I see before me a road
going across the bare fields,
and clouds are flying overhead.
LAND OF SILENCE AND DARKNESS
From the life of the deaf-blind Fini Straubinger
A Film by Werner Herzog
When I was a child, when I could still see and hear,
I watched a ski-jumping competition.
And one thing keeps coming back...
Those men going through the air...
I looked at their faces.
I wish you could see that.
I always jump when I'm touched. Years go by in waiting.
Could Miss Straubinger
tell us about the animals?
That was a great joy for us.
First, we went to the quadrupeds.
There was a hind, full size...
The animals all are full size
to give the blind an idea of them.
The hind's skin was wonderful.
Next to it, there was a stag's head
with really big antlers.
Its mouth was open.
I was amazed by its size.
There also were hares
sitting or in jumping position.
One could feel it precisely.
Some were afraid of the mice.
The second room contained birds.
There was a black woodpecker on a tree...
It was interesting.
And another, a green one.
I was delighted.
Such a long beak.
And a pheasant with its long feathers.
What a pity you can't see the colors!
Can Miss Julie tell us about the animals?
They ask...
if you could also...
tell us about the animals.
I don't know much anymore.
Her memory is very bad.
Tell us what you know.
I touched a lot of animals
that I had never seen before.
Pheasants, crocodiles...
snakes, tigers, lions...
...and many others.
Also European animals:
Goats, stags, hares, foxes,
and even a mouse.
The First Flight
Memories
I was rather temperamental when I was young.
I made it quite difficult for my mother.
She always had to check me.
My father died at the age of 33.
I was hardly six.
And when I wasn't watched,
I could do what I liked.
That's how, when I was nine, I fell down the stairs
from the third to the second floor.
I fell with such a force
on my back and on my neck
that a neighbor thought he had heard shooting.
He asked me if I was hurt.
I told him I wasn't,
and I asked him not to tell my mother,
otherwise she'd get mad.
I climbed the stairs on all fours
because I couldn't walk.
I was so in shock, and it really was a terrible blow.
I sat down and prayed,
"Please, make that my mother won't punish me."
From that day on, I always felt pain,
especially headaches,
which I never had before then.
The doctor said it was my growing up.
A second one agreed.
The third understood I'd fallen.
I always did my best at school.
I was very attentive.
One day the teacher told me,
"Fini, you should write on the lines."
I said "Yes, of course."
Then I understood
that I couldn't see the lines anymore.
I wanted to learn embroidering,
but I had to leave that very soon.
They told me to go home
because I couldn't see enough.
I didn't care about embroidering anymore.
But...
That was the beginning of the end.
First, I went blind.
I was 15 years and 9 months old.
Then I had to stay in bed.
I had severe eye inflammation.
And then, at 18, I began to have ear troubles.
At first, I didn't understand what those strange sounds
in my ears were.
And one day I was completely deaf.
Mother talked to me, and I didn't hear her.
She came to my bed and asked, "Can't you hear me?
Why don't you answer me?"
I said, "Did you say something?"
"Yes, but you don't answer."
I said, "Mom, I couldn't hear you."
We were both very frightened.
My deafness was very strange.
First, it was the right ear,
and then the left one.
I wanted to see a doctor. I wanted help.
I took foot-baths, I prayed,
but it wasn't any use.
Gradually, I lost my hearing
up to a rest of 5%.
I fled to religion.
It gave me strength,
but this terrible loneliness stayed on.
People promised to visit me,
but they didn't come.
And when they came, they talked to my mother,
and I stayed in my silent world.
And when I talked, my mother hit me lightly
and said she'd tell me later.
I wanted to participate.
How long...
did you stay in bed?
Nearly 30 years.
I always tried to get up.
Sometimes I couldn't move at all.
It was awful.
When the doctor noticed it could be very long,
he took me off the morphine.
It was difficult, but I got through it.
People think deafness means silence,
but that's wrong.
It's a constant noise in the head
going from a gentle humming,
through some cracking sounds,
to a steady droning, which is worst.
You don't know what to do any more.
It's very hard on us.
Sometimes it makes us rather touchy.
It's the same for the blind.
It isn't total darkness.
You often see all kinds of colors.
Black, grey, white,
blue, green, yellow...
It depends.
Hello, Mr. Messmer.
I'm very glad...
you came here.
Fini invited her friends for her 56th birthday.
They're blind and deaf like her.
It isn't easy to organize
because everybody must have a companion
to translate everything in the hand
since they can't see or hear each other.
Hello, Mrs. Meier.
Where is Mr. Forster?
Hello, Mr. Forster.
Please translate everything we say for Mrs. Meier.
She still sees a bit.
But they also need help
so they don't find themselves unprepared
in the land of silence and darkness.
Hello, dear Juliet.
Where is...
...Mr. Hundhammer?
Noble friend George, where are you?
Here.
- Hello, Mr. Hundhammer. - Hello.
Thank you for coming with Juliet.
Hello.
Is everybody here?
- Yes. - Yes, all set.
Who?
Who's there?
Mrs. Augustin?
No...
It's the "Little Snail".
Hello, my "Little Snail".
So, hello, everybody.
Who will say a poem?
Please translate for the deaf-blind.
I will speak slowly.
For when the deaf-blind can't follow things
and keeps staring into the void,
he is very depressed.
I will now tell you a poem
that reflects on our situation.
The title is: "The Most Wonderful Art."
To stay apart...
When others have fun...
But being happy all the time...
Gladly carrying out...
The most sacred task...
Renouncing in a noble way...
One's personal desires...
Living in darkness...
From the sun...
But shining like a star...
That is the art that only one...
Whose soul is bent on heaven can understand.
Can I start?
Ann with the beautiful hat...
Which becomes you so well...
You make up for joy...
You have cleaned our stairs...
For which I thank you here...
Today and every day...
For things well done...
ls what I like most of all.
In the afternoon, Fini Straubinger and her guests
go to see the botanical garden.
You can touch it,
but carefully.
It's like a column.
Shaped like columns.
Very carefully.
That's a cactus shaped like a column.
This one's interesting.
You have to describe it.
This one's interesting.
Cultivated...
Cultivated.
This is the cactus' fruit.
The fruit of the cactus.
You can take one.
This is the fruit.
The autochthons...
...eat it.
The flesh is good.
Who eats it?
The autochthons.
Are they ripe?
No, it's too small.
You have to peel it.
You must peel it first.
Can I eat it?
Not like this.
- Thank you. - You're welcome.
Look!
That's bamboo.
Bamboo!
- Is it bamboo? - No.
I didn't think it like that.
It will be January,
and I'll have a lot of work.
First, the visits here
and then in the Palatinate.
No, not before Christmas.
All I still have to do...
Mr. Schwarzhaber asked me to prepare a show,
but how, what, and when?
For four years, Fini Straubinger visits the deaf-blind of Bavaria
on behalf of the Bavarian League for the Blind.
Accompanied by Mrs. Mittermeier,
who translates everything into her hand,
she keeps in touch with the deaf-blind
and takes care of their problems.
My ticket, thank you.
If I were a painter,
I'd represent our condition like this:
Blindness like a black river,
flowing slowly like a melody towards great falls.
On its banks, beautiful trees and flowers,
and birds singing sweetly.
The other river, coming from the other side,
is as clear as the purest crystal.
This one also flows slowly, but without any sound.
Deep down, there is a very dark and deep and lake
where the two rivers meet.
Where they join, there are rocks
making the waters foam.
Afterwards, to let them flow silently and slowly
into that somber reservoir,
which lies in a deadly calm,
only troubled by an occasional ripple,
representing the agony of mind of the deaf-blind.
I don't know if you can understand this.
The rocks who tear the waters
stand for the depression
that the blind and the deaf feel
when they become deaf-blind.
I can't explain it any better,
but that's how I feel it.
For more than two years,
Else Féihrer has been living in a neurological clinic.
She is 48.
Her mother, the only person who understood her, is dead.
Hello, my sister in destiny.
Yes.
It's our sign.
Ms. Féihrer spent two years in a school for the blind in Munich
where she learned braille,
but she forgot it because she had no more practice.
Since no caritas or nursing home wanted to receive Else Féihrer,
she's in this asylum, which isn't her place.
She withdrew into herself.
She never talks any more.
When she still had her mother,
she could understand by touching the lips.
But that's all over now.
She keeps looking at you.
For you, my dear Else, for you.
She still looks at you.
I am deaf and blind...
like you...
deaf and blind.
Not a word.
Maybe that.
Blind...
Deaf...
Yes?
We're just alike.
Poor dear, no contact with the world.
She says nothing.
She can't speak any more.
From...
...Munich.
No possibility of contact.
I am Fini...
Fini Straubinger from Munich.
Does she talk?
No...
But she looks at you.
When you let go of my hand,
it is as if we were a thousand miles apart.
NOT ISOLATION, BUT INTEGRATION
Another much neglected group,
unable to assert its rights
in our affluent society,
where only production counts,
is the group of the disabled.
Society owes them more
than just the right to live.
It owes them complete integration
in various aspects.
In fact, this is all about our moral attitude
towards those people.
And frankly,
this attitude still isn't up to the mark.
A society which doesn't respect
old people, sick people, and disabled people
as part of itself
is condemning itself.
I was very much impressed.
I was very upset when the President came to me
and took my hand in his.
His hand was cool, not cold.
And while I was telling of our needs,
I felt the pressure of his hand
as a sign of understanding,
and I really was understood.
This is what I told him:
"Mr. President,
think also of the deaf-blind.
Get us out of our isolation.
Help us to find those
who can break our loneliness.
Could you explain to us...
the tactile translation?
Oh, yes.
It's a system of dashes and dots.
But you must take great care
as to how to make them.
For instance, the short dots
are made with a downward move --
H, G, D, B.
P is an upward move.
For A, E, I, O, U,
you touch the top of the fingers.
Four fingers on the palm of the hand
make up a K.
One horizontal dash is a Z.
Everything goes like that.
---C)---Y---
"Joy-II
It's hard to understand.
Who makes you practice?
Practice?
Nobody.
My brother can't learn it.
You could talk to him.
He only speaks his dialect.
On a farm near Freising,
Fini visits Ursula and Joseph Riedmeier.
She is deaf and nearly blind.
She understands by following the lips.
You only speak your dialect.
You can't talk properly.
No.
Her brother is blind but has some hearing left.
You said you'd never learn
the blind alphabet.
He said, "Straubinger".
I brought him a money-box.
Look...
Joseph, I brought you...
a money-box.
To put in coins.
See how it works.
And when you need the money,
you press and the money comes out.
Have you got it?
It's our natal home.
That's the vegetable garden.
That's the meadow.
My brother often mowed it.
Poor man, what work.
The wash...
Yes, of course...
The wash...
Where is he?
Where is Joseph?
There he is.
'Yes?
I don't see or hear anything either.
I'm just like you.
Now he's waiting.
Ask if he understood.
Did you understand?
Head up.
Stand straight!
You aren't that old.
It's the first time these deaf-blind visit a zoo.
Some of them haven't touched an animal for a long time.
It isn't hard to give them pleasure,
but there aren't many people who will help.
Not me, not me.
Two years old.
Can we take it out?
Don't hurt yourself.
You're nice.
It's so small.
Can I hold it?
What will its mother say?
Deaf-blind by birth
This is Harald, Ms. Straubinger.
Harald is one of my first pupils.
He came here five years ago.
He was a wild child,
making a mess and breaking everything.
It was very hard to give him the habit of a daily sequence,
to teach him tasks.
It took a year
to give him some notions of the tactile alphabet.
Helen Keller says
that this discovery
is the spiritual birth of the deaf-blind.
That really is the start
of education for those children.
Michael, sitting there beside you,
still hears a bit.
With Michael, we didn't start with the finger alphabet.
Instead, we used the vibration method discovered by the Americans.
He touches the lips of the one talking and he repeats the word.
Michael, it's a car
with a trailer.
It's very difficult
to guess the thoughts of our pupils, how they think, what they feel.
We can only guess at it.
I still remember my visit about two years ago.
Harald was a little devil.
He was fascinated by watches.
It's much harder still to teach them abstract ideas.
We give them practical examples.
When we want to explain the meaning of "good", we say:
Harald gets up,
Harald learns,
Harald helps Sabine,
Harald is good.
Then we show him the opposite. We say:
Harald hits Sabine,
Harald takes something away from Sabine,
Harald is bad.
That's how we teach them good and bad.
Now let's go into the water.
Harald was afraid of water.
It took over a year to get him to go in.
Now I want him to get in by himself.
Now go back alone.
He's still scared.
One more time, Harald.
Your turn.
One more time.
One more time up to your shoulders.
Now he gets praised.
Good job, Harald!
Hearing aids are used for diction courses.
Harald can thus feel the sound waves.
But even when they can speak a sentence,
it's almost impossible to teach them abstract ideas.
What they understand as ambition, hope, or happiness
will always be a mystery to us.
Vladimir Kokol is 22, deaf-blind by birth.
Only his father cared for him.
He never had any special training.
His needs were never specifically addressed.
It was never attempted to awaken his understanding.
Vladimir never learned to walk.
He only takes soft food
which he presses between the tongue and the palate.
There he is.
Hello, Vladimir.
That's to indicate I'm here.
With patience and observation,
we can still get a lot out of him.
He will never learn to talk,
but maybe he will learn to interpret signs.
I noticed that sometimes he presses his nails into my hand.
But he does that because he has no other way to communicate.
It's not to hurt me.
Don't hurt me, little one.
Look, he gives me the other hand.
It's a radio, right?
He likes it, he feels something living.
Is it music?
Yes.
When you give him food,
how does he eat? With a spoon?
I put it in his hand.
You have to put it in his hand.
And does he know what to do with it?
Then he understands.
How do you get him to sleep?
How does he know night from day?
That's difficult for the deaf-blind.
They don't adapt to that sequence.
Does he know if it's day or night?
When it's time to get up and when it's time to go to bed?
No, he doesn't know,
but when it's time to sleep, we take him to bed.
And he goes to sleep?
Yes, he does.
We put his pajamas on and he gets into bed.
Can he dress by himself?
No, he can't.
And can he eat alone?
Now he reacted!
Now I noticed it!
Can he eat alone?
No.
Soup or something that's eaten with a spoon, can he eat it alone?
No...
You have to give it to him.
Have you ever tried it?
What does that mean?
I must talk.
He'll get to something.
Be a good boy.
I think he's bored.
Hello.
For five years, Heinrich Fleischmann, 51,
lives near Niirdlingen
lives in a home for the aged, with his mother.
He was deaf by birth and lost his sight at 35.
He was so much neglected by his family
that he forgot how to speak and write.
Rejected by human society,
he looked for the company of animals.
He lived with the cows in a stable for a long time.
He's looking for my hand.
My hand. Now he's laughing.
He was looking for his mother's hand.
Now you.
He knows it's not my hand.
He knows my ring.
We want...
...to talk a bit.
Should we go there?
Can he talk?
Yes. If he could see the lips,
he would be able to talk.
When he could see, I talked to him.
Just like I'm talking to you.
But no longer.
For example, in the winter,
I put his hand into the snow,
and he said, "Snow".
But I've lost contact.
Sometimes he says a word.
Sometimes, but it's very rare.
Did he ask who we were since our last visit?
No.
He doesn't even know his siblings.
No, he doesn't recognize them.
Not even his own siblings?
No, he doesn't know who they are.
They give him their hands,
he doesn't recognize them and stays away.
He doesn't want to see strangers.
Yet, he must have had his experiences.
Yes, right. There is much I don't know.
Good-bye.
Did you say good-bye?
Yes, I said it.
Good-bye.
If a worldwide war would break out now,
I wouldn't even notice it.