Hi Rahul, Which meditation retreat do you wish to attend? There are those retreats where some amount of talking is allowed, and then there are also completely silent retreats such as Vipassana.
I have so far attended three ten-day Vipassana retreats in Hereford, England, and my experience has been extremely positive. They have a sprawling campus in the middle of a forest, and the atmosphere is very conducive for meditation. The Vipassana centre here takes accessibility very seriously. They even have an accessibility committee, which looks into minute details for making the centre fully accessible to people with various disabilities. One is expected to strictly adhere to the code of noble silence during these retreats. In order to make this possible for a blind person, they provide a fulltime assistant (they call them servers). On day 0 when a blind student arrives at the centre, the assigned server meets with the student and orientates her to the centre. The server also reads out the menu for various meals for all ten days, and the student can specify what she wants to eat during various meals on all of these days. The server notes down the preferences. This eliminates the need to discuss the menu at mealtimes. In order to minimise talking, blind students are also encouraged to devise various gestures. For example, if you need to use the washroom, tap twice on the shoulder of the server. And when the server arrives to collect the student from the meditation hall, she can tap on the student's shoulder once in order to announce her arrival. These gestures do work. During the entire duration of a ten-day retreat, I wouldn't have spoken more than two or three sentences. It is quite possible that Vipassana centres in India work differently. They may also be more lenient about allowing people to talk during the course. In order to maximise the benefits you derive from such a retreat, maintaining silence certainly helps a great deal. Several centres in India may also not be able to provide a dedicated server to a blind student. It is important that you discuss arrangements with the centre well in advance. There have been instances of some blind students being turned down by various centres in India. Geetha -----Original Message----- From: AccessIndia [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Rahul Bajaj Sent: 07 August 2018 18:19 To: [email protected] Subject: [AI] Accessibility of Meditation Retreats Hi Everyone, I was wondering if any of you have gone on a meditation retreat and how accessible you found it to be. I am asking this question because my understanding is that people largely communicate nonverbally in such settings which is not viable for a blind person. Also, one would need assistance in things like accessing food and mobility. Would love to hear your thoughts about this. Best, Rahul Sent from my iPhone Search for old postings at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ To unsubscribe send a message to [email protected] with the subject unsubscribe. To change your subscription to digest mode or make any other changes, please visit the list home page at http://accessindia.org.in/mailman/listinfo/accessindia_accessindia.org.in Disclaimer: 1. Contents of the mails, factual, or otherwise, reflect the thinking of the person sending the mail and AI in no way relates itself to its veracity; 2. AI cannot be held liable for any commission/omission based on the mails sent through this mailing list.. Search for old postings at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ To unsubscribe send a message to [email protected] with the subject unsubscribe. To change your subscription to digest mode or make any other changes, please visit the list home page at http://accessindia.org.in/mailman/listinfo/accessindia_accessindia.org.in Disclaimer: 1. Contents of the mails, factual, or otherwise, reflect the thinking of the person sending the mail and AI in no way relates itself to its veracity; 2. AI cannot be held liable for any commission/omission based on the mails sent through this mailing list..
