Parliament Not Wheelchair Ready

If you are a wheelchair user in Trinidad and Tobago and you are considering getting into politics to get into parliament, you may want to reconsider doing so because the home of the Trinidad and Tobago parliament is not wheelchair accessible. Imagine that, the country’s parliament is not wheelchair accessible.

My Budget Response

As I said in one of my previous posts, if you are silent for too long in Trinidad and Tobago people tend to forget and neglect you. On the 8th of September the Government of Trinidad and Tobago announced its 2010 - 2011 National Budget and not one word was mentioned about the differently abled community. I read the budget yesterday and I did not even see the words disabled, differently abled or handicapped. I think that the National Budget should have been called the National Budget for able bodied people because it surely was not a National Budget for differently abled people.

Bad Service At Piarco

When I returned to Trinidad on Saturday night I thought that I would have gotten the great service that I got when I was leaving Trinidad but boy was I wrong... The wheelchair attendant had a bad attitude, the airport had a wheelchair attendant shortage, therefore, the wheelchair attendant left my mother and I to fend for ourselves for approximately seven to ten minutes, therefore, my mother had to push my wheelchair a little way but the wheelchair attendant did come back and push my wheelchair until we exited the airport.

How Hard Can It Be?

I am still in the United States and I have been going to malls, etc. All the public buildings that I have been to so far have been wheelchair accessible. I went to my brother's wedding at a church and even the church where the wedding was held was wheelchair accessible, even the bath rooms at the church were wheelchair accessible. How hard can making public buildings wheelchair accessible in little Trinidad and Tobago be?

More Than Equal Treatmennt

My mother, my aunt and I are on vacation in the United States and I had someone to push my wheelchair from the time we entered Piarco International Airport then they took me to my seat on the plane. When we landed in Miami International Airport they took me off the plane then I had someone to push me through the entire airport until it was time for us to board our flight to Washington. Think about that, then think about how wheelchair users can't even get into some public buildings in Trinidad and Tobago.

Not Disabled But Differently Abled

I may not be able to walk but I can use my wheelchair to go where I need to go. I may not be able to speak clearly but I can use my laptop to write e-mails and chat on Facebook plus I use my cellular phone to send text messages. I said all of that, just to say this, differently abled people can do a lot of things with the help of technology and Determination.

Are We Invisible?

I was looking at an early morning television show a few weeks ago and they were speaking about HIV/AIDS so I text them and ask what about the disabled because they were speaking about every other community and they said that's a community that they have always overlooked. So my question is, are disabled people invisible in Trinidad and Tobago?