Hospice Niagara brings region’s first “Wind Phone” to Ball’s Falls

Hospice Niagara is bringing the region’s first ever Wind Phone to Ball’s Falls on Wednesday to provide visitors the opportunity to speak with loved one’s who have passed away.

In a partnership with Niagara Hospice and Niagara Peninsula Conservation Authority (NPCA), the project aims to connect users to loved ones who have passed and provide the opportunity to say final goodbyes that may have not been said.

The concept has a phone connected to nothing at all, where visitors can speak into it and release their message into the wind.

The Wind Phone is located on the Cataract Trail along Twenty Mile Creek at the Ball’s Falls Conservation Area, halfway between the pedestrian bridge and the Upper Falls.

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The original “telephone of the wind” was created in 2010 in Japan by a man wishing to speak to his cousin who had died of cancer. He found that these one-way conversations made the grief more manageable.

A year later a devastating tsunami would hit Japan, and he would offer the wind phone to others grieving, leading to people around the world traveling from around the world to visit, grieve and remember those lost.

Hospice Niagara offers a variety of programming and workshops to encourage healthy and real conversations about the experience of grief, with support offered at no cost to anyone above the age of six and regardless of the cause of death.

Anyone interested in sharing their experience can do so through windphone@hospiceniagara.ca.

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