Nas Campanella: Good evening and welcome to tonight's event. Haben Girma: The First Deafblind Harvard Graduate. My name is Nas Campanella. I'm the host for this evening. I want to start firstly by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land that we are on, the land of the Bidjigal people who are the traditional custodians of this land. I would like to pay my respects to elders past, present and emerging. I would also like to warmly welcome any First Nations people in our audience tonight and any disabled people who are joining us tonight as well. Welcome to all of you.

I start all of my events by giving and audio description for anyone who may be vision impaired in the community. I am a white woman in my mid 30s, I'm wearing a teal coloured dress, gold sandals and I have light brown, dark brown, dark brown, shoulder length hair. See that's what happens! You have to remember what colour your hair is when you have no vision.

I have multiple disabilities. I have a neurological condition which impacts my ability to read braille. It is called Charcot-Marie-Tooth or CMT. And I'm also totally blind. I am also the ABC's National Disability Affairs reporter and this is my second time interviewing Haben Girma and it is an absolute privilege to be with you tonight.

Tonight kicks off UNSW's Diversity Festival 2024. The festival brings communities together to spark thought provoking conversations from different perspectives about how to create a more inclusive society.

For tonight's event we are joined by the incredible Haben Girma, we'll explore her story and learn more about the work she's been doing in access and inclusion. An international trailblazer, Haben will share with us her story of resilience, education and her love of travel. Many of us would be able to identify with some of those stories that she will share with us.

She is the first deafblind person to graduate from Harvard Law School, believing disability is an opportunity for innovation, Haben advocates for equal opportunity for people with lived experience. She travels the world teaching the benefits of inclusion. Former US President Barack Obama named her a White House Champion of Change. She received the Helen Keller Achievement Award and a spot on the enviable Forbes 30 Under 30 list. Her work has also been honoured by former President Bill Clinton, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and former German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Haben is joined by her translator Gordon, who is here with her tonight at the side of the state and her wonderful guide dog Mylo, which we can also ask her a little bit more about later.

During tonight's event there will be an opportunity to ask questions of Haben from our audience microphones that will be roaming around. I have the pleasure of asking questions first. So hold your horses. Get your thinking caps on while we chat. And you will be able to ask anything and everything of this incredible person that we have up here tonight.

We also do have AUSLAN interpreters and you will learn a little bit more about their work as Haben can talk you through a little bit of the communication strategies that each of us will be using up here tonight.

Haben, this is, as I said, the second time that I've had the pleasure to interviewing you. I'm thrilled to be on stage with you. The first time was in 2020 and we had to do it online because of the little thing called COVID. It is an absolute pleasure to be with you here tonight. Welcome.

Haben Girma: Thank you for the amazing welcome. Hello, everyone. I'm so excited. It's my first day in Australia and it's an honour to be able to share this time with all of you. As you heard, I'm Deafblind. I have limited vision and hearing so I'm not seeing the audience but I want to be connected with people and I sought non-visual and non audio techniques to be able to connect with people. While my sense of sight and hearing are terrible, my sense of touch is excellent. So I was seeking touch base solutions and we came up with pairing a keyboard to a Braille computer.

A very brief visual description. I'm sitting up here with a braille computer on my lap, a German Shepherd seeing eye dog to my right. I'm a black woman in my 30s. I'm voicing. I do know some sign language, mostly American Sign Language, but I hope to be learning Australian sign language while I am here. Our interpreters will be switching every 15 minutes or so, so that's another visual description for folks who are blind or multi tasking.

Visual descriptions help in many different situations and it's one of the ways we can make our presentations more accessible. Another way we can make our presentations more accessible is patience. You will notice a pause between the questions and the answers. That's because we're waiting for the braille transcription to come through. I'm reading the words in braille and we have a typist transcribing the questions. A big part of accessibility is patience. Often times, society urges us to rush and we are told from a very early age that fast is better and slow is stigmatised.

There is value in taking time to savour moments. Whether it's breakfast with a family member, or it's time with a book, or time to think about an answer to a question. Accessibility is also adjusting our culture to accommodate all the different ways we speak or listen. We're taught that the way to listen is to sit still, make eye contact and stay quiet, but not everyone listens that way. Some people need to move to process what they're hearing. Some people listen with their eyes. Some people vocalise. Part of an accessible culture is letting people listen in a variety of different ways. So, if you need to stretch, move, that is absolutely OK. This should be accessible for all of us. For the speakers, for you, and for the dog.

Laughter

Back to you.

Nas Campanella laughs

Nas Campanella: In terms of accessibility tonight, for me, I have a laptop on my lap. I have an earpiece in my ear. I use screen reading software that is a little robotic voice in my ear. I am scanning the screen using keystrokes, different combinations of keys, and the screen reader is reading what I have typed into my ear. That is how I am accessing my notes.

Haben, I have had the pleasure of reading your book 3 times. I would highly recommend. You can buy those books at the front and Haben will sign the later on. You talked really beautifully about going to summer camps in your book. You went to several of them. A few really stuck with you. Can you tell me why?

Haben Girma: Absolutely. There was a summer camp for blind students. In most of my classes growing up, I was mainstreamed and I was the only deafblind student in most of my classes. That's isolating. It is exhausting to always be the one who has to explain, "Can we provide this in an alternative format? This activity is not accessible. Can you make it accessible?" Often that work falls on the shoulders of a disabled people and it's exhausting to always have to do that.

When you create a space where disability is a dominant experience, you no longer have to shoulder a lot of that work on your own. It's spread out throughout the community. For a week each year, I had the opportunity to be surrounded by other blind people. In a space where it was cool to be blind. As a teenager, it was a very important experience to help build up my identity and self-confidence. By being around other blind people. Blind people my age and also adults.

I had sighted teachers who would tell me, "You can do anything you want. Anything is possible." It is very different to actually meet blind adults who are going to college, who are having jobs, in relationships. So teachers, sighted teachers, will tell you one thing. It is really important for teachers to encourage students. But we also need the experience of actually meeting people who represent possible futures for ourselves.

Nas Campanella: Mmm.

Haben Girma: That camp, a big part of it was your typical camp activities. Archery, made accessible by showing us alternative techniques. Soccer, boating, bowling, dancing, talent shows. A lot of the typical camp experiences, but with adaptations to make them fully accessible. We didn't have to advocate to make them accessible. They were accessible from the start and we could just relax and enjoy ourselves.

The other piece which I did not even know I needed at the time, and most kids do not know they need, is the opportunity to build up your self-confidence with your disability. That's what I got out of that camp. And it's my hope that more kids with disabilities get those opportunities to spend a few days with others who share those disabilities. So that they can build up their identity.

And there are adults who lose a sense or develop a disability later in life. They should also have opportunities to come together with other disabled people, have fun, go camping. And while doing those activities, building up their sense of pride, their identity with a disability. Back to you.

Nas Campanella: You talk there about blind camp and finding a sense of community. For me, I also went to Braille camp and blind camp. When I was a lot younger, before I realised that braille for me was quite a struggle because of my neurological condition.

But you are part of multiple worlds. The deaf world, the blind world and the deafblind world. How do all of those intersect?

Haben Girma: I want to touch on how you went to braille camp and you learned that braille does not work out for you. I have had experiences that are similar, where the dominant disability culture is saying, "Hey, because you are blind you should be doing X. Or because you are deaf, you should be doing Y." But, I wasn't just one disability. I'm a multi dimensional person. I have multiple disabilities and they intersect and we need camps and centres that honour that. And also make sure we're welcome.

Sometimes at those camps and other spaces, they would tell us, "Oh, just use your hearing." And that left me out. And there were other blind students with other disabilities who also faced barriers. So some of our disability organisations do really well with one type of experience, but need to do more with other experiences to ensure all of us are included. Including those of us with additional disabilities.

Nas Campanella: I think most people would think that because you are deafblind, and particularly with the hearing sense, that you don't have a relationship to music. But you write really beautifully about an account with the piano in your book and I wondered if you could talk to me about, what is your relationship to music? Do you have one?

Haben Girma: I have a complicated relationship with music. So, there is a lot of pressure from society to love music. And that music is powerful and joyful and brings people together. So I made a fierce effort to try to involve myself with music. I studied braille music and took music lessons with piano, and some other instruments. And I can train my fingers to memorise patterns. So I could play on the piano. But, I was also getting feedback from teachers and others in the community that it wasn't very good.

Laughter

Haben Girma: And my ability... Thank you for laughing at me!

Laughter

Haben Girma: And, it wasn't bringing me joy. And, the hearing people were noticing was that it wasn't the best music, which is understandable. So I realised even though society says we should love music, it's not working for me. And it's OK to say I no longer want to be in a relationship with music.

Nas Campanella laughs

Haben Girma: So we had a divorce.

Laughter

Haben Girma: Back to you.

Nas Campanella laughs

Nas Campanella: I wonder if you could talk to me a little bit about your family. Tell me what influence they have had on you, have they helped, hindered, supported you? Or all of the above? As families do.

Haben Girma: My parents told me that I can do anything. They expected me to do chores, just like my sighted, hearing siblings, and my deafblind sibling also had to do chores. I tried telling my parents, "Blind people can't do dishes, you can't ask me to do dishes!" But they didn't fall for it.

Laughter

Haben Girma: At the same time, they were protective. And they were worried about me experiencing dangers in the world. I wanted to go to San Francisco and be part of a blind rock climbing club. That meant after school taking the subway across the bay to San Francisco. At first they said no, I should not be taking public transit by myself. So many things could happen in San Francisco.

But I had an orientation and mobility instructor who talked to my parents and said, "We have given her lots of lessons. She knows how to take the subway." Part of their lessons were deliberately getting me lost. We would deliberately get off at the wrong stop and they asked me to problem solve and figure out how do I get to my destination if I make a wrong turn, if I get off at the wrong stop?

So I had all these skills and they were able to tell this to my parents. Finally, my parents agreed and I was able to take the subway to San Francisco and be part of a rock climbing club. So they believed in me. But they're also parents, and lots of parents worry about their kids. So, it was a community effort of having patient O&M instructors to be able to teach my parents and me that there are alternative techniques, there are ways to move through the world safely.

Do you have stuff like that in Australia, orientation and mobility instructors?

Nas Campanella: Yeah, we definitely do, I had the same. I use a cane, you have a dog. I had instructions who would show me from A to B, and most of the time that would be when I had a new transport route to learn. So it might be I had started at a new job and they had to show me how to get to that new job. How to get the bus. How to navigate from the bus stop to the office. And using different bits of technology in order to do that.

And I think, what is interesting for me, listening to you, is that I get silly questions from non-disabled people all the time but here I am about asking a very silly question as a blind person, but everyone's experience is so unique. And so, could you explain to us how it is that you do navigate the world? Have you always had a dog? What did you rely on to tell you where you were?

For me, I do rely on my hearing because I don't have sight. How do you do it in your scenario?

Haben Girma: Excellent question. And don't worry about silly questions. These are... everybody needs an opportunity to learn and we are making a safe space for people to learn.

So, I did not always have a dog. I grew up using a cane. My O&M instructors gave me keen travel instruction. Even with those instructions, I felt nervous and worried. How would I manage going to college in a different state? What would I do so far from my family?

I was talking to one of my blind friends, sharing my nervousness, and I told them, "I know a way to build up my confidence, I will get a guide dog! So I will apply to guide dog school and then I will have a guide dog to help me more confidently navigate through college." My friend said, "You are going to rely on a dog for confidence?" And when he put it that way, it did sound a bit odd. So he reminded me that we can't rely on external things for confidence, we have to have our own confidence.

I have a lot of different strategies now, like GPS and travel apps on my phone. But because of the O&M instructions I received, I know how to travel even when my phone dies. And the backup battery dies.

Laughter

Nas Campanella laughs

Haben Girma: I have those strategies to still make it work so it's important to have the confidence come from within. And it's OK to use tools like GPS, it's OK to work with a guide dog, but you have to have your own confidence.

So at that time in my life I said no to a guide dog, I continued using a cane, I built up my confidence at a blindness centre. Four years later I once again applied for a guide dog, I was ready. I was not depending on the dog for confidence. The dog gives me so much information, visual information and audio information. He was trained as a seeing-eye Moorestown, New Jersey. It's a guide dog school, they do not do hearing dog training, but he has really big ears.

Nas Campanella laughs

Laughter

Haben Girma: So when he hears things, he reacts and that lets me know there's something happening in our environment. So he gives me so much visual and audio information I would not receive from a cane. So, since then, I've loved travelling with a guide dog and have been travelling all over with a guide dog. Australia is Mylo's 19th country. So he's been many different places with me and through his eyes and ears, he give me more information.

I'm also taking in information through my feet. I like wearing minimalist flats to help me feel the different textures beneath my feet, and that gives me more information about the world around me. The air currents, the smells, I've been smelling a lot of jasmine walking around Sydney. So it's many different ways to take in information, to get clues from our environment, and that helps me navigate. Back to you.

Nas Campanella: I know we agreed on a set of questions but I'm totally going off script now because there are too many things that you are saying. How do you use a phone? I use audio technology. That reads things out to me that are on the screen. How do you do that?

Haben Girma: Excellent question. I have an iPhone with voice-over. Voice-over's a screen reader that reads out loud what's on the screen. But it also can output to braille. So by building in accessibility into the iPhone, Apple gives people the choice to read information with their eyes, their ears, or with their fingertips. It's my hope more tech companies will design multiple ways to use their apps and tech.

We have a very sight centric culture and that misses out on a lot of different experiences. We should be building more tools for our sense of touch, our sense of hearing. Why not have more tools for sense of taste and smell? When I'm walking around, sometimes I smell something and I don't know what it is. I'd love to have an app that tells me, "Oh that scent, that is a rare Australian plant. Let me tell you about it." What you think of an app like that?

Nas Campanella: It sounds incredible. I think there are so many things, if you and I sat in a room together for just a day, I think we could quite possibly change the world through our ideas.

Nas Campanella laughs 

Laughter

Haben Girma: Yes, we would come up with a lot of cool new apps.

Nas Campanella laughs 

Nas Campanella: Can I ask, how does one travel with a guide dog? Logistical nightmare is I'm assuming your answer, but could you take a through it? 

Haben Girma: It really depends on where you're going and within the United States, travel is relatively easy. You don't really... yeah, it's relatively easy. You book a train, bus, plane, you can pretty much travel within the states very easily. We have an EU pet passport and that means travel to Europe is also pretty easy and straightforward. Then there are places like the UK and Australia where there are a lot of extra steps you need to go through and that is to help keep these places safe from diseases like rabies and other risks that we don't want spreading in traditional countries.

Is also a balance though. I've heard some Australians with service dogs choosing not to travel because the amount of paperwork involved and the expense of the additional vet visits, adds up very quickly. And it's not fair to make people make that choice, to force them to decide, do I take that job, or that study opportunity, or social opportunity and leave my dog behind, and not have full access to all the different experiences? Or do I get, you know, some people used pet travel companies to help them go through the paperwork and all the hurdles involved. So we could be doing more to make that easier for Australians and people outside of Australia who rely on service dogs. Any more questions about guide dog travel?

Nas Campanella: No, I'd like to move onto your law studies. Did you always want to study law?

Haben Girma: I didn't always want to study law. I came to it kind of late. I started in college wanting to go into computer science and technology, but there were a lot of barriers. I was very much discouraged from going into that field and I switched over to sociology and anthropology because the professors were welcoming. When I asked for accomodations they actually provided the materials in braille and made sure I could participate. So the experience of being discouraged from going into a field I want helped me realise there are barriers out there.

Then there were other barriers like accessibility barriers at the cafeteria. The menu was only in print and I did not have access to the menu even though I was paying to eat the cafeteria, like sighted students. That was frustrating. There is this idea that non-disabled people do not need supports, but non-disabled people receive a ton of supports. This room has lots of chairs and those chairs are accommodations for walking people. People with wheelchairs roll in with their own chairs. So there are lots of support for non-disabled people. Lights are support for sighted people. Microphones are supports for hearing people.

If we can recognise that non-disabled people are receiving help and accommodations, then it would be easier for more people in a society to respect accommodations for disabled people. All of us need support. We're all interdependent. So that is something that was not very well understood at my college. And I was struggling to figure out, "How do I advocate? How do I remove these barriers?" And I eventually came to the American with Disabilities Act.

The ADA helps increase opportunities for disabled people, including students. Once I brought the ADA into the conversation, the cafeteria realised I wasn't asking for special favours, I was asking them to comply with the law. Finally, they started making the menus accessible and I used the ADA to make other adjustments at my university.

Learning the power of the ADA made me want to study it and become an attorney, so that's what eventually drove me to law school. I was the first deafblind student at Harvard Law School. Many others wanted to attend, but Harvard had many barriers.

Helen Keller was a deafblind woman who lived from 1880 to 1968. She really wanted to go to Harvard but they said no. Only men were allowed to attend. Over time the school changed and opened its doors to women, people of colour, disabled people. It was the school's culture that needed to change, so by the time I applied, they had overcome enough ableism so I could attend. But there was still more work to do. There's still barriers.

One of the ways ableism and came up – and this is a story that in the book – we had networking events at the University for students to meet with attorneys and talk to them about job opportunities. I was standing near the centre of the room, my braille computer was on the table and interpreter was across from me and she was typing descriptions of what was happening. I asked for one of the lawyers to come over. He came over, he would not talk to me. He only spoke to the interpreter. He told her, "Wow, what a beautiful dog. Does the dog go to class with her? It must be a smart dog." I explained that everything he is saying is coming through in braille. And I know it can be confusing to talk to a deafblind person for the first time. I explained the braille and the keyboard, and I asked if he would like to try typing.

Again, he would not talk to me he only spoke to the interpreter. He told her, "I have enjoyed watching you two, tell her she's very inspiring," and he walked away. He was not inspired to offer me a job.

Laughter

Nas Campanella laughs 

Haben Girma: A lot of times when able non-disabled people feel nervous, they call disabled people inspiring. It can be a mask for pity. It's like saying, "I'm inspired to stop complaining because at least my life isn't as bad as yours." No one wants pity.

I like the word inspiration when it's tied to action. When someone says "I'm inspired to make my classroom more accessible", or, "I'm inspired to make my technology more accessible." That's beautiful inspiration. So if you find yourself about to say someone is inspirational, tie that to action. We all can make our communities more accessible and if you feel deeply moved, allow that emotion to guide you to action. Back to you.

Nas Campanella: Well, speaking of action, what could universities do to become more inclusive to students with a disability?

Haben Girma: Disabled students have a lot of knowledge. We need more of our universities listening to disabled students. If there is a student disability club or association, have that group hold regular meetings. If the university does not yet have such a group, create one. Give students a space to come together and share disability pride, develop a space to have disability culture. It will help pinpoint what are the access barriers. And create a community to advocate for the removal of those access barriers. There should also be regular training for staff on how to make sure classes and other programs are fully accessible. There should be training for everyone in the IT department and tech to ensure that when you purchase new software or have updates to the website, that it’s done accessibly.

A great resource for those in tech is the Web content accessibility guidelines. It's a set of technical standards for making websites accessible. For a variety of different disabilities. Vision, hearing, mobility, learning disabilities. We're one of the largest underrepresented groups. So when schools invest in accessibility, they're growing. They're reaching a larger audience. Both in students but also in faculty. When the university becomes more accessible, they can draw more talented professors to share their work and teach students. So accessibility is for every level of the organisation. Back to you.

Nas Campanella: I do have to go to audience questions soon, but I wanted to ask you a couple more from me first. Barack Obama, we can’t go past it. You have had the absolute pleasure of meeting him, tell us about that encounter.

Haben Girma: That is an excellent question, we’re not going to skip that one!

Laughter

Nas Campanella laughs

Haben Girma: For the 25th anniversary of the Americans with Disability Act, I had the honour of introducing President Obama and President Biden who was Vice President back then. Normally they communicate by voice. But we explained that I am deafblind and I access information best through braille. I have had a lot of people tell me, "No. That's weird, that's different." A lot of people are nervous about stepping outside of their comfort zone. They're nervous about trying something new and changing up communication. But, President Biden and President Obama said yes. They took the keyboard and they typed, and it was a real honour to be able to experience that. President Obama was typing with two fingers.

Laughter

Nas Campanella laughs
 
Haben Girma: And I teased him about that, because my dad also types with two fingers.

Nas Campanella laughs

Haben Girma: But, ultimately, it is about connection. Whether you used two fingers or ten fingers, or use an interpreter to type for you, we can adapt and make sure we are helping other people to communicate. So, it's is not just non-disabled people who need to adapt, disabled people also adapt. Especially when we are in cross disability spaces.

So, we will move on to our wonderful audience. If you have questions, we have mics in the audience for questions.

Nas Campanella: We do. We also have Skye from the university who can facilitate this for us. If someone needs a mic brought to them, pop your hand in up. Skye, I will leave you to facilitate this bit.

Audience Question 1: Hello, my name is Danny. Thank you so much, I'm really enjoying what you're saying. I would like to ask a question about the ADA. So, here in Australia, we have the DDA, the Disability Discrimination Act. It is almost as old as the ADA, and it has been a long time since it has been reviewed. It's considered fairly toothless. It's very much reliant on the person with disability making the complaint and following through a range of steps which can end up being quite expensive. If you don't take the expensive route, then it doesn't actually assist anyone after you. It might help you, but it doesn't set precedent.

I'm wondering what your view is, of what are the features of a really good, strong, anti-discrimination piece of legislation?

Haben Girma: Excellent question. With the ADA, we also have frustrations that the promise of equality depends on disabled people filing complaints. That is really exhausting. A solution we have is we have some agencies that take those complaints for free. We also have nonprofit disability led, disability rights organisations that help disabled people file these complaints.

Even so, it's a lot. And it's exhausting. I think the ideal disability rights legislation would put the burden on those engaging in discrimination to do the work. Rather than putting the burden on disabled people. And the state, the government can shoulder some of that work.

I have noticed in London, a struggle many people with guide dogs have – or other assistance dogs – is that some taxis, Lyfts, Ubers, will not take you if they see that you have a dog. It is illegal, but it keeps happening. It is also a problem in the United States as well. But in London, it's a crime. The police will actually take on this issue. So you can report it to the police and that way the amount of work on your own shoulders is less compared to if you had to file a complaint lawsuit, and had a shoulder the work of advocating the whole process. So there are models out there that will shift the burden so that disabled people aren't always doing all the work all the time. Excellent question.

What other questions do we have?

Audience Question 2: Hello Haben. My name's Stuart and thank you for sharing your story. It's very good. I'm one of those organisations that actually help other organisations make sure the technology is accessible. I, sort of, know the answer because I follow you, of course. I would love you to share your opinion about the wonderful solution for all accessibility problems on the websites, called the wonderful accessibility overlay.

Haben Girma laughs

Haben Girma: Yes, let's make it public and official in Australia! Haben is against overlays. So overlays are tools that some companies claim you can put on your website to instantly, easily make your website accessible. The marketing sounds amazing. You pay a little bit and then they'll put the software on your website and then you do not have to think about accessibility anymore. It is all taken care of. Your website is suddenly accessible.

But that's not true, and a lot of disabled people, including myself, have struggled with websites that have these overlays. I have used many of them and they make websites harder for me to navigate. That is really frustrating. And because of the marketing of overlay companies, a lot of organisations who are trying to do good and make their websites accessible are being misled by the advertisements. And thinking that if they add overlays to their website, their website will be accessible.

So we need more awareness about overlays, and there should be more work to prevent misleading advertisements that get organisations into trouble like this. One of these companies is facing a lawsuit in New York. I hope there will be similar cases in Australia, so that disabled people can have accessible websites and tech experiences. Thank you for that question.

Nas Campanella: Are there any more questions?

Audience Question 3: Good evening, my name is Christine. I would like to say thank you ladies, for both of you, for coming to speak to us tonight. Nas I have listened to you and seen you for so many years on the ABC so thank you. And thank you also for coming out from the US to speak to us.

I have a simple, two little questions. One, was, were you able to bring your companion on the plane with you or did they oblige you to have your assistance dog travel separately?

And secondly, I have a friend, Fiona, who probably would love to say hello. She's a qualified lawyer and she is actually blind as well, and would have been here but she's in Melbourne. Do you work with other groups, with other individuals or companies that are working to provide more accessibility for people with sight and hearing disabilities? As I know my friend Fiona does sometimes. We have new credit cards that have features on them for making them more accessible.

Nas Campanella: We'll just let Gordon catch up.

Audience Question 3: Yes, I spoke too fast, I apologise.

Nas Campanella: No, no no! All good!

Haben Girma: Are they tactile pictures on the credit cards?

Audience Question 3: Yeah, they have a new shape and they have little spots, tactile spots, to help you orient the card. And the printing is larger and there's cutouts to actually allow you to see which way is up. I'm on a which bank card. So Australians will know what that is. But, yeah, so my particular bank has a new credit card that makes it easier to work out what is going on. 

Haben Girma: I love tactile strategies like that. More financial institutions should be thinking about making their cards easily touch accessible. Many people reach into their wallets or purses to pull out a card and if they're touch accessible, sighted people can more efficiently do that as well. So, I am glad to hear that there are tactile options out there. Hopefully more will do that. I look forward to talking more with you about your friend who's an attorney.

Audience Question 3: Were you able to travel with your furry friend within the plane, beside you? Or were you obliged to be separated for the flight here to Australia?

Haben Girma: We were together the entire flight. So, Australia has an import process and export process for assistance dogs. You can have your assistance dog with you the entire time you're travelling in cabin.

Audience Question 3: Thank you for your answers, and I am happy to hear that too.

Haben Girma: You're welcome.

Audience Question 4: Hello!

Nas Campanella: This will be our last question.

Audience Question 4: Oh, thank you.

Nas Campanella: Thank you.

Audience Question 4: My name is Anesh. I'm male, in my 30s, long hair, beard. 

Nas Campanella: He's learning Haben!

Audience Question 4: Yeah!

Laughter

Nas Campanella: Accessability!

Audience Question 4: I've got... thank you for your open-ness and candour this evening. I really appreciate it. I've just got a question about how does someone who is deafblind learn how to speak and pronounce words?

Haben Girma: There's a lot of diversity within the deaf and deafblind community. Different types of hearing loss and different times of hearing loss. So, I had more hearing when I was younger and that gave me access to speech sounds and resulted in my speech. I've also taken theatre classes, voice lessons, and I've had lots of different teachers helping me with my pronunciation. I think I'm going to have a lot of Australians teaching me slang and new terms here.

Audience Question 4: Thank you so much.

Nas Campanella: I have the pleasure of asking the final question. When are you going to try Vegemite?

Laughter

Haben Girma laughs
 
Haben Girma: Do I have to answer that?

Nas Campanella: I have your email and I insist that I have an email from you once you've done it, please. I promise you'll love it! You told me today that you had smashed avo for breakfast and that our avos here were sweeter, and back home they tasted a little saltier. All you need to do is add a tiny little bit of Vegemite to your avocado and it will taste like it does back home.

Nas Campanella laughs

Haben Girma: I was not planning to try it!

Nas Campanella laughs

Haben Girma: But because you insist, I will try it during my trip here and I will report back to you.

Nas Campanella: Thank you very much and thank you for sharing part of your incredible story here with us tonight, what I have learned is – a huge amount – but mostly that an hour is not enough to unpack so much. This list of questions I have in front of me, after reading your book, is endless, and I didn't even get to half of them. So, everyone please put your hands together for Haben Girma. 

Applause 

Haben Girma: Thank you everyone!

Nas Campanella: Can I also please extend my thanks to our Auslan Interpreters, Delia and Bettina.

Applause 

Nas Campanella: Thank you to Gordon our translator and thank you to Mylo, who everyone can see on the stage here just in front of Haben. 

Applause 

Nas Campanella: Haben will now be signing copies of her book outside, you can purchase that book outside in the foyer. Thank you so much and have a wonderful night. 

Applause 

Centre for Ideas: Thank you for listening. This event is presented by the UNSW Centre for Ideas as a part of the Diversity Festival. For more information, visit unswcentreforideas.com and don't forget to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.