“Once, I was at the shore of Penghu in Taiwan. There was a gust. The sound of wind I heard was marvellous. I could feel that the wind was able to take me away.” Frances is an office worker. She has taken part in sand drawing performances. She hopes her works can evoke happiness and freedom.
She recalled having once heard the sound of gentle breeze and once a fierce gust, but she has never heard thunder and lightning, or rainstorm – the sounds she is now anticipating. Every sound ordinary people consider mundane is novel to her.

Frances’ hearing disability was discovered when she was around three. “My parents’ voices – I couldn’t make out what they said,” she recalled. Her hearing ability improved when she was studying at IVE (Hong Kong Institute of Vocational Education) at the age of 15. At that time, the school provided hearing aids to students with hearing disability. Tuning the hearing aid to ‘T (Teacher)’ mode enabled the user to hear the teacher’s teaching clearly, without hearing classmates’ talking. Since then, her hearing got a little better. She described her current hearing ability as ‘halfway’, similar to the quality when ordinary people listen with earphones. In a quiet environment, she can hear sounds. Therefore, she enjoys practising sand drawings at midnight. As the creation process has to be accompanied by music, the duration cannot take too long. She once listened to music for two consecutive hours, which tired her ears out.

Speaking
During her primary and secondary school years, Frances studied in mainstream schools. Her parents have always encouraged her to learn speaking and to communicate with ordinary people by lip-reading and verbalising. Later on, Frances was transferred from IVE to Chun Tok School, a special education school for hearing-impaired students. As requested by her mother, Frances communicated with classmates by simultaneously using sign language and spoken words, so as to maintain her speaking ability. Now, when you talk to her, you may find her speech not as fluent as ordinary people’s. But as long as you are face-to-face with her and pay attention to what her low voice is saying, you don’t need to rely on a sign language interpreter to understand her.

Hearing Impairment and Sound Art
Frances is actually very talkative. Although her ‘hearing’ and ‘speaking’ are not as good as that of ordinary people, that doesn’t undermine her passion for communicating with others. In terms of artistic creation, she communicates with the audience through sand drawing. “Not being able to communicate through sound, I use other means,” she said. This June, she participated in the ‘Itchy Ears’ listening workshop. She was the only participant with hearing disability. She tried to record the workshop contents via a recorder. Holding the recorder and listening through the amplifying function with her earphones, she discovered a lot of sounds she had never heard, “I didn’t realise sound could be this interesting!” To her, the most unforgettable thing was suddenly hearing the sound of the door opening and closing via the earphones, which she wasn’t aware at the time. Since then, she became even more sensitive to and curious about sounds. She started to put together different objects to create sounds. “I create with bubble wrap, bucket cover, ping pong balls and bouncy balls,” she said. When it’s done, she listened to it with her father. They both think it sounded like firework displays.

“What is this sound?” is a question Frances always asks. Her family would tell her: it’s the sound of air-conditioner, it’s the sound of water, it’s the sound of thunder, it’s such-and-such sound. Once, the weather worsened. There was thunder and lightning. Frances’ mother said, “Very terrifying!” Frances only saw lightning, but couldn’t hear thunder. “I didn’t find it terrifying. I really wanted to know whether the sound was really very terrifying.” She is anticipating the next thunderstorm so that she can record the bad weather with a recorder and experience it in detail.

(please scroll down for Frances’ creation)

「有一次喺台灣澎湖嘅海邊，突然間好大風。我聽到啲風聲好正，感覺啲風可以帶我走。」Frances從事文職工作，亦曾參與沙畫表演，希望作品能帶出開心和自由的感覺。

她記得自己聽過一次輕柔的風聲，亦記得自己聽過一次強烈的風聲，但就未聽過行雷閃電、大風大雨的聲音。她正在等待這個聲音。對她來説，一般人習以為常的聲音，都充滿新鮮感。

Frances自三歲半起，被發現有聽力障礙：「爸媽的聲音，唔知講咩嘢。」她的聽力狀況，在她約十五歲，於IVE (香港專業教育學院)求學時，出現改善。當時，學校為有聽障的學生提供上課用的助聽器，把助聽器調較至「T（Teacher）」模式，便能聽到老師清晰地講課，但聽不到同學們説話的聲音。自那時起，她的聽力好了一點。她形容，現在她的聽力有「一半」，大概跟一般人戴着耳塞聽聲音差不多。在寧靜的環境，她能聽到聲音。所以，她喜歡在深夜練習沙畫，因創作沙畫時，需要配合音樂，但也不能聽太長時間，她試過連續兩小時不停聽着音樂，便㑹雙耳好攰。

在説
在中、小學階段，Frances都入讀主流學校。她的父母一直鼓勵她學習説話，靠着讀唇和説話，與一般人溝通。後來，Frances從IVE轉到專為聽障人士而設的真鐸學校，在媽媽的要求下，Frances跟同學溝通時，㑹一邊做手語，一邊開口説話，以免説話能力退步。現在與她談天，她説得不像一般人流利，但只要大家盡量面對面，留心去聽她那低沉的聲音在説什麼，不用手語翻譯員幫忙，也沒有問題。

聽障與聲音藝術
Frances其實很好傾，雖然在「聽」和「説」，她比一般人差一點點，但阻不到她希望與人交流的熱情。在藝術創作中，她以沙畫與觀眾溝通：「聲音溝通唔到，我用其他方法。」今年六月，她參與了「抓耳朵」聆聽工作坊，她是工作坊內唯一有聽障的參加者。工作坊內，她嘗試用錄音機做記錄。拿著錄音機，透過耳筒的擴音功能，她發掘了許多她未聽過的聲音：「原來聲音，好得意㗎喎！」她最難忘突然從耳筒聽到開門、關門的聲音，這是她從沒有留意過的。自此，她對聲音更敏感和好奇，開始把家中不同的物件放在一起來製造聲音：「我用氣泡紙、桶蓋、乒乓波、彈彈波創作。」完成後，她和爸爸一起聆聽，大家都覺得聲音像正在放煙花。

「呢個係咩嘢聲？」現在Frances常問這個問題。家人㑹告訴她，這是冷氣機聲、這是水聲、這是雷聲、這是什麼什麼的聲音。有一次，天氣轉壞，行雷閃電，Frances的媽媽説：「好恐怖！」Frances只看到閃電，聽不同行雷：「我唔覺得恐怖，好想知道，個聲音係咪好恐怖。」她期待能在下次橫風橫雨時，用錄音機把壞天氣錄下，然後仔細去感受。

:: Frances’ creation in sound ::
:: Frances的聲音創作 ::

firework displays 煙花