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When I was twelve my best friend became deaf and blind. Due to a genetic disease
his brain was damaged. And so he lost his ability to see and hear but he survived
which probably is the most important thing isn't it?
I could not tell you stories about living in a hospital for more than one year
and having Christmas with doctors and nurses instead of your family and friends...
...or of all those tiny problems that occurred, finding your way to the bathroom, what to play, how to communicate?
But all of these problems for us as we were eight and twelve years old did not felt like the most annoying problems.
There were one problem that really annoyed us alot but this was not about us.
This one problem was about the people around us. People just started to treat us differently,
they started to see me as a kind of a professional working with him, they did something like
"oh, it's so nice of you that you are still visiting him". I am meeting my friend, what's the point.
People could not imagine that little poor boy, deaf, blind has just friends
or at least no friends without any disability her or himself. Sometimes people were like really starring at us.
Can you imagine the scene in a cafe, a person sitting there just five minutes long doing nothing but [starring].
Don't do that, please don't do that.
We just invented a game, we would sit next to each other and then i did something like [ elbow nudge] and
he was like "I know" and he started to turn his head real slowly
and if i did it again [elbow nudge] "ah, here is the person starring at me"
and then we just waived. Then the people were like "oh, I am sorry, I did not mean to".
Calm down, it's no problem, but come on, ask whatever you want to know but please don't stare at us [act of starring], don't do it.
One reason why people might have been starring so much could be our new way of communication.
We had only about half a year until he was deaf and blind.
We had to find a kind of a quick fix solution.
So we thought of a symbol for every letter in the alphabet and it had to be really easy to be reminded.
So we did something like "M" Mouth "M", "N" Nose,
"I" the dot on the letter. So i just touched his face, so that he could read what I am saying so to say read my mind.
So with this system, we could now talk about everything again.
It was just that easy, we could talk about
how to find the way to the bathroom, we could discuss what to play, we could talk about just everything.
One topic that we discussed quite often was what to choose for a job.
He decided to become a therapist for other deaf-blind people, which for me is really a cool story. Me instead, was really struggling.
I grew up attending musical classes, I learned how to sing, how to dance,
a little bit of acting and things like that, and sometimes, I dreamed of being an artist,
traveling around the world, meeting interesting people and having the one or the other backstage party maybe.
But I never was so to say, good enough, in one of these branches to really study music.
And if I could not attend a university to do a job then for me it was not a job.
So, I left my passion, I left the music and started looking for something else that really just met my skills.
And so I decided to move to Berlin and study German sign language and deaf culture.
That was the first time that I heard of a word I never heard before.
The word was Inclusion. By the way, this is the sign for inclusion
And this already explains the whole of it. You just grab everyone around you and put them in the same society,
with the same options, the same opportunities to access things and to get whatever he or she wants.
[ sign language of the word inclusion] That's the theory but as universities don't
teach you how to use your theory in everyday life, I was standing there with
"humm, thank you". In the second year of my studies, I received an e-mail.
It was from the NDR, a German TV station. They had one of the most inclusive idea I've ever heard of.
They wanted to bring music to the deaf. I first read their e-mail and were like "aha".
Nice idea, but impossible. How would you do that? They can't hear, I am sorry but it's
music and they can't hear so how to do? But then I thought about it again and was like"hey".
If an eight year old deaf blind and a twelve year old little girl can invent a
new language, how impossible could it be to bring music to the deaf?
So, we decided to produce videos together, they were looking for a person that can translate German music videos
into German sign language. And so we did exactly that. We put the first videos
on the internet and it was just amazing. It was the start of something for me that feels
like a fairy tale. We had thousands of clicks, hundreds of e-mails. It was just crazy.
Really, really crazy. We have here tonight with us, wonderful Ella Ronen. And might you
lend me a part of your song, which I really do like to just illustrate how music and
sign language looks like. So maybe we can do the first part and then stop after the first refrain.
So thank you.
[Piano]
First step is to sing to yourself in the shower.
Sing as loud as you can. You sound good, don't you think.
Now do that for an hour.
Then take it outside.
[percussion]
Stand in a full train And start humming that same tune.
[piano and percussion]
Take off your headphones or you won't hear when the world Calls out your name.
Now take it outside.
Sing us a song.
Even if you look kinda weird.
Sing it loud.
You've been making sens for too long.
[Clapping]
What you can see is that sign language is
now not anything like standing in the same position and do the signs.
By the way, this is the sign for doing sign language. So. I am a bit banged out.
Okay, so you use the rhythm of the music and you can sign higher or lower
due to the melody. Then it needs some months of practice and it looks like this.
But for me it was always important to work with the lyrics alot. When I get a song, I try to interpret
the lyrics in a way that kind of don't give away too much because for me music is like a gift,
I just get from the musician and I don't want to just like wrap it up and give it way."Here"
that is what she is singing. I want to get it and want to put another layer on it so
so to say the sign language layer. And then give it away because music for me is kind of the
same like life, everybody can just find something else in it, sometimes just the wrapping is annoying
so sometimes you are deaf and blind. And this works for me in a studio
doing music videos but it works as well live on stage with a band.
So two years after we did the first videos, I get another e-mail, thanks to e-mail.
I received an e-mail from Maren, I did not know her but it was quite nice, she just wrote:
"Dear Laura, do you want to go on tour with Keimzeit, best, Maren".
And I answered: "Yes".
Keimzeit is a German rock band I really do like
and so it was just crazy to be on stage with them.
I thought, okay, it won't be too worse, you know doing music from the studios, it's okay.
Being on stage
About three hundred people, it's not the same.
It's really not the same. But my luck was that the singer supported me in the best way
he ever could by just explaining me every single step he will do.
And so I felt quite at ease on stage with it and it was just great.
Do we want to give away another present?
So then, do Wendy's song.
Peter sits with me tonight
On a bench out by the lake
He brought imaginary tea
I brought imaginary cake
We haven't seen each others since
We both were very small
And since then everything has changed.
And nothing changed at all.
You know I didn't mean to grow up.
I tell him looking at the ground.
I hope you know all this was not my choice
and that I've always left my window open.
But far too many times
What I heard
was not your voice.
[Piano, slow]
Behind the eyes of sleeping children
A Neverland lives on.
But that is all for me, my dear.
For me, that world is gone.
[Piano]
After the very first concert,
there was an older man who came to me,
he was deaf
and signed
"I am now seventy six years old
and this
was my very first concert
so thank you".