Born Blind to Inspire: YouTube Channel Creator, Mom, Gardener and Author – From Ukraine to Down Under

Full Transcript

Olga Itsenko-Mahler:

I wasn’t the same anymore, I was standing out from the crowd, I had to learn not only how western culture works but also what it’s like to be blind among sighted people-

Jeff Thompson:

Please welcome Olga Itsenko-Mahler-

Olga:

-and it was actually quite terrifying.

Jeff:

-creator of the YouTube channel “Born Blind to Inspire.”

Olga:

Hi guys, my name is Olga, and I’m completely blind. Today I would like to talk about fitness.

Jeff:

From the Ukraine to Australia, and how one year in Texas opened her mind to the possibilities.

Olga:

I think it’s the right way you guys do it in the western world, that kids from young age have to go to the mainstream schools.

During the coronavirus I started gardening, I started writing, and I started a YouTube channel.

For me, it was an absolutely self-discovering, wonderful time.

Jeff:

From the Born Blind to Inspire YouTube channel, please welcome Olga Itsenko-Mahler. We hope you enjoy.

Olga:

-grew up in the Soviet times, and in the Soviet times God didn’t exist, so it would be actually, politically punishable if back then people did celebrate Christmas.

Computer voice:

“Born blind to inspire” in Russian is [born blind to inspire in Russian.

Olga:

No matter what life can be bright, you can be happy, it’s all in our heads, it’s all about our attitude, you know?

Jeff:

Welcome to Blind Abilities, I’m Jeff Thompson. In the studio today we have a YouTube creator, Born Blind to Inspire, her name is Olga Itsenko-Mahler. Olga, welcome to Blind Abilities.

Olga:

Thank you, thank you so much for having me.

Jeff:

I’m glad to have you on here, I’ve seen you on YouTube, I almost know one of your children from the YouTubes, I know you have another one, you’re from the Ukraine, now you’re in Australia, so I would just want to say thank you so much for taking the time to come onto the Blind Abilities and talk to our listeners.

Olga:
My pleasure, my pleasure.

Jeff:
What’s it like there today? Is it warm, sunny—you guys are headed towards fall.

Olga:

It’s actually winter now-

Jeff:

Winter!

Olga:

-we live upside down, you know, so it’s winter in Australia, but we are quite spoiled, because even in winter- because in Queensland, it’s now about, oh, I don’t know fahren- in Celsius it’s like 25 degrees during the day, so we don’t really have winter, we can still wear shorts, it’s pretty amazing.

Jeff:

No, that ain’t really winter.

Olga:

Yeah, well, we call it winter.

Jeff:

So when you celebrate Christmas, do you have snow on the ground?

Olga:

No, we don’t have snow-

Jeff

Oh, man!

Olga

-we actually have really disgusting weather for Christmas, I feel like instead of decorating a Christmas tree decorating a palm tree, you know. Yeah.

Jeff:

I mentioned Christmas, and you didn’t get to celebrate Christmas back in the Ukraine as much, I imagine your Christmases now are quite different.

Olga:

Oh, definitely. My family is an atheist family, because they grew up in the Soviet times, and in the Soviet times God didn’t exist, so it would be actually, politically punishable if back then people did celebrate Christmas, so New Year, that’s the thing we would celebrate as a family and in Russian tradition, in Ukrainian tradition, it’s a different- you basically cook hundreds of different dishes and put them all at once on the table and turn on the TV and eat and drink and just be merry, that’s the way we celebrate New Year in Ukraine. But here, obviously, Christmas is a bit more spiritual, a bit more family-orientated, so it’s all about spending time together.

Jeff:

It must be quite different from- coming from where you’ve been to where you are today, especially, like, in the education field. There must have been a certain point in your life where all of a sudden you said “Wow, there’s a whole ‘nother world out here.”

Olga:

Oh, definitely. I grew up, actually, in a boarding school for the blind, and everyone was the same around me, and then in year 11 I went on an exchange program and I studied in America, in Texas, so for one year, and that was absolutely an eye-opening experience for me because I wasn’t the same anymore, I was standing out from the crowd, you know, I had to adjust, I had to learn not only, you know, how western culture works but also what it’s like to be blind among sighted people, and it was actually quite terrifying. I think it’s the right way you guys do it in the western world, that kids from young age have to go to the mainstream schools, and they straight away have to push out of their comfort zone and get adjusted to society, whereas in Ukraine after the boarding school I was absolutely unprepared for the real world.

Jeff:

Was there any repercussions, all of a sudden coming here, getting that type of awareness and confidence that you carried back there, did anybody push back against that on you?

Olga:

I came back a lot more independent, I came back a lot more active than what I was before, and I have to say that initially it was quite obvious, but then again it started sort of rubbing out. I noticed that I started going back to my old ways, and for a while I was pretty timid again until I had to sort of push, when I was a single mom with a little child, I though “Gee, I need to make sure I give this little one a bright future, I can’t wait for something magical to happen, I have to make it work,” and so I thought “Oh, well, I’ll try to go back to the western world, I’ll have a lot more opportunities as a blind person there,” and I registered at a dating website, and that’s where I met my current husband from Australia.

Jeff:

Mm. So that must have been quite a change for you, to go right into a whole different country, a whole different way, western type of society, the freedoms that you were allowed, you could just become who you wanted to become, I imagine.

Olga:

Yes, but again when I just first came to Australia, I didn’t know there were such organizations, like guide dog organizations, who can actually help you to learn new routes, to learn new mobility skills, so when I first came I wasn’t actually that active either, sort of living my Ukrainian way, and then when I discovered there’s actually help in the western world for people with disabilities and started getting services, that’s when I became active, because once you sort your mobility you are good to go for anything, really. You know, I actually haven’t been a cane user for the whole of my life even though I had extremely low eyesight from when I was born. I have blind parents, so I inherited that, and the first time when I took a cane in my hands I was 23, inspired again by someone from the western world saying “Come on, you’re kidding me, a cane gives you freedom, a cane gives you safety, you shouldn’t be ashamed of using it,” because that was the reason why I didn’t want to use my cane, because I was embarrassed to walk around with a cane. So, again, in Australia, once I learned how to become mobile I started making friends, I started to learn the culture a lot quicker, and becoming a part of the community. So definitely that was very important to become part of Australia, for me.

Jeff:

On this YouTube channel that I keep talking about, you do a lot of just showing how you do things—cooking, drive a car of course, and washing the guide dog, but you always incorporate your three-year-old. That’s kind of neat.

Olga:

Not always, not in the driving-

Jeff:

No, no, they would have come after you if you were driving around with your son in the car.

Olga:

Well, I actually had to rename the channel. Initially it was called “My Mom is Blind,” and Michael, my three-year-old, was opening the video, and saying “Hi, my mom is blind, and today we’re going to do this or that,” but then I realized I didn’t want just to do blind parenting videos, I actually want to reach out to a lot more people, to a broader audience, I want to cover a lot more topics than just parenting, and inspire people in a lot more areas than just parenting. That’s when Michael’s presence in my videos decreased.

Jeff:

Ah, that explains knockout, where you did some boxing.

Olga:

Yes, yeah, I have a video- by the way, the color of the gloves I’m wearing in that video is pink, but do not underestimate that because I box quite hard. My husband, he was teasing me the entire video, saying “You are exercising, not kneading bread, come on, work harder, punch harder,” and so at the end, it wasn’t even planned initially, I decided to show him what it feels like being boxed by me, so he got a bit of a knockout there.

Jeff:

There you go.

Olga:

-strike jabs, [punching sounds]-

Jeff:

There you go, that was pretty exciting, it was pretty rapid-fire punching there.

Olga:

Mm, yeah.

Jeff:

And that’s quite an exercise.

Olga:

I’m quite fit, I love fitness, and actually that video served as an inspiration to sighted people as well, I have a friend, they are not [unintelligible], they don’t have really any health issues or anything, but they do struggle with sort of staying active, physically active and eating well, so they were so excited after watching my video that they said “You know what? Now we set up a gym,” and I was like “Yes!” That’s my goal to inspire not only blind people but any people to just do more with their lives, you know?

Jeff:

Mm-hm. That’s great, when I saw that I’ve got some friends that go to boxing clubs around the city here, and I always wonder what it’s like, but seeing the energy that you exude while doing that, it’s like “Oh, I get it,” I mean, there’s no way someone can hear that video and not think that Anthony had a chance.

Olga:

No, he didn’t. He definitely didn’t have a chance. Also, in the video that you mentioned, about driving a car, it was also my husband’s car, so he had no chance. I said to him “I’m driving your car, I don’t care that your insurance doesn’t cover blind drivers, that’s what I’m doing.”

Olga’s husband:

Okay, now the gear lever’s on your left.

Olga:

Yeah.

Olga’s husband:

Press it in and pull it all the way down, okay-

Olga:

Yeah?

Olga’s husband:

-now you’re in drive, let go of that, put both hands on the steering wheel-

Olga:

Yes?

Olga’s husband:

Now let go of the brake pedal gently and then press the pedal on the right gently.

Olga:

[screams]

Olga:

Because, like, we have to figure out where we’re doing it, and he’s got a friend living all the way in Victoria, so it was about 20 hours of driving to get to that farm where you could legally drive, since it’s a private property, you know, and so I took all that effort of driving for 20 hours to that farm with my husband and my children so I could film that video.

Jeff:

That was done pretty well, that was pretty cool.

Olga:
Oh, we were quite lucky because the son of my husband’s friend actually professionally videos weddings, so he had the drones so we got some drone footage of me driving, it was pretty cool. I felt very thrilled driving that car, and once I almost ran over my husband because I didn’t realize I made a 360 degree turn, I thought it was only 180. So he almost got run over and also there were quite a few cows roaming around so that was my other obstacle, but other than my husband and the cows I was pretty safe, and had a lot of fun. But we did some other videos there too, at the farm, like I got to use a chainsaw and chop the wood-

[chainsaw noise]

Olga:

Hi guys, my name is Olga, and I’m in Piper’s Creek, Australia. I’m completely blind, and I’m going to chop some wood today, and use a chainsaw as well.

[chainsaw noise]

Australian man:

That’s the way.

Olga:

Let me see where it is-

Australian man:

That’s the way-

[chopping noise]

[cheers]

Olga:

It was pretty fun.

Jeff:

Oh, that’s cool. That’s always exciting when you get to experience stuff that you’d only imagined before.

Olga:

Mm. Definitely, and I just want to send a message to blind people, or anyone, you know, really, that no matter what life can be bright, you can be happy, it’s all in our heads, it’s all about our attitude, you know.

Jeff:
Mm-hm. It is; if you take a good attitude towards anything it’s probably going to end up bright side up, you know?

Olga:

Definitely, yeah.

Jeff:

The kid bell, that was interesting. It was like “Oh my gosh, this is borderline-” you know? But there was laughter, and chuckling, and it was more fun-

Olga:

-all right, so we’ll start with kid bell swing, this is a compound exercise so it works for multiple group muscles. Ooh, is it fun?

Michael:

Yeah!

Olga:

Whoooo!

Michael:
I’m ready to take off!

Olga:

Do as many repetitions as you can-

Michael:
I’m ready-

Olga:

Whooooo!

Olga:

My husband thought I was making a humorous video again when he was videoing, but I actually meant it serious. I actually thought it was a good video, a good idea for some parents who’s stuck at home with this coronavirus, can’t exercise in the gym or whatever, that they actually can do this with their kids for real. I didn’t mean it to be a humorous video, I meant it to be a serious, like, instructional video.

Jeff:

You know how they keep dumbbells on the racks at gyms?

Olga:

Yeah, yeah.

Jeff:

You could have different kids lined up, all different sizes.

Olga:

Yeah, waiting for their turn.

Jeff:
Yeah.

Olga:

But I have one little one, if some families have multiple definitely.

Jeff:

On your videos there was one that you took down, it was a- or made private, you didn’t take it down, did you? Just hesitating on it a little bit. It was about eating cereal, and I just want to bring it up because we all live the life of blindness, we all live every day, every day, every day, and we come across people who think- the limited expectations that people have on you, or societies have, like “How do you do this? How do you do that?” and everything like that, and when I saw you do the cereal one, and you did a satire on just exploding it out, like “This is how I do it,” and it was a total, it’s totally what- you would never learn that in training school, that’s not how-

Olga:

No, no, you’re not trying to eat with a ladle, definitely not!

Jeff:

Or a cereal bowl, probably- a salad-sized bowl!

Olga:

Yeah, it was a salad bowl, and you know, I haven’t seen any blind person who would miss their mouth, definitely not. You see, I find that blind people in particular are very sensitive, they have very high expectations of themselves, they set very high standards for themselves, but I was trying to say “Hey, you don’t have to. You actually can be yourself in this society. You don’t have to worry each time you do something, each time you take a step what people think about you.” Yeah, it’s hard to be blind, yeah, certain things we do differently, but it’s okay, it’s okay to be you, it’s okay to express yourself the way you want. So that was I guess the initial intent of this video, it didn’t quite come across like that. Some people were swearing at me, like, you know, it wasn’t very nice reading some of the comments, and people were saying that I was making fun of the blind people whereas I was actually making fun of the sighted people, and some of the questions they ask me, you know?

Jeff:

Well, I think the humor there is evident, and I liked it, and I encourage you to put it up there again sometime, you know-

Olga:

Oh, wow.

Jeff:

-I mean, you took it down so we know that you’re conscious about it, you know, it’s a tough area sometimes—how many times can we be perfect and do everything the right way, as people would expect you to do, sometimes it’s just like “Ugh, 39 times out of 40, I’ll do the perfect thing that you could teach in a blind school,” but every once in a while, I just go “Really?” and just let something out, you know, it’s kind of fun, because that’s the way we do live, and you’re right, we do things differently, that doesn’t make it wrong at all.

Olga:

Yeah, and I don’t understand how some blind people say “Oh, I’m proud to be blind, I love to be blind, I would never swap this life for any other life,” no, I think it sucks to be blind, I’d love to do things a lot quicker, I’d love to have a lot more freedom, so basically I’m trying to say there is nothing wrong with being blind, there is nothing to be ashamed of, and also I’m trying to show, like, in those parenting videos that you can have high expectations of yourself as a parent, as a blind parent, but hey, you know, after all, kids decide how they want to run things in a way, you know, like, you can’t be perfect. After all, it’s all like what we can do, you know? It’s only to a certain degree we can do things and then it’s up to our kids.

Jeff:

I have kids myself, and one day I was asked this question, I said “Heck, I taught my kids how to read by reading me the mail,” you know? They learned English very young.

Olga:

When I first started taking my little one, Michael, to the library, they run in Australia, regularly free activities for kids, but they would sing nursery rhymes with hand actions, and then they would take some toys out for kids to play, so when I first started taking him to those activities, he was about one, so you can imagine, blind mother with her cane, trying to follow a one-year-old with little bells on his ankles so I could hear where he was, and I would witness those perfect mothers, sighted mothers, reading books to their kids, and I felt so inferior initially, I just was getting depressed. I almost felt like “I don’t want to go back to those activities, because I feel like my child is missing out, I feel like I’m a bad parent.” But then I pulled myself together, and said to myself “Well, I can do things differently, yes, maybe there’s not the same variety of books that have pictures and Braille, maybe, you know, it’s not exactly the same to tell a story versus reading a story, but still I’m doing as good a job as I can,” and also, when you look at outcomes, my 14-year-old has always been the best reader in the class. My little one at kindergarten, when they do alphabet activities he is very confident, he even helps his peers with different letters and cards. Obviously we as blind parents do something right, you know, it’s really possible to do a good job even if you’re blind.

Jeff:

And we just do things differently. And it leads to being very innovative sometimes.

Olga:

Definitely, yeah.

Jeff:

Like on that one video where I thought you were serving up some edible playdough, but it was actually green cookie dough, yeah?

Olga:

First of all, my son thought it was playdough—it’s just cookie dough for cutout biscuits, and we colored it green, added just some food coloring to make it more fun, and we made dinosaur cookies with my son, had a lot of fun. Such a simple thing, you know, but any blind parent can do that. It doesn’t have to be rocket science, it doesn’t have to be jumping off a cliff, you know, to impress your child. Children actually are quite happy to do basic things. I for my childhood remember, for example, playing dominoes with my blind mom, you know, we had those special dominoes with raised dots. She didn’t have to do that much to create warm memories for me.

Jeff:

That’s great, and I believe you were baking a cake and I saw that you were using a talking scale.

Olga:

Yes, I love my talking scales, they have improved my baking a lot-

Olga:

Hi guys, my name is Olga-

Michael:

-my name is Olga-

Olga:

-your name is not Olga, and I am completely blind, and I’ve got a little helper today, what’s your name?

Michael:

Michael!

Olga:

How old are you?

Michael:

Three!

Olga:

And what are we going to make today?

Michael:

Cake!

Olga:

We’re going to bake a cake, which may be a disaster because I’m not a baker. I’m going to use a recipe from Sally’s Baking Addiction website called triple chocolate cake, I have no idea what it will turn out like. We’re going to start with dry ingredients. Here are my talking scales, so they can measure in pounds, grams, or milliliters—well, we need grams, we’re going to measure some flour-

Michael:

Flour!

Olga:

-some plain flour, let me double check how many grams I need of that.

Talking scale:

-quarter cups, 220 grams.

Olga:

220 grams, okay, Michael, do you want to pour-

Olga:

I have used prior to using the scales just measuring cups, but because recipes come from all over the world and actually cup sizes vary from country to country, I’ve grown to like not just measuring my flour, sugar, butter, anything. I even use now my talking scales for gardening if I want to mix, for example, fertilizer, liquid fertilizer, I would use my scales to measure liquid things.

Jeff:

Oh yeah, I just had to do that the other day, I had to put in one ounce per gallon-

Olga:

Yeah.

Jeff:

-and when you’re using one of those measuring cups usually it’s the cap or something that comes with it or it’s provided, you know, you’re talking about a pretty strong chemical there, so sometimes you’ve got to be aware about how messy things get, but you did pretty good.

Olga:

And you don’t want to stick your finger in it, do you, to see whether you’ve reached the mark.

Jeff:

Yeah, do you realize how fast that fingernail would grow with all that fertilizer?

Olga:

I know that it would be very stinky, that’s what I know.

Jeff:

Oh, yeah.

Olga:

You probably wouldn’t be able to get rid of that smell on your hands for a while, so I try to keep my hands away from that.

Jeff:

Gardening—do you do raised gardening?

Olga:

I do container gardening.

Jeff:

Container-

Olga:

Yeah, container gardening, so I do keep my plants outside in the containers, but I love containers because that way I can find things easily, versus you know putting them somewhere in the, like, soil. It’s a lot more controlled environment, if you’re blind it’s easier to check on plants, see how they’re doing, whether they need watering or not, whether they get eaten by some little bugs or not, and I’m quite successful, to be honest, in my container gardening. I don’t buy any more salad, I don’t need to buy any herbs, I grow everything myself.

Jeff:

I myself have containers, I have clay pots-

Olga:

Hm.

Jeff:

-that I use, and I have one, two, three, four, five, usually I have seven, but this year I have five of them.

Olga:

Oh, I have about 27.

Jeff:

Well, you’re feeding the family. I’m just doing stuff for pretty flowers that come up.

Olga:

Oh, no, definitely not flowers, I’m very pragmatic. I’m growing snow peas, and tomatoes, and you name it, anything.

Jeff:

Oh, wow—how do you label your containers, or do you just know by which container’s which?

Olga:

I just know them, you can tell by the smell, by the feel.

Jeff:

Tomatoes, for sure.

Olga:

Yeah, and also when I grow something from seed, and I did forget in which container I put which seeds, once they start sprouting I can just taste it straight away, you know, I don’t care that it’s a bit dirty. It’s all organic, I don’t use any non-organic fertilizers or pesticides, I use all organic, so it’s all clean. My son just comes to the tomato plant and just, you know, plucks some tomatoes and puts it straight away in his mouth, so it’s all clean.

Jeff:

Where’d you get the green thumb?

Olga:

From coronavirus.

Jeff:

Oh, really?

Olga:

I did, yes, coronavirus was such an amazing thing for me as an individual. I discovered so many things about myself, including gardening. I actually only started doing it recently, and you actually wouldn’t be able to tell by the look of my garden, because it’s just absolutely flourishing.

[birds chirping]

Olga:
Yes, I, during the coronavirus started gardening, I started writing, and I started a YouTube channel.

For me, it was an absolutely self-discovering, wonderful time, because I didn’t have any more to run crazy drop-offs, pick-ups, taking kids to sports, you know, gym, I used to go to the gym like six times a week, you know, I couldn’t do any of that, you know, I would exercise a couple of times a week in the gym, yes, we would play some games with kids, do some activities, but still, I didn’t have any schedule to follow, so I had more time and more energy, so I started exploring my personal passions, not as a mother, not as a wife, but as Olga, and I’m so glad that I had that time out to discover those things about myself, because now on the other end of coronavirus, at least in Queensland that’s what it appears to be, it’s almost finished here, I’m a different person. I’m more creative, I’m happier, I’m looking at the moment for a literary agent to publish my first children’s book. I love my YouTube channel, it gives me a lot of inspiration to myself, it sort of motivates me to stay active and inspire other people to be active, I love it.

Jeff:

Oh, wow. It gave you the opportunity to do things that you probably always put off that were just in the back of your mind, and now you let them surface and they’re blooming just like your plants.

Olga:

Yeah, definitely.

Jeff:

And people will be able to enjoy them just like you’re enjoying the salads and stuff—a children’s book, that’s interesting. What led to that?

Olga:

Well, my son is obsessed with dinosaurs, my three-year-old. As I said before, reading for a blind parent is a bit challenging, so a lot of nighttime stories actually just come from my head, and I come up with stories. At some point Michael got interested in days of the week, and I thought “Oh, I’ll combine those two topics, days of the week and dinosaurs,” and I wrote a poem for him, and I showed it to my husband, and he was like “You know what? If you put a little bit more effort, you can actually turn it into a book that we can try to publish.” I was like “Seriously?” I had no idea, you know, I could do that, I didn’t think it was that good, and then I started working on it. I’m quite a passionate person, if I get interested in something it absolutely takes all of my mind, all of my time, I couldn’t sleep for a few nights straight, just working on that poem, expanding it into a book. So this book is about a very tricky and bold dinosaur-

Jeff:

Hm.

Olga:

-who on each day of the week it turns into a new character, like a firefighter or a diver or an astronaut, and it’s all rhymed, it’s in English, it’s a poem for each day of the week, and I have already commissioned an illustrator, I’ve got like watercolor art from her, and yeah, now I’m just working on my query letter to address literary agents, and it will be all ready to go. I will let you know once I hear from some agents whether it’s successful or not, but I have intentions to publish that book anyway even if I don’t get any interest from publishers, I will just self-publish it.

Jeff:

My friend Daniel Bernstein, he’s from Minnesota here, he’s published three books now, children’s books, so I should connect you up with him so you find out an agent or something.

Olga:

That would be great!

Jeff:

Yeah, I’ll do that. He’ll like that, he’s a really nice guy, and it’s exciting when he comes on, there’s actually a couple podcasts he’s been on already. So, you’ve been staying busy with this, I’m sure by the next time if the coronavirus keeps on going and we get you on a podcast again you’ll be like a concert pianist, or an astronaut.

Olga:

Not quite—I think in Queensland we have conquered coronavirus, we haven’t been getting any new cases for a long, long while, whereas in Victoria, the other state of Australia, they’re back to like 600 new cases a day, a few deaths a day. It’s nothing like you guys are having in America, but I think Australia is managing it pretty alright, so I don’t know if I’ll get that time out again any time soon.

Jeff:

I’m glad to hear that, especially for your community there getting control of it, because you know it is something that we’ve gotten used to being around, and yet the numbers are astonishing, that are just exploding here in the United States, so I hope something comes good of all this in the long run and I hope it’s over quick.

Olga:

Oh, it’s horrible in the long run for little businesses especially. Australian government is trying to support people financially at different levels, like the people who are on some sort of, like, disability pension, whatever, had, you know, from time to time, like double of their normal amount of money. People who lost jobs getting about $1500 a fortnight as support, it’s been going about six months now, they extended it for another six months. People who are looking for a job are getting double of their sort of unemployment benefits, and businesses get incredible tax concessions in Australia. Australian government has spent, like, hundreds of billions of dollars trying to support the community, and they’ve done a great job, but I’m afraid a lot of generations will have to pay the debt in the future.

Jeff:

Well, they are unprecedented times that we’re going through, and I don’t think we’re through it yet, but we’ll see what it- let’s reboot 2020, and hopefully we come out better. I wish we could do something like that, but we have to push our way through and see what happens on the other side.

Olga:

Definitely, yeah.

Jeff:

So, tell me this—on a daily basis, what are some of the tools, the accessible tools that you use?

Olga:

I use Macbook, I use Windows, Microsoft computer, I use Braille No-Touch Plus, I use iPhone, and I use Victor to stream, Victor to- the navigation one, what is it called-

Jeff:

Trek?

Olga:

Victor Trek, that’s it, and so I’m using all of those devices, some more, some less. I find that Apple computer is working better for internet, for browsing, or if I want to do online shopping. For Word document, Microsoft Word, obviously, Windows is much better, so yeah, it depends what I’m doing.

Jeff:

Mm-hm, and the iPhone just about does everything else.

Olga:

Yes, I love my iPhone, I do most of the things using iPhone. I didn’t find it very helpful, Victor Trek—in Australia it seems to be still kind of leaning toward American, Canadian, I’m not sure, sort of layout. You may be going on one side of the street, and it’s announcing to you businesses that are on the opposite side of the street, and I tried several times to try to find a business—out of experiment the one where I knew it was, and it would just take me absolutely past it and confuse me, because it was thinking that I was walking on the other side of the road.

Jeff:

Hm.

Olga:

It was very weird, so I didn’t find much use for that. I do like, though, searching landmarks if I’m walking on the esplanade along the ocean and there are not that many landmarks you can follow to exit the path, so I like using landmarks for that.

Jeff:

You can drop your own landmark?

Olga:

Yes.

Jeff:

Ah!

Olga:

Yes, I would create a landmark, then as I approach it alerts me that a landmark is coming up, which is very helpful, you know, if there is not much information for your cane to pick up.

Jeff:

Ah. Especially when you return to the same location.

Olga:

Yes! So it’s a permanent landmark unless you delete it, you know, so like I have a landmark at a playground, for example, it’s on the esplanade so it’s all just a continuous line, not very easy to pick with your cane, whereas now I use the Victor Trek, and I know exactly where the playground is. Not that my little one doesn’t know it, but I still want to be in control as a parent of where we’re going, you know.

Jeff:

Oh, yeah. I mean, you can use it anywhere that you have access to the GPS service, and there you are.

Olga:

Yes.

Jeff:

Boom.

Olga:

Yeah.

Jeff:

Well, that’s really cool. Olga, what advice do you have for someone who might be experiencing vision loss?

Olga:

First of all, accept your new self. Respect your new self, love your new self. Just because you are losing eyesight, or you have lost eyesight, it doesn’t diminish you as a person. Yes, things might be going differently, slower, but still, you are the same person, you still matter, and you still can make a difference for the society. Just try to think what you can do, rather than on focusing on what you can’t do.

Jeff:

I think that’s great advice, and I really hope to see more of your videos on Born Blind to Inspire, and that’s, I believe that’s kind of a passion because I’ve- after talking to you and listening to you, it seems like some of the things you want to do, some of the things you want to achieve, are not always for you, you want to help other people understand what you’re going through or what it’s like to be blind. I’m sure your kids are getting quite the experience—they’ll probably be gardeners, cooks, chefs, everything, you know, just from these experiences.

Olga:

Well, my 14-year-old actually wants to join the Navy when he grows up, and then start his own business in creating military equipment, because-

Jeff:

Wow.

Olga:

-he’s really, really into military stuff he does gel blasting, he attends cadet training for teenagers, and you never know with my little one, he’s quite sporty, he likes playing golf, he does trampolining, he goes to swimming, he has tried tennis and he loved it but he was not old enough to do it, and so you never know with kids what they end up doing. I guess you can do your best, as a parent, and then they will just choose what suits them.

Jeff:

I suppose you have to be tall enough to see over the net to play tennis.

Olga:

I think it’s- they’re concerned that he would be all over the place, not listening to the instructor, that’s why they want you to be at least four to join.

Jeff:

At least you see that he has an interest in stuff and that he’s probably going to get an opportunity to do it, and that’s all it takes is having an opportunity, like you’ve took advantage of, like having an opportunity like you took advantage of the opportunities you had, you came to the United States, you took advantage of those opportunities like coming to Texas, taking that back with you and planted the seed inside you about having confidence and now look where you are, and you’re raising a family, raising gardens, putting out videos, driving a Porsche, I think that’s awesome stuff. Not too many people have driven a car, so that must have been a fun feeling, having that power underneath you.

Olga:

Oh, wait until I release my truck driving video-

Jeff:

No!

Olga:

On that trip we took, where I got to drive a Porsche, a friend of ours actually was a truck driver, so he let me drive his truck that was loaded, two trailers were loaded, so-

Jeff:

Oh my gosh.

Olga:

-yeah, so the whole truck was 26 meters long, so it’s like a big room sort of length.

Jeff:

Did you blow the horn?

Olga:

Yes.

[horn blowing]

Olga:

And it was 62 tons heavy, the weight of it was 62 tons, imagine.

Jeff:

Wow. That’s almost illegal on some roads.

Olga:

Well, we couldn’t drive it on the farm, so we sort of drove it around the place where they park the trucks and where they keep the grains and stuff, because he was moving grains from one farm to another, anyway, so I got to drive off.

Jeff:

So what you’re really saying is, it wasn’t really legal.

Olga:

No.

[horn blowing]

Olga:

It wasn’t legal. And his boss didn’t know about it either, he didn’t ask for permission. Like you said earlier, it’s sometimes better to ask for forgiveness than for permission.

Jeff:

There you go! A little reference to Anna, a little shoutout to Anna there. I like that one. Well, Olga, I want to thank you for coming on to Blind Abilities, there’s-

Olga:

Thank you!

Jeff:
You’ve got so much energy, and so much stuff that, you know, people can get from your videos, and, you know, if they want to follow you on Facebook can they do that?

Olga:

Actually my group on Facebook is in Russian.

Jeff:

Oh, really.

Olga:

Yes. I have actually two YouTube channels, one in English, one in Russian.

Computer voice:

“Born blind to inspire” in Russian is [born blind to inspire in Russian].

Olga:

And the Facebook group I admin is in Russian, I love writing articles in Russian about what it was like travelling Italy blind, for example, you know? Or what it was like travelling Malaysia being blind.

Jeff:

Oh, I’m sure we’ve got a lot of Russian listeners, right?

Olga:

No, actually, because I’m more focused on the English channel, it’s just easier living in Australia to make videos in English, you know?

Jeff:

Mm-hm.

Olga:

Having an English family as well. Yeah, I actually have a lot of followers, people love reading my articles, that’s for sure. Apparently I’m a good writer! In Russian, I mean, not in English so much, so I’m going along with that.

Jeff:

That’s great. It’s kind of neat to have- you said a quote one time, something about learning different languages?

Olga:

Oh, yeah, that Leo Tolstoy [unintelligible] “As many languages as you know, as many times you’re a person.”

Jeff:

Wow. There’s something to be said about that. Well, Olga, thank you so much for taking all this time to come onto Blind Abilities, for sharing your story. I’m going to put the links to your YouTubes- well, you take care.

Olga:

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If you reside in Minnesota, and you would like to know more about Transition Services from State Services contact Transition Coordinator Sheila Koenig by email or contact her via phone at 651-539-2361.

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