Bat Boy!
I’ve always been a little creeped out by the picture of “Batboy” you see yearly on the cover of the Weekly World News tabloid. This guy, Ben Underwood is the real thing…without the creepy sharp teeth and freaky looks. He’s a completely normal 14 year old boy who is blind…but he can gain a striking amount of detail about the world around him by interpreting the echo’s from clicking noises he makes as he moves around. His abilities are really amazing.
There was the time a fifth grader thought it would be funny to punch the blind kid and run. So he snuck up on Ben Underwood and hit him in the face. That’s when Ben started his clicking thing. “I chased him, clicking until I got to him, then I socked him a good one,” says Ben, a skinny 14-year-old. “He didn’t reckon on me going after him. But I can hear walls, parked cars, you name it. I’m a master at this game.”
…”I tell people I’m not blind,” he says. “I just can’t see.”
Very cool. Read the whole story.
Hat tip Boing Boing
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Very cool!
Comment by The Rundquist's — July 21, 2006 @ 11:53 am