Tag / disability

by Yumnah Jones

Maymoona Chouglay

Maymoona Chouglay, founder of Infinite Abilities

Maymoona Chouglay, the founder of Infinite Abilities, is a social worker both in her professional capacity and as a volunteer. She is deeply involved in trying to alleviate the societal challenges of the disabled community. Her journey to finding her own path has driven her to facilitate the lives of the visually impaired. Her story shows us that it is important to always find the silver lining in the cloud, irrespective of the challenges, and that we all have the power to turn our pain into purpose.

This is Maymoona’s story …

I am sitting in the classroom and all I see is a colourful blurriness, but I cannot see the distinct features on the faces of my fellow classmates nor the letters on the dark green board a few feet away from me. It feels like a cloud hovering in front of me, through which I need to see, but I find comfort in the presence of my mother, my pillar, and my strength. She is seated alongside me, to make the lines in the book darker, to read to me from the board and to help me with learning to write, between the lines, and on the days that she is not present in class with me, my teacher tries her best to include me in all the activities.

When I reflect on my first two years of mainstream schooling, in Johannesburg, South Africa, I can remember clearly how challenging it was trying to immerse myself in a classroom designed for and filled with learners without disabilities. The struggle to immerse myself in my new surroundings was not due to a lack of care but due to a lack of special-needs resources and infrastructure, which is predominant in most mainstream schools within South Africa. 

In 1987, I was born six months prematurely, in Kimberley, South Africa, weighing 680 grams. While being incubated, I was given too much oxygen which resulted in my retinas becoming detached. Despite having undergone several operations, and receiving the best ophthalmologic care, nothing could be done to reverse the damage, thereby causing me to become visually impaired. With the need to search for better working opportunities, my parents returned to my father’s hometown, in Johannesburg, a city situated five hours away from Kimberley.

It was while I was in Johannesburg, that I entered mainstream schooling. However, the respective school was not equipped to accommodate my condition and we were referred to Prinshof School, for the visually impaired, in Pretoria, South Africa. After we went for our first appointment at Prinshof, to ascertain if it would work for me, my mother assured me that I would manage at the special school, and that she would continue to assist me.

When I was eight years old, we relocated from Johannesburg to Pretoria to enable me to start my new journey. I went from having to sit in front of the board in my former mainstream school, to be able to read the letters, to being able to immerse myself in an accommodating world with learners who endured similar challenges as me. Prinshof was truly the game changer in my development as an individual. It set me on a path of healing and growth by creating a space of belonging. Before Prinshof, I did not have a strong sense of self but through Prinshof, I became very confident and found my sense of self.

I became active and partook in many school activities including athletics, swimming, piano lessons, and the school choir. I completed Grades 1, 2 and 3 within 6 months of commencement. The rate of my development was outstanding to the extent that Prinshof wanted to promote me to Grade 4 within my first year. However, my mother refused the suggestion with the reason of wanting me to focus on learning braille and to become more well-rounded by acquiring skills in other areas, not just academics.

For the next three years, I was thriving at Prinshof but then, in Grade 6, at age 11, my World got shaken to the core by the sudden loss of my mother to lupus. It really stunned me that my biggest supporter was no longer there to cheer me on and to guide me on my path of becoming … There are days that I still miss my mother. I miss her tender touch, her comforting hugs, and her unconditional love but as a child, it was harder to navigate the World, without her, because she was my voice, and as a child, I was still finding my voice. In the midst of the darkness, my father and I held on to each other, and even if I never got over the loss of my mother, I appreciate and have the greatest respect for my father, for always being there for me and for creating a sense of normalcy for me, when she left this World.  

One year after my mother’s passing, my father remarried, and I was blessed with a second mother. She became the mother I needed when my own mother was no longer, and our little family of three was later expanded with the arrival of my twin brothers. This sense of family has been my comfort and through the coming years, I continued to thrive at Prinshof until I completed my secondary education. When I started studying at university, interestingly, it felt like I was regressing into the real world where the mundaneness of university life was in fact, a blind person’s nightmare, all because of a lack of reasonable accommodation.

It was tough adjusting but fortunately, my mother accompanied me to campus as I embarked on my BA Degree in Social Work at the University of Pretoria. She was there for the first six months, assisting me with navigating classes and making notes, until we employed the services of an assistant that walked me to classes, typed my notes and books, where needed, and executed any other tasks that were required. Although I used a white cane, it was very difficult navigating campus with it because university buildings are not always streamlined and flat-surfaced to facilitate walking unaided or even, with a cane.

During my second year of university, I was further diagnosed with glaucoma, which caused me to lose my eyesight completely. I nearly threw in the towel and quit university because my condition got progressively worse, and the daily challenges were just mounting. It was tough but as a believer, I was reminded of one of the most enlightening verses in The Qur’an, “Allah does not burden any soul greater than it can bear” (Chapter 2, Verse 286) and I soldiered on. Six years after I started university, not only did I complete my BA Degree in Social Work, in 2012, but I also graduated, in 2013, with a BA Honours in Social Work.

I have worked and continue to work both within the governmental and non-governmental sectors, from Gauteng North Services to the Department of Social Development and am currently busy with my Masters in Disability Studies. Being a person that is living with a disability, has augmented, and aligned me to assist people with disabilities, in addition to my other social work responsibilities. I am involved in extensive voluntary community work, with other organizations, including the supervision of a home for blind children, from ensuring their well-being to their accessibility to an education, and an empowerment center under the auspices of a non-governmental organization, Garden Social Services. I was previously involved in consulting work with the braille packaging of skincare product ranges with L’Occitane, for a two-year period (2018-2019), and currently participate in public speaking engagements, disability awareness training and campaigns and have also established my own organization.

In 2019, Infinite Abilities was established as a consulting firm to serve persons with disabilities, and their families, with therapeutic to general support and empowerment services. The organization offers educational and disability awareness training to businesses and organizations and supervises social workers and social auxiliary workers in their respective roles in accordance with the Social Work Supervision Policy Framework but with a special focus on dealing with persons with disabilities. The vision of Infinite Abilities is that through its services, every professional will become aware of and be educated and equipped with the skills, tools, and guidelines to assist persons with disabilities that they may encounter in the workplace or in their everyday lives.

For the past four years, since its inception, Infinite Abilities has been a one-woman show. Hence, with the aim of expanding and bringing members on to the executive board, the organization hopes to reach more individuals, living with disabilities, by providing resources to aid in their medical care and counselling services, their educational aspirations and to enable the disabled community to live empowered lives. Furthermore, Infinite Abilities aspire to assist social workers to establish their own private practices with the aim of accommodating more persons with disabilities that are unable to reach the government’s social work services due to geographical locations or being under-capacitated.

There are numerous daily challenges that I encounter in my interactions with people that are not attuned to my visual impairment, from a personal assistant that may not read the instructions clearly, to me, to a driver that does not drop me off at a precise location and it is frustrating, and it can be depressing but I refuse to live in those moments of darkness. I am a firm believer that this condition has been bestowed upon me, to be of service to humanity, to aid me in understanding the nuances of living with a visual impairment and to use my voice to be a voice for other visually impaired children and adults.  No matter where my journey may lead to next, I will continue to strive and empower myself, to the best of my ability, to use those skills to help the disabled community but my deepest desire, in all of this, is that society learn to pass the baton, to persons living with disabilities too. We are more than just being disabled.

If you are interested in learning more about Maymoona or would like to get in contact with her, please reach out via her Facebook page, Infinite Abilities, or email her at info@infiniteabilities.co.za.

by Yumnah Jones

Anel Coetzee

Anel Coetzee, founder of the South African Visually Impaired Community (SAVIC)

Anel Coetzee, the founder of SAVIC, is a legal advisor and a former attorney. Her journey to finding her niche has been no easy feat and was fraught with tremendous challenges because of the unbending nature of society to reject that which is deemed different. Her story shows us that with the right support, we can all become contributing citizens of the World and that we should never underestimate the power of the slightest gesture of support as it can facilitate and alleviate the struggles of others as they go about their daily lives.

This is  Anel’s story …

I can feel the cool metal of the railing surrounding my balcony, with my fingertips. I can hear the sounds of moving vehicles and people going about their daily lives, eight floors beneath me. It smells like rain, but for the moment, the sun warms my face, and it is a beautiful day. I know what beauty feels like, I know what it sounds like, and I know it is something that can be experienced by all of our senses, but I do not know what it looks like. In fact, I do not know what anything looks like. In my world, there are only shapes and shadows in which days are either blurred or too bright, with many moving objects and no colours. 

In 1992, I was born in Johannesburg, South Africa with a condition known as Congenital Rubella Syndrome (CRS). It is a condition that occurs when the rubella virus, German measles, in the mother affects the developing baby. There are a myriad of complications associated with CRS but in my case, it affected my retinas.  With damaged retinas and no available cure, I have had to navigate the world depending largely on my other senses.  

Growing up, my childhood was, by all accounts, normal. Apart from some minor adjustments like teaching me to use my remaining senses to accomplish certain tasks, my father, a businessman, and my mother, a teacher, ensured that I, just like my sighted siblings, live an active life. I learnt to ride a bicycle, played hide-and-seek with the neighbourhood children, made my own bed (when I was reminded to), and spent my school holidays climbing trees and swimming in my grandparents’ dam.

Since I could not attend mainstream school with my sisters, I was sent to Prinshof School, a school for visually impaired children. While completing my formative education, I met other children with disabilities who became my friends, for life. However, this educational system, where disabled children are isolated from society and their families, would ultimately become one of the greatest challenges later in my life, because it did not prepare me for life outside the carefully designed and adapted world in which I grew up in.

Through Prinshof, I received a good education, learnt braille and participated in other curricular activities such as the school choir and piano lessons. However, the school did not offer a broad spectrum of sporting activities. With this in mind, my parents decided to enrol me in acrobatic gymnastics after my eldest sister introduced me to it.

With my visual impairment and my love for Barbie’s, I first learnt acrobatic gymnastics through a gymnastic doll. The doll became the tool used to show me how to perform various acrobatic tricks, as I would feel where the doll’s arms and legs were positioned, and then copied those movements with my own body. I practiced this for hours on end and to my astonishment, realized that I was really good at it. I loved walking on my hands, doing back walkovers and challenging myself to what I could do. My introduction to acrobatic gymnastics was “love at first pointed toe” to the extent that I started to participate in competitions, outside of school grounds. Through this exposure. I was starting to become aware that the world was not designed for people with disabilities and that it was up to me to advocate for my individual needs since fellow competitors complained that I was given preferential treatment because the judges pitied me.  It was for the first time in my life that I learnt that perception matters and that it often matters far more than reality.

Consequently, my dance teacher would enrol me without disclosing my disability and the ramification of this was that I could not ask for reasonable accommodation. Thus, prior to the competition period, my parents would take me to the location of competitions to teach me the layout of the stage and to show me where the judges and the audience would be seated. Determined to prove my naysayers wrong, I put in a lot of effort and practice. Finally, in 2002, at the age of 10, I won the South African National Acrobatics Championships in my category, where I was one of approximately eighteen participants, but the only dancer with a disability.

In 2010, I matriculated and decided to pursue a career in law. I registered for a LLB degree at the University of the Free State and in January 2011, my mother and grandmother dropped me off at campus, a five-hours’ drive from home. I was super excited about the new adventures that lay ahead and was eager to start my university lectures.


At 18 years of age and having already experienced my fair share of discrimination and bullying, I thought if I left my white cane at home (which Mom later sent to me within my first month of arrival. What was I thinking right?) and pretended to not have a disability, I would have a better chance of blending in with the crowd and making new friends. But alas, 2011 was the year that I realized how dismally my country has failed me by not providing inclusive education. All of a sudden, I went from a classroom of five learners to a lecture hall of 500 students, with no reasonable accommodation.

Campus life was a challenge as both lecturers and fellow students had no idea how to accommodate or behave around a visually impaired person. Neither did I receive the appropriate orientation and mobility training to navigate the campus. There were also many other disabled students and a limited capacity to timeously convert my textbooks into braille. In most cases, I did not receive my books in time for test and exam preparations and had to write from knowledge acquired during lectures. I subsequently failed my first year and  when I started over, in my second year of university, I started to learn how to use a computer and screen reader and switched from braille study materials to electronic study materials (e-books), which were not very popular at that time.

For most of my able-bodied peers, living in residence with me, the prospect of attending university, was exciting, and their biggest concern was coping with an increased course load and not being awoken by the early morning calls of their parents. As a disabled person, I had to contend with a lack of accessible study materials, a lack of awareness, inaccessible lectures and having to learn to cook for myself and doing my own laundry. It was overwhelming, and the volume of work which included study guides, textbooks and case law was more reading than I have ever done but I pushed ahead.

During the period of my studies, I have acquired so much knowledge on legal subject matters  but the most valuable lessons I have learnt were about myself. On countless occasions, I have wandered unknowingly into male lavatories, approached store mannequins for assistance, walked into doors and knocked over spectacles from people’s faces trying to feel for a seat on trains. I am no stranger to embarrassment and the older I get, the less these incidents hurt my pride. Although I did not blend in and still experienced bullying and ignorance, I chose to not let the actions of others define me. I went on to graduate with an LLB from UFS and completed my articles of clerkship before becoming a practicing attorney.

Securing a job after the completion of my studies was extremely difficult because I was blind and without a driver’s licence. When some of the law firms realized I was visually impaired, I was instantly rejected after initial consideration. Eventually, I was employed by a law firm in Johannesburg and gained valuable experience, but the career path was very taxing as I constantly had to prove myself to clients. Most of my colleagues knew I was capable and competent, and with their guidance and mentorship, I was able to accomplish my tasks, attend meetings and prepare for and appear in court.   However, the unfortunate reality was that most of my working time were spent with strangers and because I am a disabled woman, I was deemed incapable and was treated with condescension.

As an attorney, is it integral to have a good clientele but as a blind attorney, it was difficult to build up a clientele. After five years in practice, and with the firm’s helpful transition from an archival filing system to a paperless system, I reached my personal goals through hard work and consistent effort and was, by society’s standards, successful. Successful, but not happy … I thought that after becoming an attorney, I would finally receive the respect that I have always yearned for as a human being, living with a visual impairment, but despite my accomplishments, that were recognized, I was never fully regarded as an equal. It was a mental health struggle, for me, and time for a change.

In due course, I found work as a legal advisor at a company that tremendously improved the quality of my life, because for the first time, my abilities mattered more than my disability. I am not a visually impaired legal advisor; I am a legal advisor that is competent, capable and hardworking. I am seen as an equal, functioning individual of the greater society. Fortunately for me, this is my current path, but not many disabled individuals can say the same. They continue to walk a path, in society, that praises them when they succeed in a world that is not designed for them yet fails to accommodate them with opportunities to integrate and contribute. Societal barriers are the greatest hurdle for disabled individuals to overcome and through first-hand experience, I can vouch that if disabled individuals are surrounded by people who actively remove these societal barriers, then their disability will not be an issue.

While I enjoy my career and the challenges it presents, my heart will always be with the disabled community. When I am not at work, I spend my time creating awareness, along with my canine companion, on  disabilities but particularly on visual impairments and guide dogs. I share my story in the hopes that it will encourage disabled people to step outside of their comfort zones and reach for their dreams. I also try to destigmatize the myths and misperceptions on disabilities.

For many years, I have felt that the visually impaired community is disconnected and that although we face similar obstacles and challenges, we tend to waste our time and resources by trying to solve our problems, individually. As a result, I started to research practical and accessible ways  that would unite the visual impaired community. 

Earlier this year, in 2022, I launched an online platform, called the South African Visually Impaired Community (SAVIC) on Discord. The purpose of SAVIC is to create a single platform and sense of community where visually impaired  South Africans can find all the resources available to discuss the different career paths chosen, to provide information on employment and bursary opportunities and to share insights on accessible living. SAVIC is a resourceful community, consisting of 41 members, with a lot of expertise. Currently, we host events on topics ranging from access to justice, accessible traveling and new technologies. Going forward, my vision for SAVIC, is that it can be used to identify and rally, as a collective, against instances of discrimination. We are looking to expand our networks and have created a Facebook group that is open to any interested visually impaired person, and their families.

I may be classified as disabled, but I am more than that. I am a sister, a friend, a partner, a professional and an animal lover. My lack of sight does not define me in these roles. My disability moulded me into a resilient and empathetic person, it taught me patience and to find the humour in every situation, but it will never prevent me from living a fulfilling life.

If you are interested in learning more about Anel or would like to get in contact with her, please reach out via her Facebook page, Life after blindness or email her at coetzee.anel@gmail.com. If you are visually impaired and would like to know more about SAVIC, you can join her Facebook Group, SAVI Community.