Word: deafness
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...voice of a video game tells him, "You have no authority." He seems almost at ease with his fate--one of those rare men who don't dare to dream or think of themselves as hero material. Imagine an older Rocky Balboa who got clobbered until he was half deaf, and whose Adrian dumped him to marry the town scumball...
They seem to be part of the subways of New York City, walking meekly up and down the cars, handing out pens and key chains, along with frayed business-size cards that read I AM DEAF. Then they scurry back, ricocheting from post to post as they silently gather up their cards and wares, their cocked heads appealing for riders to buy the pitiful $1 trinkets. Most people ignore them...
However, four of these vendors ventured nervously into a police precinct at 4 a.m. on July 19 with a three-page letter that hinted at the silent netherworld they inhabited. Following them to two houses in Queens, police discovered 57 Mexicans, most of them deaf-mute illegal immigrants, crammed into two top-floor apartments. Alternately signing and writing, the shabbily dressed immigrants--among them pregnant women and children and infants--described themselves as exploited laborers held captive by the Paolettis, a Mexican family whose deaf members had enticed them with promises of a sweeter life, then confiscated their identity documents...
...neighbors described a nightly horror show of barefoot women, clad only in nightgowns, fleeing from the houses with men in pursuit; of babies crying, their squalls unattended; of walls vibrating from slamming doors and pounding fists. George Friebolin, an advocate for the deaf at the Lexington Vocational Services in Queens, who knew some of the immigrants from a Bible-study program, said one man told him last week that his son had been kidnapped. "They told him that the baby was placed in a convent or a church in Manhattan," says Friebolin. "He says he's been searching...
...other day, a deaf man was plying his trade on the 10 p.m. outbound train, selling miniature screwdrivers with the tags "Please support the deaf with a dollar donation" attached to them. The tag concluded with a disarmingly friendly sketch of the sign language symbol for smile and then a smiley face. The man walked haltingly up and down the train, placing a tool set on each empty seat, but each passenger pretended not to see him or unintentionally flinched as he came near. One would have thought the man contagious--and not merely deaf...