Sabriye Tenberken, 2005 Women of Discovery Humanity Award

" No borders for the blind!" — Sabriye Tenberken

Co-Founder, Program Director of Braille Without Borders

Born: 1970-01-01

Hometown: Cologne, Germany

Education: Central Asian Studies at Bonn University, Germany

Achievements

Discoveries: Braille script for the Tibetan Language

Expeditions: Climbing Blind expedition in 2004, Blindsight Student Expedition on Mt Everest, 2006.

Biography

Sabriye Tenberken was born in Cologne, Germany. At age 12 she became blind. She studied Central Asian Sciences at Bonn University. In addition to Mongolian and modern Chinese, she studied modern and classical Tibetan in combination with sociology and philosophy. As no blind student had ever before ventured to enroll in these kind of studies, she could not fall back on the experiences of anyone else - and had to develop her own methods in order to follow her course of studies. Out of this need, Sabriye developed the Tibetan Braille Script, translating Tibetan into Braille and then traveled to Tibet where she established Tibet's only school for the blind in Lhasa. Traveling on horseback throughout Tibet, looking for blind children to bring to her school, she realized how sightless children, because of their blindness, suffered from unhealthy living conditions. Together with Paul Kronenberg, Sabriye founded Braille Without Borders to empower the blind and visually impaired throughout the world by providing access to education and a better future. Sabriye is also the author of three books:  "My path leads to Tibet," published in 12 languages, which tells the history of the project and about the way Sabriye dealt with becoming blind, "Tashis neue Welt," and  "Das siebte Jahr" ("The Seventh Year"), which tells the story of Sabriye and Paul's seventh year in Tibet.

In addition to teaching blind children how to read with Braille, Tenberken also teaches them how to climb in the Himalayas and overcome the stigma of their disabilities. In 2006, the award winning film "Blindsight" documented Sabriye and Paul's expedition with a group of their students to climb Mt. Everest. She and 6 of her blind students joined world class blind mountain climber Erik Weihenmayer in an attempt to summit Lhakpa Ri, the 23,000 foot peak which rises spectacularly beside Mount Everest. The resulting 3-week journey is beyond anything any of them could have predicted. 

Fun Facts

Favorite Item to have in the field: Pronto Braille computer

Heroes: Jacques Lusseyran, blind hero of the French resistance, WWII