This Woman Was Turned Down By Countless People To Charge Her Bionic Arm At SXSW Because They Thought It Was A Prop

She took the opportunity to spread awareness about her situation.

Jenny

• Published in News
• March 18, 2018

Many people would feel lost without our smartphones. We use them to organize our life, communicate with family and friends, entertain ourselves, keep up with current events, and for some people- even to work and earn our income. With that being said, we try our hardest to make sure our phones are up and running and never close to running out of power. However, when it does inevitably happen sometimes, we scramble and panic trying to find a way to charge our devices. It's utter madness. And this just might make you lose your faith in humanity.

This panic and anxiety carry over to other electronic devices that people need to live a comfortable life. For actress and bionic limb advocate, Angel Guffria, this came true. Her bionic arm ran out of power while she was at a South By Southwest conference in Austin, Texas.

For everyone who doesn't know- this is what a bionic prosthetic arm looks like. This one is controlled by a smart phone, but not all of them are.

Despite the necessity of charging her bionic arm, no one at the conference that she asked would give up the chargers they were used to her. 

"I wasn't sure how many outlets were there, so I asked if there was room for me to charge my arm and they said no, and directed me to the back of the room. They could've thought my arm was a prop."

She quickly took to Twitter and explain that people mistakenly were thinking it was some sort of prop and not an actual bionic arm because it was covered in lights. Eventually, Angle found a place to charge her bionic arm. While she has no anger or resentment toward anyone who wouldn't give up their charging station, she wants to bring awareness to the public about what bionic and prosthetic limbs are and how they work.

The tweet in which Angel light-heartedly called the situation "#cyborgproblems" and said "charge me up!"

To make the story even a little more frustrating, Angel had forgotten her charger at home and had to have it delivered to her!

After the incident, Angel's only goal, being an advocate- was to bring awareness to prosthetic asnd bionics. The tweet got almost 10,000 likes and people were very supportive. They used jokes to connect with her.

And hilarious puns.

And many were interesting in the science and asked questions (meaning her goal of spreading awareness had been reached!).

Angel is hilarious and loves to joke around about her bionic arm. A lot of people on Twitter found her after she posted this gif.

More importantly though- she's is out there making a difference. She's spreading awareness about her condition (congenital amputee) and encourages people to ask questions.

Check her out also on Instagram here.

Jenny