Visual impairment didn’t stop the clatter of falling pins at Regina’s Golden Mile Bowling Lanes Monday morning.
Members of the Canadian Council of the Blind (CCB) Regina chapter took on the city’s media in five-pin bowling in a friendly competition to focus attention on blindness and visual impairment.
CCB spokesperson Russell Coubrough put together the 46th Annual Media Bowling Challenge to kick-off White Cane Week 2017, the national initiative that puts visual impairment into the spotlight.
“This is our main event that we have, the Media Bowling Challenge… to promote awareness,” Coubrough said.
According to the Canadian National Institute for the Blind (CNIB), approximately half a million Canadians live with significant vision loss — around 15,000 of them are in Saskatchewan. Those numbers are expected to increase as much as 30 per cent in the next decade due to an aging population.
Terry Parsons, partially blind and an avid bowler since 1972, participated in the challenge and said the public needs to be aware that while the visually impaired may do some things slower, they should be treated equally.
“We do things a little differently than what you guys might do, but we’re still doing it and we’re getting the job done,” he said.
Visually impaired bowler Darlene Smith also had a message. She often has to remind the public that her guide dog, Deidra, is for her use only and can’t be pet on the street like most other dogs.
“People get mad at you when you tell them to leave her alone, because they don’t understand that she’s working,” Smith said.
In the friendly five-pin competition, the media managed to squeak by with a 135-115 victory.
White Cane Week runs from Feb 5 to Feb 11. Saskatchewan also has a team competing at the Canadian Vision Impaired Curling Championship in Ottawa.
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