I have been wishing to have useful ears like dog’s. If possible, I also want to have a dog’s nose.
When I had walking training at bus stop or subway station, although I was told to walk paying attention to sound, it was too noisy to hear. That is why I felt like having dog’s ears.

Dogs have 3,000-4,000 times keener sense of hearing than human beings. They can hear supersonic waves that human beings can’t hear. Moreover, they have double muscle to move ears compared with us. Dogs can gather wider range of sounds. If I had its super ears, I would be able to hear all the surrounding sound. If somebody called me from far away, I would be able to grasp who he was and where he was. I wonder something will change in my ordinary life, if I come to be able to hear supersonic waves.

Also, dogs have 1 million times keener sense of smell. From the distance, they can distinguish their owner or not by smelling. That is to say, the content and ingredients of menu will be found out easily with dog’s nose. And I will be able to find the person exactly I want to see even in a crowd.

Off course these are dreams I imagined. But at the various situation in my ordinary life, it is fun to imagine how they would work if I had dog’s ears and nose. Someday, somewhere, I would like to have the similar experience even if it is not real.

I came to yearn for dog’s ears and nose more to get to know their terrific ability. On the other hand, I have become conscious of senses.

I am now absorbed in taking a walk beside Toyohira River near my house. Together with my father and brother, I take a walk for 2 hours. As the promenade is wide enough, we mostly walk in a straight row. In the spring, I can hear the sound of stream from the river rising with the thaw. In the early summer, as the river falling down, the sound of stream gets smaller and I can smell new grasses. The other day, I could get to know width and depth of the river by the sound of throwing stones. I heard that salmons had already come back to the river. But I haven’t been to Toyohira River in the autumn. When I feel the sound of leaves to change and wind to get cooler, I will visit there to feel the sense of season. I guess I will feel the difference of the smell of woods beside the river.

We, the visually impaired, cover the eyesight with other senses we own such as hearing and smelling.

Through the walking training, furthermore wishes came up in my mind. 2 hours training by bus and subway made my walking territory wider. As the result, I felt like knowing more about my surroundings and being involved with other people.

While the training, I had a nice chat with elderly lady in the subway, she spoke to me that her son helped the physical handicapped people as the volunteer. Young mother leaded me to the bus terminal through the long stairs holding baby and the baby buggy. One lady gave me her turn at the bus stop. I was a bit afraid that I was leaded to be dragged in at the subway station and bus stop. While Yosakoi Festival, nearly 20 people talked to me at the training.

These experiences were never retained while I was guided.

I not only appreciated a lot of people but also realized that I had been protected warmly. Now I have come to try to be involved with other people actively. This is what I’ve never felt. I also think I want to help other people activating my ability someday. What I have to be conscious is to improve my ability not only taking care of myself but also looking towards society.

Dog’s ears and nose are my dream to yearn for and also to give me a chance to think about how I will be involved with society.

I do “Kakeru” in any case. (F.Y.R. There are various Japanese words which sound “Kakeru” meaning put on, bet, run and so forth as follows.) I put on glasses to cover the eyesight. I have bet on horse racing. As I like running, I can run as fast as 3 minutes per 1 km on the ground just like Pegasus in the sky. I explained too snappily. I will make my dream come true through my life.

My dream is to become a teacher. During the school days, everyone must have had the teacher to yearn for. In my school days, there weren’t strong/cool teacher like “Yankumi” of TV drama “Gokusen” and too enthusiastic teacher like “Kinpachi”. But all the teachers around me and I finally shared happiness of graduation with tears of joy. Then, I have come to feel like being a teacher like them.

To make the dream come true, I think 3 elements are necessary. The 1st element is “Never give up”. Everyone has dream. But very few people can make their dream come true. To make dream come true, it is very important to analyze the dream and create its vision to realize and keep moving forward. Even if we have visual impairments, we can have and create the dream. But in fact, most people give up their dream to be captivated with other things. Fortunately, I am studying very hard everyday like a horse to become a teacher without being captivated.

However, it is difficult to make dream come true just by myself. As the 2nd element, I need someone to support my dream. How is everyone’s case? For example, when I run 1 km at full throttle on the ground, if I am alone, I may give up running to have heart leaping into a mouth and feel pressure in the chest. But if my friends cheer me up beside me, I bet I will never give up running toward the finish line. A carriage horse would also give up running without being pushed sometimes. Thankfully, I have a lot of teachers to push me. Off course I also have a lot of good friends to cheer me up.

And the last element is to get the chance. There are not so many chances. So we always have to be ready not to miss the chance. I think that’s happened to everyone else, that is, due to studying too hard on the night before the test, I was too tired to do the test well because of sleep shortage. At the sports meet, one father, who used to be a member of the track club, was overexcited to trip and fall. Since I was said, “You will have no school tomorrow because of typhoon getting closer”, I woke up expecting to miss the school next morning but it was beautiful day. And I went to school only to find there is nobody in the classroom. The teacher told me that we had got typhoon warning on the news program. To avoid this kind of experience, we need not only running hard but also having a break to listen carefully to surroundings/world and wait for the chance. I am also fortunate that I can always listen intently to the people’s chitchat and the public. Although I am pushed to study hard like a horse, my ears are not as dull as horse’s yet. So, I am sure that I will be able to get the chance without missing.

I can’t make my dream come true without these 3 elements. I always keep these elements in my mind to build a bridge towards the dream. I will keep doing “Kakeru” with utmost effort.

As I give my whole attention to both ears, I’ve never cared noises inside the train. When enjoying the comfort of sound, I feel my pulse getting stronger and something abundant coming up. “Now I’m excited about meeting my friends after 3 weeks interval.”

When I was in junior high school, I was living in such a small world. That is why I didn’t have enough general education/knowledge and many opportunities to communicate with other people. Even though I love railway, I didn’t have friends to share its fun. I used to feel lonely everyday.

But I faced a turning point in last May when I just became high school student. The teacher said to me, “Why don’t you try to join Board of Representatives? It’s a good opportunity to make friends to talk about railway you love. It’ll be a valuable experience to expand your world.” She strongly recommended me to join “Board of Representatives of Kanto Blind School Student Council”. I’ve been longing for friends to share the fun of railway for a long time. In June, I decided to attend Board of Representatives as an observer holding a great hope.

And I found them! I could make friends by chatting and introducing myself while a break time. Fortunately, I could find two! Since it was a great encounter for me, I was so excited. Strangely, contrary to my custom, I could speak with them very glibly. One of them was very quick to gather information and super knowledgeable about railway. He gave a lot of information about private railway to me who had known only about JR. The other one introduced “The Blind Railway Club” to me. It is a club for the visually impaired people who love railway. I registered their name on my mailing list right away. My hobby world started to expand further.

On weekday while spring vacation, I tried to make a trip by myself using Tobu, Tokyu and Keikyu Railway. However, the accident happened at the Kawagoe Station in Saitama Prefecture. I had my very important white cane broken. I was too shocked to think about even the reason why the cane had been broken. I was in a big trouble. I was in a panic. And I was dumbfounded with the broken cane in my hand for a while. But I determined to solve the problem finally. I got an idea to buy a gummed tape to mend the cane at the department store in Ikebukuro. But I couldn’t measure things just in front of me and bumps to get down without the cane. I sweated heavily because I felt so nervous. Finally I could arrive at the department store taking a long time carefully. With the white cane heavily bandaged with the gammed tape, I could carry out my almost plan. As soon as I got back home, I felt totally drained of energy and fell down.

Right away, I reported it to my friends on the mailing list. They gave me replies with encouragement and wisdom of living such as “You had a tough time!”, “You had better to bring the extra when taking a trip.” All of them were very helpful. But the best thing I got from the experience is I realized I was on the way to conversion. If I had this kind of trouble before, I must have returned home immediately. I was very proud of me to solve the problem by myself.

As the relationship with new blind friends became stable, I received a request from the elementary school principal. He said to me, “I’m sorry to disturb you on weekday but I want you to come to my school and make a speech for children.” It happened when I joined the JRC activity to help my mother who does teaching. Some blind people say, “We are not a kind of spectacle!” But I don’t think so. I think we should stay together to understand each other. Just calling to is not enough, spending time together with ordinary people is the quickest way for normalization.

Although I had to miss a class and I was not confident, I visited the elementary school holding the guitar. When the principal introduced me to everyone saying, “Mr. Ishikawa has been to Hakata by express train with sleeping berths just before the abolishment.”, there was stir among children and that made me feel relaxed. As playing the guitar, I spoke to children, “If we are trained specially for the braille and walking and so on, our basic life style is not very different from ordinary people’s, even though we sometimes ask a support.” It might be a little bit difficult to understand for children in the lower grades. But I really appreciate that I had a good opportunity to appeal to ordinary people as many as possible for understanding the life of visually impaired person.

One year has passed since I faced the turning point after becoming the high school student. Although I said patronizingly, “ We can do everything if trained well.” to children at the elementary school, I still need a lot of supports. People pushed my back to encourage me and I just started to convert towards the independence little by little such as 5 degrees to 6 degrees. If I go into a 360-degree roll, I shall return to the previous me who always used to wait for somebody’s direction only. Therefore, “180-degree conversion” is my goal for the independence. It’ll be a long way and hard to achieve the goal. Although I may be childlike, cherishing fun of the trip to listen to the sound of train which I love so much and expanding my life space, I’ll aim for “180-degree conversion” appreciating my surrounding people.