Manuela Vos: “I am the same as before but in a different body” | Culture

“Do you need a quadriplegic actress?” Manuela Vos (Leeuwarden, Netherlands, 56 years old) asked Emilio del Valle the first time they met after her accident. Then, the playwright answered no. Now he does need her, he needs her, not just anyone. You are the axis on which it rotates Manuela, the infinite flight, which premieres tomorrow, Thursday, October 17, in the Madrid room Cuarta Pared and will tour Galicia, Cantabria, also Zaragoza, Valladolid… The piece is about, mixing music, video and text, about a woman whose neck was broken (she has damaged the fourth cervical, the fifth and the sixth) and life on July 5, 2021 climbing the needles of Tajahierro, in the Picos de Europa.

In just over three years he has overcome many obstacles and reached many goals. The last one – for now -, the one that passed on September 24 in Zurich. By winning her category, H1 (where those with the greatest degree of disability compete), she became the first Spanish world champion in Paralympic cycling (she became a nationalized a year ago).

Ask. Is society prepared to live with people with needs different from those of the majority?

Answer. I don’t think so, although I can’t speak for other people. In the work we work to normalize, that is the message. It’s based on my story, but hopefully it helps people who are different, who we look at as if they were weird. The more different people we see, the more accepted it will be.

Q. Do you feel those condescending looks?

R. There’s always that, so I smile, people smile and relax a little. What happens to me a lot, and bothers me, is that if I am accompanied they do not address me, they ask or speak to the other person as if I would not understand them or find out. It shocks me a lot.

Q. Are cultural facilities such as museums, theaters, auditoriums accessible?

R. I’ve been doing this for such a short time… There is more and more accessibility. Let me explain: there is more accessibility for others, but there are few quadriplegic people like me who are as active and for us it is not so common. Spaces are increasingly more accessible to the public, but what about actors in wheelchairs? If someone wants to audition or wants to study theater, are the spaces prepared? (In the Fourth Wall they have set up a dressing room for her).

Q. What do you mean you’ve been doing this for a while?

R. It’s only been a year since I’ve felt myself in my body. At first you are in a bubble. It is such a big drama, so complicated to assume, I’m not even talking about accepting it, I haven’t accepted it. It takes you a while to feel yourself. For a year now I feel that the one that is here, in my body, is the same as it was before, I have not changed. Before I was in a more than mobile body, I did a lot of sports, and now I am in this; But my mind hasn’t changed.

Q. How do you live with the life before the accident, with the memory?

R. I touch it little… (gets excited). The two most important things in my life were my children and the mountains, there I found my peace. Now where do I find it?

Q. Have you returned to the mountains?

R. I have done the adapted Sella descent. I don’t want people to think that I take too many risks, there are those who think I take them by walking down the street, but I have the right to do so. I do the adapted version of the descent and there are people everywhere who help you.

I don’t like it when they say… “of course, for climbing…” Climbing is safe, I fell in a very easy area. I was very prepared, I had the best material, I spent a fortune on the anchors (safety and anchor points used in climbing), they were the best, in fact, the last one I put saved my life. People think that if you practice these sports you are unconscious, but the important thing is to do things well and I need to have a life.

Q. And does God, who appears in the work, play a role?

R. No, I don’t think so. If it existed, the things that happen would not happen, and I don’t mean to me, I mean in the world. But I understand that there are people who help. What I do believe, and I don’t know why, is that there is something after all this. That makes me not afraid of death. When I was in the ICU and couldn’t breathe I remembered that the euthanasia law had been approved a few months before.

Q. How does it feel to be considered an example, a heroine?

R. I am a normal person, someone who is trying to find himself again. I’ve been through monumental downturns. I have a lot of pain. I take a lot of pills. The pain is always there, I compare it to the noise of a nightclub, when suddenly, when you go out and there is no noise, you have that feeling of “ah, what a relief!” The day they find something to take away my pain will be something like this. I don’t ask to walk, it’s enough for me to take away the pain, my life would be different, but I don’t want to be a complainer.

I do sports to find that peace that I previously found in the mountains. For feeling healthy. And the theater to have an occupation, to be useful.

Q. On stage you also talk about sex, is this topic taboo with quadriplegics?

R. I know you are curious, but no one dares to ask. I speak from the point of view of women. Emilio (del Valle) wrote that it is like a volcano, that it makes noise, that it is there, about to explode. And it’s like he describes it, like electricity, something lights up in you. I can get lonely thinking, just like before. I notice those vibrations, it has to be a lie. I have no sensitivity, but I do feel. I think you work a lot with memories. I have orgasms, they are different, but they are real. I thought: “Oysters, how strong! “It’s very cool.”

Q. And something, maybe better, or not… The sense of humor.

R. Without humor there is no life.

Q. Have you ever laughed at your situation?

R. Of moments caused by my state. Moments that make me cry, but then, when you tell it, you end up laughing. I used to say that I had emotional incontinence, I cry a lot. Now I say that I am incontinent everywhere, and people don’t dare to laugh.