Undeterred by visual impairment, Emily Lee turns to sports to make her life ‘colourful’ again

SINGAPORE – Determined not to let her visual impairment stop her from leading an active life, Emily Lee has

represented Singapore in goalball and para-cycling

, and taken part in races such as the Great Eastern Women’s Run.

The 55-year-old’s latest pursuit is para-rock climbing, having picked up the sport in November 2024. She also signed up for Merdeka Monkey: Beyond Sight, Singapore’s first blindfolded climbing competition, which took place at Outpost Climbing gym at Crawford Lane on Oct 17.

Organised by Outpost Climbing in partnership with the Singapore Disability Sports Council, local social service agencies and Japanese non-profit group Monkey Magic, the competition saw 10 teams of sighted and visually impaired climbers work together to score points within a time limit.

Lee, who was born with a congenital eye condition that caused weak vision, became completely blind by the age of 28. But that did not deter her from picking up sports.

“I had retina detachment and it (deteriorated) quite fast over a few months and I could see less and less, it was like a black curtain, just kept coming down until it came all the way down,” she said.

“When people keep asking you, ‘Can you see?’, it’s not because they want to test you, but because they don’t know how to express their concern.

“I feel that by keeping away from people for a while, it was good to have your own quiet time.

“And then I told myself, I better map out my own life, I don’t want to waste time thinking about the negative things and I cannot move on,” she added.

“So I said, the life is mine and I want to make it colourful. Then I started to exercise and I’m going into many different types of sports just to try because I haven’t tried them.”

At the competition, there were four sighted climbers and one visually impaired climber in each team, all of whom were blindfolded while climbing.

The sighted climbers take turns to act as the sight guide by relaying instructions to their blindfolded teammates via a headset, telling them to feel for certain features at their two o’clock, for example.

Christine Toh, who was Lee’s sight guide, was also blindfolded when it was her turn to climb.

The 35-year-old said: “Having this event really helps me understand how it is like being in their shoes and it was really an eye-opener.”

Asked about guiding Lee during their competition, Toh added: “I feel that she was really amazing on the wall and she could really feel her way through the rocks. Giving commands was not as easy as I thought…

“Beyond what I was saying to her, she was doing a lot by herself, feeling the rock and she could figure things out quite quickly.”

It was also Toh’s first blindfolded climbing experience since she picked up the sport in 2023.

She said: “Honestly, I was scared, because as a regular climber, I really rely on my vision 100 per cent.

“When I want to do a check before I climb, I want to make sure that I’m secure and that my belayer is also attentive… At that point in time, I couldn’t do any of that so I was very anxious.”

Monkey Magic founder and four-time para-climbing world champion Koichiro Kobayashi, who performed a demonstration climb and also took part in the competition, said his passion is to share the love of climbing with others.

The 57-year-old Japanese, who is visually impaired, said: “Twenty years ago, I established this non-profit organisation and my dream was to make a more mature society through climbing.

“And the visually impaired community understood what I wanted to do, eye doctors, association for the blind. But they could not understand what climbing was. They said it was dangerous and very difficult.

“But now 20 years later, climbing is very popular in the world and it is in the Olympics, with many climbing gyms around the world and people with disabilities can easily access them.”