Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!yale!bunker!hcap!hnews!104!810!Phil.Scovell
From: Phil.Scovell@f810.n104.z1.fidonet.org (Phil Scovell)
Newsgroups: misc.handicap
Subject: Japanese Abacus
Message-ID: <13458@bunker.UUCP>
Date: 12 Aug 90 04:34:58 GMT
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Index Number: 9783

[This is from the Blink Talk Conference]

Hey Stew,
Does anyone still teach the abacus?  In the mid 1960's when I began 
going to the school for the blind, they tried a few of us out on the 
Japanese abacus but it never went over too well.  I loved it however.  
I became so attached to it that I still use it for many calculations to 
this day.  When I first moved to Denver, I went through the vending 
stand program and got a snackbar downtown.  During the three months of 
training I was told I wouldn't be able to add fast enough to keep up 
with the lunch lines.  I did though!  I use a talking calculator 
now, of course, but there's not a day goes by that I don't use the 
abacus for something.  In fact, as I write this message, I used my 
abacus to add up the files a couple of people requested to see how many 
K all five files would take.  I could have used my talking calculator 
but for some reason I automatically reach for my abacus.  Wonder if 
anyone else on blinktalk uses the abacus or is this an out dated device 
I wonder?  It doesn't need batteries you know.
P.S.  Doesn't that word, abacus, send your synthesizer for a loop?

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