#155: Straight to heaven

Welcome to Blind Guy's Chat, where Oren O'Neill—

Hello!

Jan Bloem—

Hello!

And Mohammed Lashir—

Hi there!

Talk about the A to Z of life.

Well, hello ladies and gentlemen, and you are very welcome to episode 155 of Blind Guys Chat. Jan is on assignment.

Jan is on assignment this whole week.

Yeah, he's a busy boy.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. He's stirring up enthusiasm for our products in Africa.

I'd say no better than to do it as well. Yeah. Whereabouts is he?

In South Africa. He's a huge country, right?

He's all over.

I think in Joburg, but I'm not entirely certain. Maybe it's Cape Town. I, I'm just calling out towns now.

Bloemfontein.

He's somewhere.

Oh, you're funny.

Jon, where are you?

Where are you, Jon?

You sound like you're in a hall or on a stage in a theater or something, Mo.

That's because I'm shouting. Oh, yeah.

Okay. Are you at home? Do you live in— you have a massive, like, Country estate or something, do you?

Yes, that's what I have.

Lord of the manor.

No, normally actually I close my curtain, which sort of dampens the effect. But right now I have forgotten. When you said like you sound like you're in a hallway, I'm like, oh no, the curtain is open. The life of a podcaster, everyone.

I'm going to start proceedings by a little bit of a moan.

A little bit. Why break a habit, Søren?

Well, exactly. So last week I was in Geneva speaking at a conference.

Yeah, yeah, you fancy pants.

I know.

Yeah, yeah.

Who's fancy pants? It's Mo. He's been all over the place.

That's true.

Or Jan. Or Jan. Yeah.

And yes, I have a little bit of a gripe. Not— well, Geneva was fine. And lovely. Very expensive, but—

And warm.

And warm. Lovely warm weather. Very nice. Um, but, and although I was talking before we were recording about an issue, if, if I had been on my own trying to find the assistance desk at Geneva Airport, I'm more concerned with the lack of training, or what would seem to be the lack of training, with the assistance people in Charles de Gaulle Airport because—

Uh-oh.

We flew, because I will not fly Ryanair anymore, we flew Aer Lingus, which was lovely, to Geneva direct, but unfortunately the flight back to Ireland was at 10 o'clock or 10 o'clock the following day, and that was, we weren't gonna be finished with our conference, so we had to do a little hop to Charles de Gaulle from Geneva, And then Charles de Gaulle to Dublin. So there was a changeover, and I would say that I experienced one of the worst—

Airport assistance.

Airport assistance, thank you. Airport assistance that I've probably experienced so far in my life. I mean, this guy actually just, he grabbed me, um, we almost started running.

Oh my God.

But were you late? No, we weren't.

We weren't—

no, we weren't.

Charles de Gaulle is big and it's—

Yeah, we were going to be last. Well, we were probably going to be last or near enough to last on, but, but because I was getting the assistance, they knew, they were able to radio ahead and say that we were on the way. So it wasn't— we weren't late as such, but, um, it was an experience and a half, to say the least. Just this guy was Yeah, just, I mean, he was almost trotting and I was trying to keep up.

And you didn't have Larry, so you're on your cane, which slows you down a bit.

Yeah. Oh, I, I don't use canes with assistants. I just put my hand on their shoulder and we go.

Oh no, I always use the cane. Just, well, I use the cane in the sense of I do arc it, but generally I just have it pointing outwards to my right-hand side just so as I can stab anybody along the way.

Just so people trip over it.

Yeah, exactly.

So I'm wondering, has anybody, has anybody kind of experienced this? And it's like, I have to say, I will say that the assistance at Dublin Airport was, was far superior. And I think Clodagh would agree.

They do get training though, don't they?

Well, they do get training. Yeah. And I wonder, do they actually get training? Because it seemed to me that this, it was almost like, you know, Hey, Mo, are you free to do some assist? Yeah. Okay. Go on. Give that fellow a lift.

He like grabbed grabbed your sleeve and dragged you. Well, yeah.

I mean, I've never had assistance at Charles de Gaulle because I've only been at Charles de Gaulle once, and that was with a colleague when we were flying to Sison. So I just walked with her, and we didn't have assistance that that time. But I have had assistance in Lyon, Saint-Exupéry, and that was good. I mean, the guy had the wheelchair and he asked me like, do you want to sit? And I'm like, nope. And he put it away and we started walking. We had a nice talk, a nice chat, and he dropped me off at the airplane and we were good. Like, so that's what you want, you know, knowing, knowing the French. they probably have some sort of centralized way to do things. So I'm surprised that Lyon is good, but Paris, or Charles de Gaulle at least, is horrible. I, I mean, I will tell you, I don't know if I've ever told you this story, so, you know, if I have, stop me right now. But I was on my way back from the States in Atlanta.

I knew we were gonna do that.

Too early, too early. I'm not stopping. And it's orange, so I'm not stopping. Clota, stop me.

I'm fine, go ahead, go ahead.

I came back from, from Atlanta, from Florida, and I, I had a layover in Atlanta. And, um, it was at the height of COVID And this lady, I mean, she was the nicest lady because we had a nice talk and all while we were walking, but we were a little bit late because there was a thunderstorm. And so we couldn't touch down for a little. And then when we touched down, I, I didn't have much time to get to my connecting flight to Amsterdam. It was the height of COVID it was 2020. And so there I was, and she was waiting for me, and she's like, all right, well, sit down on this wheelchair here. And I'm like, no, I can just walk. And she's like, no, no, no, but you don't understand, you're almost too late, and the wheelchair is faster. And I highly doubted it because I'm a fast, fast walker. Yeah, yeah. So she— so, but I was not about to argue too much because I was late indeed. And I'm like, well, if I stand here and argue with her for 15 minutes, I'll be too late for sure. So I sat down and that lady started to trundle, like literally trundle along the airport. And I'm like, ah, if I— I can walk faster. I'm faster than you on hands and knees, let alone walking. And she was, and she was also like breathing very heavily. So—

Oh dear.

Like right behind me and talking to me. And I'm like, oh no, if I don't— I hope I don't catch COVID That was the whole way, the whole way. And we went on a train. Atlanta Airport is massive, it's huge. So I went on this little metro-like train and we like walked almost for, for an hour, it felt like. And she just, she was so slow, so unbelievably slow. And I was sitting there thinking, ma'am, I could have taken you there, you know, there and back 3 times in the time that it's taken you. And I don't even need to see where I'm going. I would have found it faster. But it is what it is, you know.

Well, I was, I was in, um, I, again, I was told to sit in the, uh, the wheelchair, but actually it wasn't just one wheelchair.

Oh yeah?

It was a tandem wheelchair.

A double buggy?

So one behind the other, and I think, um, some of my colleagues said there was actually more. There was 3 or 4. Some of them were 3 or 4.

A wheelchair train?

Yeah, and the woman at the back had, um, the woman who was steering it and doing the Motor. It had a motor, and it was like— so it was like we were huskies, you know, like—

Oh, I love that.

The dog sled.

Oh, I think I've, I've sat in one of those in Frankfurt as well. Yeah, yeah, you were one behind the other, and then there was the, the last one had a— indeed was steering, and the thing had a motor, and that thing went fairly fast. I mean, that was like I felt like I was driven around. It was pretty good.

That sounds like fun, actually.

Yeah, it was.

The whole, the blooming end result was that one colleague went, was told by the woman who was assisting me to go off in a particular direction to the gate, right?

She couldn't go with you.

So she couldn't, she wasn't allowed to go with me. So then, so she went off in one direction. I went in another direction. And like 20 minutes later or more, I think it might have been more, I arrived at the gate and we got on, got on last or thereabouts.

Oh, it's the worst.

And went to my colleague and she said, where were you? It's like, like, what do you mean?

It's like we went sitting waiting for you.

I was like, how are you sitting there? She said, I was at the gate 5 minutes after you.

Oh my gosh.

Yeah, if I'm with people, I'd never take assistance. I mean, it's useful, don't get me wrong.

It's useful for going through the security, you know.

Well, yes, yes, but actually, one trick that you can use is pulling out your cane. It doesn't work as well in northern countries, but in southern countries they actually let you through.

That's interesting.

In the Netherlands and possibly Ireland as well, they'll be like, nope, you're gonna stand in line.

But I think in the Irish they let you through pretty much, don't they? It's like they have a special like VIP line for—

No, no, if you, if you, if you pull out your cane without assistance, so don't—

Oh, I see, I see.

Only pull out your cane.

Okay. Ah, it's a risk.

Well, actually, sometimes even the Dutch let you through, like, you know, rules are no rules. No, but No, but the Dutch are really rules-based. So the thing is about the Netherlands, for example, right? In a lot of countries, especially European countries, as a blind person, you can, for example, take the train for free.

All right, yeah.

Not so here. Like, you have to pay. You can take your assistance for free, but not you yourself. So you can have You can have your guide come with you for free, but not you have to pay.

Here, both you and your guide get to travel for free.

Exactly. Same, same in Germany, same in Belgium. I don't know how it is in France, but I assume the same in Italy as well.

In France, it's the same, but you have to, uh, there's mad kind of registration you have to do and it takes ages.

Well, of course it's France.

Yeah, there's a lot of paperwork.

Right. You got to fill out a lot of papers to have the privilege to live in France, but you get the privilege eventually.

That's true.

But in the Netherlands, you pay for the train as a blind person.

Oren, you had an experience in an airport in Florida, didn't you, with the TSA security over there?

I wonder, did you have this experience, Mo? Because so we were going through security and Claudia was told to go through first, and she did. And then she— from what I can recollect, or remember, recollect— I think you said something like, uh, that you're gonna stand there and just grab my hand and pull me, pull me through.

I, I asked, could I go back through?

Oh yeah, could you go back through? Yeah, yeah.

And they wouldn't, they wouldn't let me.

Yeah.

So I had to stand, and they were like, stand aside, stand aside. They were very bossy, very angry men.

And oh yeah, TSA. Yes, TSA.

Like, they're a whole other— they're like the army or something. It's very scary stuff.

Yeah.

And, uh, so I went. So Clodagh was on the other side, and then I was— and I wouldn't— they wouldn't let me walk through with the cane either.

Yeah. And then so the guy said, come here, walk, walk, walk through here. And like, Gordon is like, where's here? I don't know where here is. Um, so I asked him to stand opposite the gap, basically. And it was quite a narrow little gap, right? Um, and so Oren kept bumping into the side of the scanner thing, of course, because like, how's he supposed to know? And your man was getting more and more annoyed with him and sending him back. Go back, go back, go back. And then, you know, do it again. And like, I don't think he understood that Oren literally could not see. Like, it was like—

Sometimes, sometimes with TSA in the States, you're very lucky and they actually help you very well. I don't know what happens when you rub them the wrong way and they become, like you said, the army. And you're like, all right, all right, I'll just click my heels together and jump 5 times, as you say, and off we go. But, you know, just calm down. But like, I think they— I mean, I've had good experiences with TSA as well.

So have we, in fairness. But that one was probably your worst one. I think eventually he Grabbed— he grabbed you. He reached through the little gap and he grabbed you and dragged you through.

I think so, yeah, yeah. But then like you get the complete opposite experience. I think the best one still is Amsterdam.

Oh yeah.

Flying home and just the, the guy—

So lovely.

Just so lovely. Just took my— put his, you know, he told me to put my hands out and kind of point them up, and then he put his hands behind my hands, and then every step of the way he just said, you know, now we're going to We're going to— I'm in front of you and we're going to start backing up, backing up, backing up. You're going to be walking forward. You know, you're about, you know, half a meter from the security.

Elbows in.

Yeah, elbows in. You know, you're just in there now. You know, just in. You're halfway through and you're through, you know. And it's like, yeah, that was such a pleasant experience.

I will say Schiphol in Amsterdam is the best airport I've ever been in.

I think it is.

I think it is too.

Yeah.

They're very organized.

I know I'm a chauvinist, But oh boy, like, I've never had an issue at Schiphol. And when people have issues, like when it really goes wrong, that's national news. The director of Schiphol will be apologizing on television.

Yeah, no, they're very— it's very well designed. The staff are incredibly well trained. It's not just an assistance thing. I think on a general level, it just runs like clockwork, it seems.

Yes, it does. It runs like clockwork. Like Dutch airports, all of them, but most of them are small, so they're, I suppose, easier to run. But Dutch airports in general are run extremely well.

You've been away, Mo, haven't you?

I have been in Istanbul, which was nice. It was a couple of days though with my sister, and we had a lot of fun. Like, there's a lot of history in Istanbul. Yeah, so that's—

I'd love to see it sometime.

Oh, absolutely, you would love it.

What's accessibility like in Istanbul?

Well, I've been in the old city and it's, it's an old city, right? So do you know what accessibility is like there? Like a lot of stairs and a lot of— but, but I think they, they do fairly well, for example, in train stations where you do have guidelines, um, and stuff like that. So actually it, it is not bad at all. I think in a wheelchair you might have trouble in the old city, but, you know, that would be the same in Amsterdam or in Dublin, I suppose. Like in the old, in the old town, you would probably have issues in a wheelchair anyway.

Cobblestones and all that stuff.

Cobblestones and stairs out the wazoo and all that stuff. So it just— yeah, well, people in the Middle Ages did not care about wheelchairs.

No. Yeah. And there's loads of people and loads of noise and all that kind of stuff as well, which is fine for most people, but some people get a bit overwhelmed. Not looking at anyone in particular.

Well, to be fair, like, if that's the problem, then don't go on your own, right? Have someone with you who can handle that stuff. I don't get overwhelmed very quickly. I mean, I— yeah, I, you know, I, I know Amsterdam and I've worked there and I've been in Very busy crowds, and I I'm fine.

Yeah, but yeah.

Well, Mohammed has a really a really good tip for for airports if you can't find the assistance. And this should we I should have played the oh it's not just airports. The blindy tip.

Yeah, play the blindy tip.

Can't find assistance. Basically just what are you saying, Mo?

Just walk around lost and call out hello.

That's great.

Anyone here?

Help!

That's what I do on train stations and in airports if I'm really lost.

And does it work?

Yeah, yeah, it does. I mean, it might take a little.

It's not staff necessarily, it's just like some random—

No, no, it can also be people. It's sometimes it's people, sometimes it's staff.

That's amazing.

Once at a train station, and I had taken the wrong train and I needed to be at the dentist, and I would try to take the metro but it took too long. So in the end, I decided to get out and go take an Uber.

Right.

And so I was on the phone with the Uber guy, and I said, look, man, I can't exactly find where I need to stand, so I'm just gonna stay at the station. And this lady came up to me while I was talking to this guy, and she was like, here, let me take you. So, you know, people, when they hear you, they'll— not always, of course, but sometimes they will come up and help you.

So, Oren, that's it. You stand and you go, help! Help!

Help me!

And then wait.

Yeah, in that voice too.

Yeah, yeah, I will do it.

That'll do it.

Running to you. Yeah, there's a madman in the concourse.

But you— I don't think, Oren, I don't think you've ever, when you've been on your own, I don't think you've ever asked for help, have you?

And I've been on my own, I have. Yeah.

No, you have to, Clodagh.

I mean, I understand that, but I, I've never seen Orin ask for help, so I don't know if you're doing it.

Because you're there.

Is that it? Is that— it's— I'm just— well, of course.

I mean, if someone else is there I know, I won't ask for help either. I'll just be with the one I know.

But you know, there's a song about that, you know.

Oh, really?

Yeah. What's it? Love the one you're with?

I mean, that's good advice, I guess.

Yeah, um, yeah, I suppose. I don't know, I don't know. I've, I've, I mean, I know it's daunting to ask for help, and especially when you don't know who you're asking.

Oh, I don't care, I'm gung-ho.

But yeah, yeah, you're very brave. I think you're very, you're very like confident.

And I mean, not just that, but I also just never had bad experiences doing that ever, really.

Yeah, that's amazing. That's really great. And it's— I suppose, why would you have a bad experience? I suppose I'm just a bit nervous thinking about that idea, and, and also the fact that I've never seen Oren do it. I would love to see you do it sometime, Oren.

I'd be happy to do it.

Well, the thing is though, Clodagh, you have to, you have to pretend that you're not Not with him, or else, or else you'll be looked at like you're the meanest, worst person.

I often get that anyway. What I used to get was the sympathetic head tilt, you know, before Larry, when I was guiding Oren and Oren had a cane. So he'd have his cane in his right hand and I'd be on his left. He'd have my left, my right arm. I'd be on his left.

Would people sometimes tell you like that it was very nice of you to help this poor man?

Oh, people would stop me and tell me I was going straight to heaven. Like, literally, people, you know, and the sympathetic head tilt, which now Larry gets, which I love. I love Larry getting the sympathetic head tilt. I don't get that anymore, which is great. But, um, but I used to get it. It was like— and sometimes people would stop me, like, where was I? Oh, I was at a party, a work party for Oren's workplace. And these women, who in fairness had probably a little bit too much drink taken, took me aside away from him and told me that I was going straight to heaven. And I'm like, I don't know what to— I don't know what to say. I don't know what to say to that.

Like, as in, I had to say that to people I was, I was at that person, at that moment with as well. Like, you're going straight to heaven.

Isn't it very odd though? Like, what do you—

it's like, I think there's only one response to that. Yeah, you're going straight to— you're going straight to heaven, and you should share your Just reply, yes, I know.

Oh God!

That's why I'm doing it, don't you know? This poor man. Why do you think I'm dealing with him? He's my ticket to heaven. Email us on blindguyschat.com. Drop us a line and come along. Email us on blindguyschat.com.

Moving on from travel to matters more important.

All right, well, 2 holidays.

2 matters more important. Number one, uh, Metatlasis not working with WhatsApp. Uh, I thought I was alone in my, um, issue, but it turns out I'm not. And we mentioned the man last on the last show, but Blind Gordon apparently is now experiencing, experiencing this problem where he cannot use WhatsApp to— sorry, he cannot use his Meta glasses to call anybody or message anybody via WhatsApp. And we've also just heard that a friend of the podcast, Roisin Lenihan, is also experiencing this same problem. And she also is unable to make normal or standard phone calls with the Meta glasses. The only solution at the moment seems to be—he tells me it will work; it should work all the time, but it doesn't seem to be working for me all the time—which is to say, instead of say, "Hey Meta, call such and such," or on WhatsApp, is to say, "Hey Siri." WhatsApp call such and such on Meta.

Sorry. On Meta?

Okay.

Sorry. No, that's a joke. It's just— All right.

Okay. But the problem with that is I haven't found that Siri will always wake up when— So particularly if your phone is in your pocket. So Gordon says it works most of the time for him. I have to try this again. But anyway, there does seem to be a fairly random issue or it seems to be affecting people randomly. And Gordon thinks it's to do with WhatsApp rather than the Meta AI app. He may be right. He probably is because he's right about most things, just like Muhammad.

Yep. Yep. Gordon and I are the best of friends.

Please do write in. Let us know if WhatsApp is working with your Meta glasses. And can you make a video call? Can you make a call, a normal call? Can you send a WhatsApp message? just using the glasses with Aimetter. Now, the second one is, and I am infuriated as much as—

Oh my God!

Gordon is. I was asking him to look at something on his Sky Go app recently to see if it had audio description. So it was a program on the BBC, and I wanted to know if it had audio description on it, and We no longer have Sky and Virgin. Our Virgin TV app is just— no other word for it, but it's crap in terms of accessibility.

Yeah, sorry, David Nason.

I asked— no, David Nason is Sky. Well, he's no longer Sky, actually. He works for Comreg.

You were there, I think, no?

No, Comreg.

Oh, Comreg.

But anyway, I was asking Gordon about this and He said that he would look at the Sky Go app on his phone, and he suddenly realized that what used to be there, which is the audio description information on each channel and each program, is no longer there on the Sky Go app.

Hmm.

So after much ado about nothing, after spending about an half an hour, he said, trying to get through to somebody on Sky.

Oh, gosh.

Helpdesk. He eventually got through to a woman and said what his problem was, and she informed him that, yes, they had taken the audio description information off the Sky Go app, and it would no longer be there. And he said, well, that doesn't help me. And is there anything that's going to be done about it? Nope. And he said, right, I'd like to leave a complaint. So, and she said, I'm not going to allow you to make a complaint because it's not going to get fixed.

Wow. Cheerio, goodbye.

Yeah, cheerio, goodbye.

Oh, that's horrible. Like, your complaint isn't going to make a difference, so don't bother leaving it kind of thing. Wow, rude.

I mean, this makes me think of the guy at Netflix who told me that Netflix was not for blind people, but sure, I could request— I could request audio description. That was fine. He would make a note.

Oh my God, that's like Ryanair saying Ryanair is not for disabled people. Did you hear that one?

Uh, yes, I did. I did hear that one. Yes, shocking.

But that's also like Sky telling Stuart Lawler to keep paying his subscription to Sky TV, but just listen to the radio channels.

I know.

I mean, are we moving on here, folks? What's going on with—

Very strange. Like, if you've got something built into your app, why do you actively remove it? Like, that just seems— it's not like it was causing any trouble or anything, was it?

Well, I mean, it could be that it was causing problem on the backend. that they were getting it from an old system and now they're migrating to a new system.

Oh, okay.

And therefore they have to like reconnect it somehow or get it from the old system into the new system. There are like, there's a shocking amount of complexity in the backend of these companies.

Yeah.

And it could be that there was a technical reason, but for them to say like it's not gonna be fixed, that is not acceptable. They could have said Yeah, we're in the middle of migrating. And even that's not acceptable where you take away a feature like that in the middle of migrating. Like, even then you should actually say sorry for doing that. But I could— I can see it happening, right? I can see the pressures in a company mounting in such a way that, yes, actually they have to go to the newer system before migrating everything over. It could be something like that.

Are you being very kind and very honest?

I think you're being very kind.

Yeah. No, no, no. So, so I'm trying to explain how things happen on the backend at companies like that. I'm not being, I'm not being in terms of like, I'm not saying it's okay. I'm saying I can see it happening. Yeah. Okay. Because things like this have happened before where people just accept bugs in order to put something out there. Consider this, right? Right. If you have a system being built right now without it being out there, without it being used, it's costing you money without making you money. And that is allowed for a little while, right? Companies will invest, but at some point companies will say, right, that's enough. Now it's gotta go live or it's dying, one of the two. And so people, people bring stuff like this live even with bugs in there. And then they fix the bugs or the omissions later.

As they go, yeah. And I suppose in their minds, like, AD and subtitles aren't important to people.

Well, or what they're thinking is, you know, just put on the channel or put on the episode and go look if you can find audio description. Why do you need the information up front, right? So I can see how people think that way. It's not necessarily okay, but it happens all the time, and it doesn't just happen to audio description. Like, this happens to a lot more things.

Oh, I'm sure it does.

Consider, for example, Sonos. That's exactly, that's exactly what happened at Sonos, I'm pretty sure, right? They were building this system for a very— this new app for a very long time. It was costing them money without making the money because it wasn't out there in the real world. And at some point, leadership said, right, that's us done investing. It's going out. End of story. And it cost the CEO his job because nobody liked that app.

Wow.

But that's how this works. It's— that's how it works in every company that I've been at. They'll accept some investment. You tell them upfront what you think it's going to take and what you think it's going to cost. They'll accept that. They'll accept some overruns, even a little bit more delay in order to increase maybe quality or get some stuff in. But at some point, it's got to end. Otherwise something never comes out. Because I've seen projects like that as well where people were not willing to pull the trigger and it just endlessly went on and on and on and on and on. Yeah. And that's a, that's an endless, that's an endless pit to throw your money into.

It's a kind of a form of agile development, I suppose, where you just put, put up a version that's like one step away from beta and fix it on the fly as you go?

Yes, that's basically what happens. And again, I'm not saying that that's okay or that it is okay to omit audio description, but I've been in teams that have omitted things and threw something onto a release because that's what, you know, management wanted.

Don't mention any names, quick.

No, it's Dutch companies. It's everywhere. It's everywhere where you go. This stuff happens. This is normal corporate practice.

Gordon is stuck with having no audio description information on the Sky Go app, and we're both stuck with having no capability of making a WhatsApp call through our Meta glasses. So this is progress. Moving on. All right, folks, thank you for listening to the show. Please remember, the email is [email protected], and do tell us If you're experiencing any Meta AI and Ray-Ban issues. And we are still— I'm def— we're really, really hoping now on the next podcast we will be talking to somebody about autonomous driving. So if you do have any questions, please get them into [email protected]. That's a good idea. And we will try our best to ask them during the recording of that interview. But we are really, really hoping And I think it will happen that it will be on the next podcast. So thank you for listening to this show, and we will see you in 2 weeks' time. Bye-bye.