We are entering the stage of lockdown level three and closer to level two on the 12th of May 2020.

Some days my life has been hectic at home but I managed to find time with my partner and our three dogs during the break. Other people actually do not realise what I have been up to, or how busy I am by making sure any information goes out to the Deaf community including people with disabilities anywhere. Or doing the groceries for the Deaf elderly people and one Somalian Deaf lady and doing live video conferencing to make sure they are okay or in the need of bits of help. I have attended many Zoon meeting, video conferencing from home daily. The Deaf Christain group did a Zoom conference for the first time and it was a great experience for them

This is Jean as myself who was juggling the emergency plan between home visits and supermarkets. Any disrupted plans can cause a problem for my travelling route and mileage. I have had made one request for a replaced worker to my case manager due to our plan last weekend.

Last Friday the 1st of May, my partner came with me along with our young pup to the vet and to have my blood test out in Te Awamutu for the first time together in one bubble. Mind you, it was a 30 minutes drive from our home in Eureka and we were making four trips on the same day. Our young pup was due to have desexed once we arrived at the vet, and dropped her off. We made out way to the Path Lab and I approached the staff for she wore a mask which disappointed me. I told her that I am deaf and needs to lip read. The second staff wore the mask and she questioned me for my identity to the record by moving the mask down and up so I can lip read her.

We head out to the Countdown Supermarket for our grocery and my partner wanted to experience life when going inside the supermarket by washing hands, walk together and avoid other people within 2 metres and so on. To my partner’s horror to find the price of the groceries such as meats, vegetables have gone up. This is the real lives of any essential workers or family members do the groceries for other people. We headed back home without our young pup. Our two other dogs noticed the young one was not home yet.

The time drawing in was the time to pick our young pup and we arrived at the vet in Te Awamutu. To my horror, the staff wore a mask – for God sake and it was not helping me for I am deaf and unable to lip read. I told the staff that I am deaf and unable to do lip reading. My partner told her but he listened to the staff on instruction while I took paperwork including the bill through grumbling over the mask appeared from the staff.  We took our young pup home safety and she wore an ugly collar – an Elizabethian collar

.

But there was never-ending work by other people’s requests during the week. One regret new from our Waikato Deaf Christain Fellowship – one Deafblind elderly lady lost her husband (natural death in sleep) during the lockdown three. I could not deliver or arrange the flower and card until next week. Last Thursday one Deaf elderly man rushed off to the hospital and his wife texted me rather a confusing message. I was planning to visit her tomorrow BUT for this Deaf elderly wife, the thing goes wrong and she admitted to the hospital per her sister’s instruction instead of staying in bed and rest. They have many health issues over many years. Several days ago, I received a voice message in my mobile and a several mobile calling instead of texts. I have no idea who was the caller. My guess was the St Johns Medical Alert Service. I presumed it coming from the relief essential worker who did not read the detail my mobile used the way of texting me, not to use voice calling. Mm, not long ago while I was doing this blog, another video call came through from one Deaf Somalian woman and her request. Her request was to get an electrician because she can not make a text message to her case manager due to the literacy problem. Her request added to my emergency list for tomorrow first thing in the morning.

My spare times was relaxing out in the courtyard, doing baking cake, feijoas, passionfruits and catching up reading history resources. Several of the most enlightened the morning, were the handmade craft of the poppy – two poppies placed outside our property. It was a symbol for the ANZAC Day, discovering a cousin link to one of my late grandma’s Watkinson family from a friend of mine who we never thought that we came from the same family and our young pup busted the collar on one fateful stormy night – Tuesday last week.

Where to, how can other people improve their service and communicate to us – Deaf people and what a better option of improving technology for many Deaf elderly people who have little of financials and unfamiliar charts of doing online, or internet, emails, Zoom. The advanced technologies are alien to many Deaf elderly people and some average Deaf people who are on benefits or receive little income. I loathe mask which pisses me off even I don’t wear mask during my lockdown work. It is okay for me to wear the mask BUT not from other people who wear a mask. It is impossible for many Deaf people to lip-read if they do not know how to sign instead of writing down on the paper. My simple advice is to get a transparent mask to meet the number of Deaf people living in the area and it saves the cost to buy a carton of the transparent mask from overseas suppliers. I bought these issues to the Waikato Hospital a couple years ago and I am not sure if this project is on the list to buy carton if there is any funding left.

Many advanced technologies bought a great thing for many Deaf people like doing zoom, chat conferencing – BUT what about the cost of getting a piece of equipment like Ipad, laptop and the cost of broadband for them? Not everyone got these kinds of technologies. Other needs of communication is read the detail from any database like St Johns Medical Alert, check the instructions before sending the texts to the next of kin and assisted support worker.

My plan on the projects are setting up a workshop such as well-being workshop, how to use Zoom meeting, chat meeting, learn to do email, online banking, budget financial and budget cooking class by using vegetables from the garden, even how to grow vegetable in your own garden and lastly basic literacy course. Getting funding is not gonna be easy after the COVID19 lockdown.