Was sitting in the balcony…with eyes closed, as always deep in thought…and suddenly I heard a sound….first thing I did is to quickly open my eyes …almost as a reflex action…and then tried to listen to the sound…tried to find the source of it….isn’t that a bit irrational?.....a sound is necessarily a primary function of the ears…still what I did (I guess we all do) is to open the eyes first…and then rely on the ears?...guess we always tend to do that… Do the ‘sense of hearing’ feel the inferiority complex? Do all the other senses feel cheated at times? That we do not give enough due to them…for us human beings…our ‘visual capability’ …our ‘sense to see' is the predominant sense amongst all the senses….that’s what matters…we feel more secure when we can ‘see’ the things…that’s why even after hearing that sound…I chose to open the eyes first, get that sense of security back…get the sense back that…yes I know where I am…whats happening around me…that I can see…and then tried to find out where the sound is coming from…
And another thing came to my mind…amongst all the senses…visual sense is the only one which you can easily choose to reject voluntarily….i mean you can choose to open or close your eyes easily…but you can not choose ‘not to hear’…if there’s a sound …you will hear it …(you can of course decide not to ‘listen’ to it though J)…if there’s a smell…you will smell it…(no pinching your nose doesn’t shut off the smell entirely..so that does not count)…if there’s a touch…you will feel it….its that simple…is that why your visual capacity is more important to you than anything else…with that capability you feel confident, you feel secure…you feel ‘in control’….
Remembered two instances in the past…my sister studied in Dnyaprabodhini School…they used to carry out this experiment regularly in the school as a part of their school activity, the teachers use to randomly or sometimes voluntarily select some students, then they were blindfolded and they were asked to remain in that artificial ‘visually challenged’ state….for a certain period of time…all they have to do is to rely on their ‘other’ senses to move around….the experiment was meant to teach them the importance of the capability to ‘see the world’ and to make them aware of the plight of ‘visually impaired’ children…
The second instance was when I saw the movie ‘Ninja Assassin’ a few days back…A handful of children were trained to become potential assassins in the movie….as a part of their education…some ‘chosen’ students were asked to spend one year of their education..blindfolded….so they had to reply on their other senses for survival…for a period of a year…to prepare them ahead of their hardest life as an ‘Assassin’…
I have always wondered…what is more difficult….the people who r blind since their birth or the people who lose their visual ability due to illness, accidents or such things…at some later stage of their life…is it harder for them ‘cos they knew what they r missing …but of course I don’t want to take away the pain of ‘not knowing at all’…that must be terrible too…
There’s apt phrase in English….when we comprehend something…when we understand something in conversation….what phrase we use often…no not ‘I understand’…we say ‘I see’…that’s what matters…
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