Inspiration outside a coffee shop at LaSalle Street and Chicago Avenue

Two days ago, a colleague of mine and I met with the person who runs disability services for North Park University in Chicago.  The disability service person also happened to be a long-lost friend of mine who I hadn't seen in probably ten years.  Because the meeting was probably going to cover than just business and disability, we met at a coffee shop a block away Access Living rather than at the office.   After about 50 minutes in the coffee shop, we headed back to Access Living, where I was going to give Drew, the North Park employee, a tour of Access Living.  Just outside the coffee shop, at the corner of LaSalle Street and Chicago Avenue, a woman approached us.  As she did, she looked right at me.  She had short, cropped, blonde hair, and she wore a white tank top and shorts.  When she spoke, she spoke with an Australian accent.  I don't remember what she said, but the words were full of what the disability community calls inspiration porn.  She said something like, "Oh my god, you are so awesome. I want to give you a hug."

I looked back at her and said, "You don't know me." 

She then explained that she had a friend who was super awesome.  I assumed that her friend is a dwarf and because I also am a dwarf, she drew the conclusion that I am super awesome. At that point, I told her that her words and actions were insulting.  It is nice and all if someone thinks you are super awesome, but I want to earn whatever awesomeness I have.  I don't want it handed to me on a platter simply because of my dwarfism. 

By now, the light had turned.  My group began to cross the street, and the young woman in the tank top started to drift in the opposite direction down the sidewalk.  Her face lost a little bit of the enthusiasm and her eyes betrayed disappointment.  But she didn't give up on me.  Her final words were, "My friend has done so much, and I know that you can too." 

"Maybe you can as well," I said. To this, she nodded, turned her head away from us, and went on her way down the sidewalk.

The experience was unexpected.  It is not uncommon to confront challenging situations on Chicago Avenue.  There is one woman who I've run into at least twice who is shocked every time she sees me and runs away in fright. Another time someone exclaimed to her friend, when I was but ten feet away, that I was the first midget she had ever seen.  Other people of short stature may or may not agree, but sometimes, based upon the look in someone's eye, you can tell how he or she will respond to dwarfism.  The Australian with the white tank top caught me completely by surprise. 

The worst part of the experience is that she is going to tell her friend, who again I assume is a dwarf, about the bitter dwarf she met in Chicago.  But the best part about the experience is that Carrie and Drew were with me.  Carrie and I work together.  We don't share the same disability, but she has had her fair share of encounters on the street based on stigma and prejudice against disability. The specifics of those encounters are often different than mine, but the themes overlap and we can relate to one another. So she knew right away what was going on, and what I would be feeling. 

With Drew, we joked afterwards that it was as if we had staged the whole thing.  In the coffee shop we talked about ways that North Park and Access Living could collaborate in terms of raising awareness about disability.  In the course of that conversation, Carrie and I stressed that stigma and  prejudice toward disability can sometimes be more of a barrier than any physical or programmatic obstacle.  What better way to illustrate that point than for a young woman to approach us and engage in a dialogue based upon disability assumptions and bias.  In my memory, Drew took in the encounter with this grin on his face, almost with a look of disbelief.  As we went back to the office and we debriefed on the experience, he said, "I am expecting the hidden cameras to come out at any moment." No hidden cameras, but plenty of entertainment, and things to talk about.

Gwangju, South Korea, 5-18 (Day 4) Part II

Mr Kim in the pottery workshop

After the events recognizing the 5-18 Student Uprising from 1980, we returned to the Holiday Inn, the hotel where I stayed in Korea.  Many conference guests left that afternoon, but I stayed until the next morning.  With some free time, my new friend Jin Bread took me to see the Han Ma Um Independent Living Center, one of several centers in Gwangju.  Mr. Kim, who had been around throughout the conference and paid for beer two nights in a row, worked at Han Ma Um, and was waiting to meet us. He toured us around the center.  They make all kinds of pottery there.  From what I understand, they haven't yet, but plan to launch a business, with pottery sales as a way of generating income.  There is also a performance space in the center. Mr. Kim plays the guitar and is in a band. 

Stage at the Han Ma Um Independent Living Center

After the tour, Mr. Kim brewed some green tea.  We sat around drinking the tea and talking for a little while, then I returned to the hotel.  I wanted several hours on my own to pack and rest up for long trip back to Chicago.

When I told people I was going to Korea, many people mentioned the food, especially the beef. "You've got to try the beef!" a few people exclaimed.  In the four days I'd been there, the closest I came to Korean Beef was the short ribs at the Holiday Inn Lunch Buffet.  So for my last meal in Korea, even though a conference organizer told me I could return to the Holiday Inn Buffet, I ventured out to the streets of Gwangju.  I wasn't necessarily looking for Korean Beef, but I wanted something new. 

Holiday Inn Gwangju

More importantly, I wanted something that wasn't the Convention Center Buffet or the Holiday Inn Buffet. I walked up a street toward a bar called the "One Shot," where a group of us had been two nights in a row.  I was familiar with the street and it looked like there would be a lot of options. There were a lot of options, but once on the street, and peering through the windows into restaurants, I got nervous.  After four days, I knew about one word in Korean -- Hello.  There was  no guarantee I could communicate with anyone in the restaurants.   I was looking for a place that had a menu posted on the door in English, or places with big pictures of food on the wall.  A few times, I found places that met the criteria, but there were all kinds of shoes piled up at the door and I could see customers inside wearing flip flops.  Concerned I would break some sort of protocol, I avoided those places.  I ended up walking well past the One Shot bar before I bit the bullet and walked into a place. It was a small joint, kind of like a Vienna Beef greasy spoon in Chicago, with a counter, a menu posted above the counter, and about ten tables on a hard tile floor.  Two of the tables were occupied.  The man who greeted me spoke no English and handed me a small laminated menu with tiny Korean script.  There were a few pictures above the counter.  I pointed at one and after a little bit of back and forth with the man who gave me the menu, he went to place my order with the kitchen.

The soup he delivered a few minutes later appeared to match the item in the picture to which I had pointed.  Nevertheless, I had no idea what it was.  It had a thick but translucent red broth, with noodles the consistency of Ramon, cabbage, some other vegetables, some sort product that could have been fake meat or processed meat, and, to my surprise, sliced hot dogs.  I tried to eat all of it, but there was a lot.   After about twenty minutes, I paid, walked back to the hotel, and tried to find the dish I ate on the Internet. My best guess is Hangover Stew.

I hope it was the stew.  Because while I never had any Korean Beef, it sounds kind of cool to say I had Hangover Stew.