Undeterred by what is arguably a significant hurdle to the pleasures and experiences of daily life, Arshina Kassam, a twenty-six year old Muslim of African background wakes each morning charged with her faith in God and confidence in her own ability to navigate the logistics of living life virtually blind.

Arshina, a second year Masters student in the School of Social Work at Carleton University, was born in Tanzania with a congenital cataract in her left eye that was not diagnosed till she was a year old. Her family then moved to Toronto where she embarked upon a series of surgeries to extract the diseased lens but following a detachment of her retina, she was left completely blind in her left eye by age two.