Singapore, 13 June 2008

Dine in the Dark was a small social enterprise set up by the Singapore Association for the Visually Handicapped (SAVH) to provide a means of earning a livelihood for some of their more abled beneficiaries with a social objective - to promote awareness for their cause.

Customers eat their lunch in complet darkness - you would not even see your fingers in front of you - served and guided by visually handicapped servers. You are alerted of their presence and course servings through the bells on their ankles and their verbal instructions to you.

It can be a scary experience as 20 volunteers from Salesforce.com Singapore tried their hand (pun intended) when they had lunch with the SAVH that day. It took a while for everyone to get seated and used to the darkness and there were much laughter and giggling as people try to figure out who is their lunch partners and the food they are served it. Attempts to eat with cutlery are successful for those who are adept with their hands and senses but the rest resorted to using hands in order to get a better feel on what they are eating. Lunch lasted only an hour but it felt much longer than that.

SAVH also gave a tour of their premises and briefing of their programmes to the volunteers. The biggest takeaway for most of us is we appreciate our sight even more as we leave the dark room and realised that the experience also taught us trust as we had to rely on our lunch companions when food and drinks is passed around the table completely by touch or verbal instructions.