Concrete Examples of our planned Eyeglasses Aid Project
The first reactions to our planned glasses aid project have already been received very quickly. Thanks for this, especially for the announced support of Olaf, who already supports the Ein-Dollar-Brille e.V. 🙂
Apart from that I would like to explain our planned project a bit more clearly with the help of small examples. We have been preparing for the coming journey for quite some time and we belong to the group of long distance sailors who really like to sail and not only want to travel the world. This means that if we spend days on the road to reach a remote atoll and finally find out that the only available anchorage is occupied, we don’t get so extremely annoyed. We just sail on and look forward to the next sunrises and sunsets at sea until the next atoll. 😉
Anyone who thinks that our project should be a “hit” does not know us. It is enough for us if we can, for example, make it possible for a single elderly lady to use her sewing machine again through one of our glasses. Then we have already achieved something! More is always possible, of course.
We will certainly meet school children who have to stand directly in front of the blackboard to copy. What could be better than to be able to provide them with glasses with -7 dioptres, for example. It will change their lives!
Of course, we do not want to compete with anyone, including professional aid organisations, and we will not advertise the glasses on marketplaces. We unpack our “aid kit” where it is welcome after approval by the chief. And since most of the chiefs are a little older, you can certainly start with reading glasses appropriate to your age, the use of which you will demonstrate yourself shortly before. If he feels an improvement in near vision for himself, you can certainly continue. And if not, then just not. But if he agrees, we could help many people on his island.
We have seen many videos of bloggers in the last years and so far we have been able to get a certain impression. Here is an example from the island of Fulaga (Fulanga), which belongs to our “target group”. It is not so easy to reach from Fiji because of the prevailing wind conditions.
In the following video of Sailing Noha there is no inhabitant with glasses and they describe the island briefly translated as follows: “There is no internet, no airport and the cargo ship comes only once a month or so to transport people and supplies. There is a strict adoption policy for yachts. They have a system of about 60-80 boats per year coming in. We arrived early in the season and were one of the first few boats of the season. Every family in the village adopts a yacht at least once or usually twice a year. Tui, Koro, John and their extended family stayed with us.
Bill, the chief’s grandson, came along for all our adventures. This was by far the most unique village experience we had so far. We attended the children’s culture week at school, we hiked with cannibals or maybe rather the descendants of cannibals. We went to church and had a nice Sunday dinner. We had a pizza party and were presented with the beautiful voices of the most beautiful people when we said goodbye.”