Yngve is almost blind and an avid user of Be My Eyes. He lives in Norway. An article in the Norwegian Blind Association announced the app’s launch back in 2015 and Yngve joined the community just a few days after reading about it. As he recalls, “I was not disappointed”.
Using Be My Eyes to sort through clothing, books and papers or to check his electricity meter and expiration dates on dairy products makes things more efficient for Yngve: his calls are answered quickly and he finds the app reliable. But what he appreciates most is the dynamic of volunteers. He shares,
The people who are answering my calls are so friendly and helpful and patient. And I never feel I really bother them, basically because I know they all have signed up as volunteers because they want to be my eyes ... they are willing to help me.
Be My Eyes not only functions as a tool to tackle day-to-day tasks, but it also draws connections between communities and provides insight into how people live differently than one another, country to country and from all over the vision spectrum. As Ygnve says,
Be My Eyes is a good way to decrease the gap between the blind and 'ordinary-seeing' community … people who are voluntarily working for Be My Eyes get a really good understanding of how it is not to see.
