PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad

AS chief of the political section at the American Embassy here for the last two years, Avraham Rabby has had the job of surveying Trinidad’s political landscape for Washington.

The fact that he has not actually seen the Caribbean island — or any of the places on five continents where he has been posted — has not stymied him.

“I necessarily listen more than a sighted person would,” he said. “If I’m walking along a street, I can tell there is a building next to me because of the echoes of my feet or my cane. A blind person sees the world differently from a sighted person. Our impressions are no less valid.”

Mr. Rabby, who lost his sight at the age of 8 because of detached retinas, is the State Department’s first blind diplomat. It is an achievement he fought for in the 1980s, passing three written entrance exams and two oral exercises along the way. But even then, the State Department barred him from the diplomatic corps.