Lip reading

Today I met a lecturer who has been tasked to taking care of the deaf students in the university.

She came to me because she had written some stories about the deaf graduates and she would like to publish the stories online. We talked and discussed, then I referred her to our copywriter, Christine for further action.

Not long after that, Christine came to update me.

Christine: “Do you know that she is deaf as well?”
Me: “What???!!! Are you sure???”
Christine: “Yeah. I said I will call her but she said don’t. Text her instead because she can’t hear. She is deaf and she reads our lips.”
Me: “Wow… I had no idea at all. She was like… completely understand what I was saying!”

Frankly, I was really amazed by how good she is in lip reading.

I once watched a Hong Kong drama ‘Silence’. The main actress is actually a half-deaf girl. One accident made her completely deaf and she has to strugle through her life, family and relationship. The only way to communicate with other people is through lip reading. She was so good at doing that like she had no hearing problem at all.

That time, I thought it was just some dramatic effects because it’s difficult to film a story with a character that can’t hear. But today, it proves that I was so wrong.

I couldn’t help but wonder, what will be my reaction if she told me that she is deaf and she can read my lip up front?

Maybe I will act differently. Maybe I will speak slower. And maybe that’s exactly the situation that she wanted to avoid.

It’s already difficult enough for a normal student to graduate with a degree. And now we are talking about deaf students. I guess they must have been through a very hard time. Really looking forward to read their stories.