A day on wheels

If you were walking around campus on Tuesday, you may have noticed some Cal State Long Beach faculty members and Associated Student officials roaming the campus in wheelchairs.

"The Disabled Experience," sponsored by the Diabled Student Services Commission, was to let people without disabilities get a taste of what people confined to wheelchairs go through on a daily basis on this campus.

For SOAR Director Randy Zarn and Student Union Assistant Director Robert Lara, who participated in the event, the day changed experiences most people take for granted into challenges.

Simply reaching for a towel in the bathroom or trying to get a drink out of a drinking fountain became a chore. Wheelchair-bound participants found themselves trying to hold their chairs with one hand while reaching up and out with the other, a chore the y found nearly impossible.

"I tried to get a drink," Zarn said,"and the water shot straight up my nose."

Not all the challenges were physical. The two men also encountered stuggles of a psychological nature. They often found themselves looking up at people in conversation, while the people looked down at them.

This led to a feeling of inferiority for the two men used to standing eye to eye with other people when they spoke. They also reported feeling as if they were out of the line of sight of people passing by, making it a struggle to get around.

The largest physical challenge the participants encountered were the many hills on campus. Trying to push a wheelchair up and down the hills wore the men out completely by the end of the day, they said.

The slightest inclines seem like mountains when you are using your arms to push your way up them, Zarn said.

"It's not a very friendly campus if you are physically (pushing a wheelchair around it)," Lara said. "It might be a little easier in an electric wheelchair. It is also uncomfortable sitting all day long."

Because of the topography on campus, neither of the men felt there was much to be done to improve the situation.

"You can't level out the campus," said Lara, "it is basically as wheelchair friendly as it could possibly be with the given topography."

"It was a good experience," Lara said. "You get a little more sensitive towards what people are doing when they are disabled and have to accomodate to a world that is not totally set up for them."