Things Are Looking Up

[chelseajmunoz]

Shortly after I'd written my last blog entry yesterday I texted the friend who'd purchased the AppleCare Technician Training for me to ask him if he'd use an app called Venmo to send me said money. Fortunately he sent the money to me right away. Shortly after I'd seen that the transaction had been initiated I sent a DM to Samsung on Twitter. I wanted to let that particular company know that I had not received anything in the mail from them lately. A little while after I'd sent a DM to Samsung I sent feedback to Airbnb that read as follows "I'm using Airbnb because I have not had any luck finding an apartment or shared housing situation for myself. I'm totally blind and I want to make you aware that some of your hosts have discriminated against me because of my blindness. While I understand that Airbnb cannot control how its hosts respond to potential guests I think it's important that I make you aware of what is going on so that you may create a non-discrimination policy on Airbnb if there is not one already. Life is hard enough as it is. I don't want to have to justify to people all the time that he or she can trust the fact that I'm a competent blind person. No one should have to convince anyone that he or she deserves the same rights as anyone else. I hope that there is something Airbnb can do to ensure that this does not continue to happen to people who are blind or who have other disabilities." A little while after I'd sent that feedback to Airbnb I received a DM from Samsung saying that that particular company would have to reach out to the appropriate people in order to find out what the status of my replacement charger was. Since I don't have any faith that Samsung will either give me a replacement charger or a refund though I didn't respond to that particular DM from Samsung. A few hours later the guy whose houses I was going to take a look at in the evening texted me to ask if I was still going to see his houses. So I immediately texted him back to let him know that I'd definitely be there as he and I'd scheduled on Tuesday. An hour or so later a friend and I took Uber to one of the guy's houses that he rents out to people. Fortunately our Uber driver was able to find the guy's first house successfully. When my friend and I'd arrived at the guy's house I texted the guy to let him know that we were outside of the house. The guy showed my friend and I a couple rooms that were for rent at that particular house. The first room my friend and I were shown was a huge room that had nothing but a sink in it. That particular room also had a private entrance/exit though which was kind of cool. Then the washer and dryer in that particular house were located near where the huge bedroom was located. However there was only one bathroom in that particular house that was meant for 6 people to live in. There were currently five people living there and each person was a guy. Then to top things off, the bathroom in that particular house was kind of far away from where the big room was located. The owner of the house also showed my friend and I another room that's going to be available for rent soon. However the second room we were shown in that house didn't feel right at all. In fact all in all I knew that I wouldn't like to live in that house for several reasons. Even though that particular house was five minutes or less from the college I'm going to be attending. Even though that particular house had a private entrance/exit in the huge bedroom. Even though the washer and dryer were close to where the big bedroom was located. I ultimately didn't want to have five guys as roommates. After the owner of that particular house had shown my friend and I around, my friend and I asked the owner if he'd take us to his actual house to show us the other room that he had available for rent. Fortunately he didn't mind taking the two of us to his other house at all. Once we'd arrived at his second house (the one where he actually lives) he showed my friend and I the room in that particular house that's available for rent. That particular room had a lamp in it but the thing I liked most about the situation was the fact that the tenant would have his or her own private bathroom. The washer and dryer were upstairs in that particular house but the washer and dryer were immediately in a room to the right after a person had climbed the stairs. The tenant would have access to the washer and dryer though which was great. The kitchen in that particular house was downstairs and the tenant would have full kitchen access as well. The house as a whole was very quiet which I loved. The guy who owns the house lives in the house with his wife and their newborn son. However the guy works full-time so his wife is a stay-at-home mom and she's at the house with their baby pretty much all the time. That's why the guy was looking for a female roommate: because his wife is home with their baby all the time and she'd feel better about having another female around if anyone is going to be there besides her husband. My friend and I introduced ourselves to the owner's wife so that she'd have an idea of who may be in the house with her. The owner, his wife and my friend and I talked with one another for a bit about general things as well as the expectations that the owner had of his tenant. The owner and I talked with one another about how he'd like for me to pay him rent every month. He informed me that the bank I use has a feature where its customers can transfer money back and forth to each other which is very convenient. However he called said feature by a certain name so I want to double-check with my bank to make sure of what he'd called this feature. Because I ultimately decided that I wanted to rent that particular room from him. I ended up deciding that i'd move to that particular house in a couple weeks though. That way I'd have time to purchase everything that I'd need for a bed (the mattress, bed frame, blankets and pillows ETC). The cool thing is that when I move to that particular house my lease will be month-to-month. Whereas if I'd gotten an apartment I would've had to lock into a contract for a year or more. I've known that I wouldn't want to go that particular route all along because my plan is to only stay at a community college until February of next year when I'll hopefully be able to transfer to a university. I want to apply to a university this coming November so that I can go forward with this particular plan just as I've laid it out here. So in reality I'll probably only live at this particular house that I claimed for a little less than a year. Before my friend and I left the owner's second house that we'd been shown though I asked the owner if he'd email me the lease agreement and allow me to sign said agreement with my electronic signature. He said he'd do that and asked if I'd text him a picture of my state ID as well. I said I'd take care of both of those things ASAP. This morning when I checked my email it turned out that I'd received a message from Samsung. In the email that Samsung had sent me I was told that that particular company had not even sent my charger. According to the email that Samsung had sent me, said charger was on hold for some reason. I'm not sure why that particular company acts like they need my permission to go to step two: mailing me a gift card. Shortly after I'd read that email from Samsung I read an email from my new landlord. The email that he'd sent me had the attached lease agreement in a Microsoft Word document in a neat-looking way. Since I didn't want to take a lot of time changing the file extension on my MacBook Pro I asked a friend of mine if I could use his Personal Computer (PC) to read the document my landlord had emailed me. Fortunately said friend allowed me to use his PC to read the lease agreement and sign said agreement with my electronic signature. Once I'd read through the entire lease agreement I electronically signed and dated the places on said agreement that I needed to sign and date. Once I'd taken care of those things my friend emailed the attached signed and dated file to me. I then forwarded said email to my new landlord. After I'd forwarded the signed and dated leasing agreement to my new landlord, a friend and I collaborated with one another to accomplish the task of taking a picture of my state ID. I used Be My Eyes on my phone to get connected with a Be My Eyes volunteer. My friend used his phone to take a picture of my state ID. The Be My Eyes volunteer was able to tell my friend and I exactly how the phone's camera needed to be positioned in order to take a picture of my state ID. Once my friend's phone was positioned correctly according to our sighted helper, my friend took the picture of my state ID. After the picture was taken I asked our sighted helper whether she could see the picture of the state ID as good as possible. She told my friend and I that the picture turned out perfectly. So once I'd disconnected the phone call with her I texted said picture to my new landlord. In a separate text message to my new landlord I let him know that I'd emailed him our signed and dated lease agreement. I want to end this blog entry on a powerful note because I think that sighted people should have things to think about that they may regularly take for granted. When I talked about how my new landlord emailed me his and my leasing agreement with no problems whatsoever, that gesture of his was huge!!! Given that his leasing agreement was already in a Microsoft Word document it was simple for him to attach said document in an email to me. Yet the apartment complex that I lived at in San Antonio Texas flat out refused to provide me with a lease agreement in the exact format that my new landlord provided a leasing agreement to me in. My old apartment complex in San Antonio Texas never provided a lease agreement to me in a format I could read in the 6-and-a-half years that I gave that particular apartment complex my business. The staff members at that particular apartment complex in San Antonio Texas repeatedly told me with their words and emails that they would not send me a lease agreement in a format that I could read. For the first few years that i lived at that particular apartment complex I didn't know what rights I had as a disabled person. So because I didn't know what my rights were before I'd even moved into said apartment complex I signed print documents that I could not read. Around 2014 though I started learning exactly what my rights were as a disabled person. At that time I learned that I had the same exact rights as anyone else had. So because sighted people were provided paperwork in print that he or she could read I had a right to read said paperwork too. The only difference in how I'd read said paperwork though would be that I'd read the paperwork in a Microsoft Word document. Then I learned about electronic signatures and how if a person is disabled he or she has the right to sign things electronically. Since my first time trying to get someone to allow me to sign a document electronically was the situation where I fought my old apartment complex staff members about providing documents to me in a format I could read though those same staff members also would not allow me to use my electronic signature on any documents. That's why I'm so excited about the fact that my new landlord is being so accommodating to me. What I asked for (a lease agreement in a Microsoft Word document attached to an email and the accommodation to be able to sign any documents electronically) is about me having equal access to the exact things that sighted people have access to by default. It's about understanding that I as a totally blind person don't need my new landlord or future landlords to purchase special equipment in order for me to have access to print documents. It's about human beings working together to make reasonable accommodations happen without any hardship whatsoever to anyone. If more people took a page out of my new landlord's book regarding reasonable accommodations, that alone would make the world a much better place.