CHINA-BEIJING-VISUALLY IMPAIRED-RESTAURANT (CN)

(240119) -- BEIJING, Jan. 19, 2024 (Xinhua) -- This combo photo taken by a thermal imaging camera shows people dining at Trojan Fairy in Beijing, capital of China, Dec. 24, 2023.

At Xidan in the very heart of Beijing, restaurant Trojan Fairy, is not an ordinary eatery because the diners can find their way to their tables only through the help of an usher, in complete dark.

Yang Demin, the pianist and part-time usher of Trojan Fairy, is now a student at the music department of the Special Education College of Beijing Union University. Yang, with no sense of the light, can accurately locate the table for diners in the restaurant.

Yu Shuang, a former surgeon, founded Trojan Fairy in 2009. Yu, once a short period patient of retinal detachment, though cured, set up the restaurant in order to enable customers to have a brief impression on how the visually impaired people feel everyday.

She provides jobs for the disabled with the hope to help them fit into the society. More than 130 visually impaired and over 40 intellectually or physically disabled people have worked here, part-time or full-time, as purchasing staff, waiters, cooks and even managers of the restaurant. With years of working experiences here, feeling being needed and respected, some of them took on various new roles as music teachers, employees of internet firms or students abroad.

Zhou Haoyu, the present manager of the restaurant, formally a part-time pianist and an usher in the past eight years, himself suffering a weak sense of light, is a good example of how a visually impaired people find a better positon in the society. Thanks to the working experiences at the restaurant, Zhou is now studying after an established musician, he also works as an instructor on vocal music at an art training agency.

Yu Shuang hopes that a meal in darkness can serve as a chance for people to start to know more about the disabled, as well as to cherish the blessings of their own life. (Xinhua/Yin Gang)

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