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Deaf Tour Guide Training Program |
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Deaf Tour Guide Training Program |
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At Deaf School Deaf Guide Deaf Guide Here we are
Japanese deaf tourist meeting with deaf club.
Deaf Guide training class
by Thi Hoang
I am a professional tour guide and tour operator in Vietnam. I have
been guiding thousands of hearing people from many countries through
years. I find those travellers very advantaged people who can travel
round the world and enjoy many nice things. As a guide, I also find
myself lucky to get paid to travel, make friends with many people and
also enjoy many nice things with my travellers.
How about the deaf and HOH people? I believe they also wish to travel
as far and long as those hearing people. Money and time can be some of
their main obstacles. Finding a destination tour operator who can make
their trips safe and enjoyable is the next big obstacle after the
above ones have been solved.
However, there are more and more tour operators who are offering
warm-hearted care and concern to disabled people. Smile
Tours Service in Vietnam is one of those tour operators. At the
moment, we are working on a project to organize tours for the deaf and HOH travellers to Vietnam. We are training a group of young Vietnamese
deaf and HOH people in terms of guidance skills and knowledge and
International Sign (IS) to be deaf tour guides.
These deaf people are having difficulty in finding jobs and making a
standard living though they look healthy and are smart like other hearing
people.. The more I communicate with deaf people here, the more I
admire their strong wills for life. But I also feel sorry and upset
about their disadvantages. My deaf guide trainees have different
situations of how they have become deaf. Some have got it from birth.
Some of them have suffered it due to lack of medical knowledge and
care from their own families when they got fevers at a very young age.
Some have even got it from stress and depression from work and life.
Some of them can gain their hearing ability back if they can afford
for some hearing–aid devices, or cochlear implants. But unfortunately,
they can not afford that now. It's really sad for me to hear their stories.
At the moment, they are working hard for at least 8 hours a day and 6
days a week or more to earn about 40 to 100 USD per month without any
extra subsidization as cleaners, tailors, painters, handicraft makers,
waiters, etc. This income covers their daily expenses, rent, food,
special occasions such as celebrations, eating out with friends, and
even some support for their families. They join some clubs or groups
with other deaf fellows to show their existence in this life. Happily,
some are in love and some will get married, even with foreign deaf
people. They care for each other and communicate well by sending cell
phone messages, using web cam chats online or emails, and meeting
together. Their world of silence is a really interesting one to be
explored. They all love travelling and being guides. They all want to
enhance their simple lives.
We believe that travelling can make a better life for anyone who wants
to learn and enjoy this world, especially the deaf & HOH people will
enhance their living standards in many ways through guided tours by
deaf fellows. We strongly believe that guided tours are better than
self organized tours in terms of security, service quality, and value
of money.
Vietnam is truly an ideal destination for deaf travellers as it offers
good security, beautiful sceneries, delicious food, interesting daily
life, friendly and helpful people. We will make good tour programs
focusing on high security, beautiful sites, delicious food, beach
hang-out, shopping, visits to schools and workshops of the disable,
etc.
Above all, by organizing tours for the deaf and HOH travellers, we
hope to offer our Vietnamese deaf guides stable jobs and foreign deaf
travellers and Vietnamese deaf guides will have chance to exchange
their different cultures, life styles, and sign languages together,
which can make their silent worlds more open and interesting.
Therefore, Smile Tours Service has tried to be a specific tour
operator for them and implemented a project of training deaf guides
and organizing trips in Vietnam for worldwide deaf & HOH travelers
since May 2007. Fortunately, we have recently received a fund from
Silverjet Vakanties / Silverjet Elegant Resorts in the Netherland
http://www.silverjet.nl to reinforce this project. In addition, we
have received practical help and support from Disability Resource and
Development (D.R.D) http://www.drdvietnam.com/, our friends in the
Netherland, Australia, the USA, etc. We will continuously train our
deaf guides and improve our organization professionally.
OUR TOURS ARE SAFE AND APPROPRIATE TO DEAF & HOH TRAVELLERS
BY APPLYING THE FOLLWOING GUIDELINES:
Safety first: We assign 2 guides (speaking guide and
deaf guide) for each tour from the beginning till the end. We make
sure the travellers will always receive full attention and help from
us. Travellers are always accompanied by our guides, especially in
crowdy places or traffic points. We choose hotels and restaurants
which are easily accessible in case of fires (low floors, wide
corridors, fire security, etc.). There are always life-vests on boats.
Sufficient time for sightseeing, relaxing and
shopping;
Focusing on pleasing their strong senses of sight,
taste and feeling, including beautiful visual sites, interesting shows
and rides; offering delicious Vietnamese food and specialties, special
treatments of massage and mud bath, visits to working places and
schools of Vietnamese deaf people or disable people.
If you are interested in this project and our tours, you are more
than welcome to visit our website
www.smiletoursvietnam.com.
Please contact us
for any information, feedback, suggestions, ideas, encouragements, and
experiences. We would highly appreciate your help in any way: taking
our tours, introducing our tours for deaf travellers to anybody or
groups who are interested in travelling to Vietnam; providing us with
sign language materials; sponsoring Vietnamese deaf people for hearing
devices or curing their hearing ability; Financing the project, etc.
