No trains I'd feel safe on and no apple fans I know of in my small South 
African backwater town.

Warm regards,

Brandt Steenkamp

You can tune in to my show wednesday afternoons at 3 PM UTC by going to 
www.TheGlobalVoice.info

Contact me:

Skype: brandt.steenkamp007
MSN: [email protected]
Google talk/AIM: [email protected]
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  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Cheree 
  To: [email protected] 
  Sent: Saturday, March 12, 2011 11:37 AM
  Subject: Re: O M G, it's beautiful


  Cheree Heppe here:


  Eeks.  That's a bit of a distance.


  No trains, buses?  Or a sighted I-device fanatic who will drive there?
  If you thought it safe, you could advertise for a driver on craigslist.


  Regards,
  Cheree Heppe



  Sent from my iPhone

  On 12/03/2011, at 0:06, "brandt" <[email protected]> wrote:


    Not when the nearest apple store is 250 kilometers (about 155 miles) away.

    Warm regards,

    Brandt Steenkamp

    You can tune in to my show wednesday afternoons at 3 PM UTC by going to 
www.TheGlobalVoice.info

    Contact me:

    Skype: brandt.steenkamp007
    MSN: [email protected]
    Google talk/AIM: [email protected]
    Twitter @brandtsteenkamp
      ----- Original Message ----- 
      From: Cheree 
      To: [email protected] 
      Sent: Saturday, March 12, 2011 9:58 AM
      Subject: Re: O M G, it's beautiful


      Cheree Heppe here:


      That sounds very discouraging.


      Could you enlist the help of a friend with a car?




      Regards,
      Cheree Heppe


      Sent from my iPhone

      On 11/03/2011, at 23:54, "brandt" <[email protected]> wrote:


        I wish for one, I had an apple store near enough to me so I could get 
to it, and secondly, I wish our public transport were good and safe enough to 
be used by any sighted, let alone blind person! Then only might I have a look 
at an iPad.

        Warm regards,

        Brandt Steenkamp

        You can tune in to my show wednesday afternoons at 3 PM UTC by going to 
www.TheGlobalVoice.info

        Contact me:

        Skype: brandt.steenkamp007
        MSN: [email protected]
        Google talk/AIM: [email protected]
        Twitter @brandtsteenkamp
          ----- Original Message ----- 
          From: Cheree Heppe 
          To: [email protected] 
          Sent: Saturday, March 12, 2011 9:11 AM
          Subject: O M G, it's beautiful


          Cheree Heppe here:

          This afternoon, I took the light rail to the Apple store to get a 
hands on look at the IPad 2.

          The line for the IPad 2 was even longer than the last time, when the 
first IPad was released.

          One of the mall security guards tried to warn me away with tales of 
the long line and of people having to take tickets to get in to buy an IPad 2.  
Undaunted, I asked the security guard to speak with one of the Apple reps.  The 
Apple rep knew me and I got right in.  Thank you, oh, thank you!

          The store had a bunch of IPad 2's arranged around a square table near 
the front of the store.  The Apple store was jam-packed, as usual, but even 
more so.  My little German shepherd dog guide settled herself under the table 
in front of where I stood and rested quietly while various curious IPad 
enthusiasts came and went and I examined the IPad 2.

          This IPad 2 looks and feels smaller, but it is actually the same 
outer dimensions as its predecessor.  Somebody had an IPad 1 with them and we 
held the two against each other to prove that the IPad 2 was the same outer 
dimensions.  Where the IPad 2 is smaller is in its weight and thickness, which 
is immediately noticeable, if one has handled  the IPad 1.  The IPad 2's 
rounded edges make it seem even thinner without feeling fragile in any way.

          There was a fellow customer examining the IPad 2 next to me on my 
right and I asked him to turn on Voice Over.  He was doubtful about being able 
to do this at first, but I talked him through Settings to General, to 
Accessibility and through engaging VoiceOver and Triple Click Home.

          Once those preliminaries were done, my newly met sighted assistant 
felt more confident about playing with the IPad 2 in front of him.  I told him 
that all IPads have VoiceOver on them and that he could use VoiceOver to read 
books to him.  He sounded interested and amazed.

          In order to hear VoiceOver in the hubbub of the store, I paired my 
Bluetooth ear bud with the IPad 2 in front of me.  Several previous customers 
had paired various phones with this IPad 2 and when I left, I didn't unpair 
those, just my own gadget. 

          Using VoiceOver, I looked around and found a lot more features on 
this IPad 2.  Maybe they loaded a few extra non-native apps on it, but I found 
three pages of apps.

          After navigating to YouTube and watching the first part of the 
original Star Trek's Doomsday Machine, I re-entered Settings; General; 
Bluetooth and un-paired my ear bud, clicked back to the Home screen and tapped 
Triple Click Home to return that particular IPad 2 to Sighted Standard Mode.

          This IPad feels a lot faster than the IPhone 4.  In fact, it feels 
like a computer in its responsivity and I really can envision this device 
morphing into a full fledged computer in very short order.  The sighted guy 
next to me thought the same thing.

          I left and took a break at the Starbuck's in the mall before heading 
home.

          Wow, what a gadget!!

          Even more amazing to me is my ability to get right on the IPad 2 and 
navigate and perform functions correctly and independently the first time.  My 
only regret is that blind users still must recruit sighted assistance to 
initially turn VoiceOver on in the absence of an ITunes interface.  If there 
were a start-up way to have VoiceOver on by default, I would have never had to 
recruit my fellow IPad adventurer to turn Accessibility on for me.


          Regards,
          Cheree Heppe


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