On Wednesday I met with my librarian, No, to start working.
One of my students in grade 12, Thira, also showed up to help. We started by sweeping out the room and dusting off the tables. I looked up at one point
while we were working and saw that No had wandered outside to sweep leaves into his dustpan… So you can see we were a dedicated group from the beginning! Haha... We got more focused over the course of the afternoon, though, and made some progress on the library and the adjoining room where we're currently storing old books.
stacks of old books we moved to the adjoining room to make room for new
they've been sitting on shelves and under tables for years, unused
The library's home to other practical relics, like this blow-up dolphin.
We encountered a lot of critters while we worked. This guy was hanging out on a wall, and not too far from him, hiding out under a chair, we found a black scorpion poised and ready for attack
Termites have eaten through a lot of the books...
And the bookshelves.
Most of the books at the bottom of stacks looked like this.
Thira and I moved these books in two 1 1/2 hour sessions. I'm hoping to get rid of most of these, since they're termite-ridden and/or irrelevant to most students (examples include a 500 + page book of American History with a vocabulary that not even my most advanced twelfth graders would understand, and multiple copies of french textbooks when french hasn't been a part of the curriculum at my school in years), but my school director is hesitant since a lot of them were donated by the MoEYS (Ministry of Education, Youth, and Sports), and he could get in trouble if they (on the off chance) came to visit and saw the books aren't being used. Kind of a frustrating roadblock, considering they're not being used anyway, and are just an eyesore and a waste of space.
That's the news for now! I'll update as things progress.
3 comments:
That looks like a lot of work! You're doing such a great job. I hope things go smoothly throughout the project! Love you.
Hannah
OMG Leah! Be careful--that was a brown recluse! They're particularly nasty spiders. Remember when Mrs. Niblock got bitten a number of years ago, she had a huge hole in her ankle.
So, for those rotting, termite-infested books, can you just keep a few of the best ones so that if the MoEYS shows up you can show them proudly displayed on shelves? Seems they probably would rather see *some* of the books usable and accessible, rather than all of them stacked, rotting, and unusable.
Where are the new books coming from, and what types of books will they be? When do you see the project being completed?
It was great talking to you the other day. Let's do that again soon! Love you!
xoxox
Mama
Re: keeping some of the books but throwing away the rest- I agree, that seems to be a nice compromise, but I'm not sure my school director would go for it. The thing is, the mentality in Cambodia is still predominantly one of quantity rather than quality so he's more concerned with acquiring as many books as possible than maintaining a respectable collection.
The new books will be purchased in Phnom Penh, and will be a variety of genres- story books in Khmer and English, text books, books on topics like hospitality and tourism. The idea is to include the kids in choosing the books so they have ownership over the project and are (hopefully) more likely to actually use the library once it's completed.
As for when the project will be completed: I have no idea. Ha. I'm shooting for September, but it all depends on compatibility of schedules, and especially the weather since the rainy season's about to start.
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