[Nfb-science] Conference Question

[Christine Szostak]

Dear Colleagues,
  I would greatly appreciate any thoughts or advice on the following. I will be attending and presenting a poster at a conference in just over a month related to my field of science. The conference, as many such similar conferences go, will be held at a large, conference-style hotel. One of my concerns with such conferences is in accurately navigating through the conference halls, rooms...

  Namely, my  question is specific to total blindness and dealing with the following while alone at the conference (for reference I use a guidedog):

1)  Being required to navigate through large and very open spaces with large crowds/numerous often crowded objects and limited spatial cues.

2)  Knowing the set-up of and finding seats within a large conference hall. Relatedly, Finding the location for and setting up a poster for presentation.

3) Having a limited ability to use cues such as  Braille or raised letter signs (e.g., they are not available or easy to locate).

4)  Having to deal with  multiple floors in a fairly unfamiliar building.

5)  Wanting to navigate around poster sessions to see specific work of interest.

  I was wondering with respect to the above what others on this list have done to  make conference travel with no vision successful. I want to be able to focus on the work, not my vision loss. Thanks in advance.
Many thanks,
Christine
 M. Szostak
Graduate Student
Language Perception Laboratory
Department of Psychology, Cognitive Area
The Ohio State University
Columbus, Ohio
szostak.1 at osu.edu