We sat in silence. Children were at the centre of what we were doing, but there was not a child in sight, nor could we hear any. I smiled to myself. It was in direct contrast to what I was experiencing last week, with children practically bouncing off the walls. They were certainly making themselves heard then and most of the adults in the room were busily and excitedly chatting too.
My day began also in direct contrast to recent weeks. I went for a 5km walk. My first real walk of any distance in the past month. Gosh, I’ve missed it. It was wonderful. The view was pretty spectacular too. Plastic still littered every surface and there is much to be done on that front but seeing the sun rise over the ocean allowed me to marvel at natural world once again and be in one of my happy places.
I have arrived in Cordova for a couple of days. I’m helping to re-establish a school library for a Kinder school – OLSHIS (Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Integrated School). The children are still switching between at home and at school learning. These past two days have been at home days, hence not being able to hear them.
I still marvelled. At one point, there were five women in the room and no chatter. They were a bit scared of me and they were shy, that’s what they told me at lunchtime, yesterday. I don’t usually scare people, but I’ve had a habit of doing that over here. I think it is mostly related to people not feeling comfortable speaking in English. My Visayan and Tagalog are terrible (read practically non-existent), so they really have nothing to be worried about. They are miles ahead of me.
I’ve never worked in a library. I’ve got plenty of friends who do or who have and I am ever so grateful for that. I had a crash course via Zoom last Monday with Helen, who helped to set this library up in the first place. Yesterday, I messaged her back and forth with my thousand questions and another teacher librarian friend was on standby in case I couldn’t contact Helen. I had lots of support and encouragement. We managed to reshelve all the existing books, do a stocktake of the current books and accession, cover and shelve around 100 new books. It was a team effort.
Today was quieter still. Just me and a few hundred books to keep me company. It’s all just about done. About thirty books to cover and shelve then, it will be time to let the children loose amongst all the adventures that await between the covers.
So Now From Here 