Learning to cook, guided by touch and smell

Their sense of touch and smell has been working overtime these past few weeks – tasting food they cook and touching the water to find if it is warm enough. No doubt there have been a few mild burns, but the 20-odd visually impaired boys say their cooking classes have been great fun.

In addition to rice, rasam, sambar and poriyal, they have learnt to make rava kesari, bajji, egg kozhambu and rose milk at a camp organised by a few individuals and the Blind Man Packaging and sponsored mostly by the Amaravathi Krishnan Charitable Trust in Tondiarpet.

After June 6, when the course ends, S. Rajkumar of Vellore is confident that he can help his mother in the kitchen. “She never allows me inside the kitchen for fear of me getting hurt. But now I have learnt enough recipes to cook for my family,” he says.

During the camp, this diverse group of boys is learning to survive outside their homes. “They normally stay at home or in their hostels. Now, as they have finished school and are preparing to join college, we are teaching them social adjustment skills,” says E. Rajeshwari, assistant professor, Tamil department, Quaid-e-Milleth Government Arts College for Women and the camp coordinator.

The boys have been visiting the beach, banks, post offices, railway stations and hospitals. “The visit to the Government Anna Library at Kotturpuram has been the best as they have four computers exclusively for the visually impaired,” says G. Muthukumar of Arakonam.

“Usually, such training in cooking and home management is given to visually impaired girls. But we thought boys too must learn such skills,” says Banu Nagappan, managing trustee of the Trust. The organisers say they would conduct courses on a regular basis if funding is provided.

Visually impaired boys are learning to prepare food items for everyday consumption