Chronicles of a village librarian - the start

 

Librarians have the power to transform not only individual lives, but entire communities.- David Lankes

Every story has a beginning. It had never occured to me that i was going to be a librarian. No! infact my childhood profile of dreams had moved from being a doctor, a teacher to adventurer to a captain in the army, which, looking back at it now had a component in service to humanity. I would never have been a librarian if it was not for the fact tha i had a hard time reading and i met Nancy Drew.

There is that one book that changes your life. That book that takes your life on a different course. By then i was almost in grade six (standard six) in a school run by missionaries and without the ability to spell the word run. The embarrasment. But a little detective girl in the pages of a book and my mother's determination changed all that.

Fast forward to about 11years ago. I was frustrated from working in a job that really did not require me to use my brain at all- serving tea . However i was surrounded by books. Books of all kinds. But they were mainly boring because i am not an academician and i love the thrill of a great story. I could only find very few books in the way of entertainment. So i decided to start my own. Mine took up a whole wall which in those days was a big investment in a bedroom on its own which meant the kids had to share. Yes i had two by the time i started to run a community library and my oldest was already an avid reader. I had all sorts of books..bought and collected. When i say collected, the shape some of those books were in, needed divine intervention. But did i care....no. The fact that it was a book and it was mine was enough. My library - home library was my peace. My place to be. Then one day of days , we had a break in. The kind the thug is a child . It got me thinking , since he had un-intentionally targeted my LIBRARY , what if we could make a library for the community kids to come to? What difference would it make if the had easy access to knowledge and information?

And it is on that day i think the ultimate decision inside my heart was made. And my journey began. No its not easy to invite kids to come to your house and you have no exit (meaning backdoor and you are located in a "plot"). They were mainly made up of ghetto kids. The rough kind. the ones you are worried that perhaps there will be robbery with no violence. The truth is, i was scared of them and of dreaming because i did not know where this would take me. I was scared for the first few days until i discovered they had some of the most beautiful hearts there can be in a human being . The kids were wonderful and mostly they appeared which is usually not easy because this is a library in a home and parents are jittery about this things. This first kids were the foundation stones. The ones we look back on and know we have and had something good going on here. The ones you meet on the road in town and they stop you and ask, .."do you remember me?" i used to come to your library in Pembe Tatu. My heart will at this time smile all on its own and i will think to myself ..." God this is wonderful!'. Then they will continue by saying,..." do you know i still read?" and i will respond with an almost hug of greatfulness...." and i still run the library@INSPIRE"

But i know YOU there have a question that you probably want to know about before we go on with stories of all kinds...., how did we get so many books?.. Well...... as I had mentioned earlier, I started by having a collection all my own about 300 books (which is impressive). You would probably have called my library weird because most of the  books were falling apart and had maybe chapters missing , but they served the purpose and they filled one entire shelf . Then me and my friend Flo, sat down and decided there must be good people out there willing to donate books to a good cause. Call it a brilliant idea because that is what it was.So i sat down and googled all known book organizations in the world. and sent emails . Thousands of them with alot of rejections. The kind that tell you " we are sorry we cant at this time. Gosh that is almost a slap in the face because you ask yourself hard questions but mostly do this guys know what i am all about or are they judging me by lack of a cover

Then AFK happened. I would have missed it entirely you know. I found this organization as a footnote in someone elses website. Right there at the bottom in the corner . Sitting , waiting. I clicked to their site and it interested me. Right down to the email of the president . With my heart in one hand and not caring if i got to them or not , i wrote a "desparate plea" . Would you please give me some books. I think i wanted to cry. I wanted to give up. I guess i must have thought ...community business is for those that know how to write in good english. I dont , i can only write like myself. And so i did. I dont know how to explain that feeling when someone replies and its not a no. It had been many months later, many mornings of looking at my email to see if there would be any reply from anybody and many many days of asking myself if i was indeed doing the right thing. Then ....an email, and not just an email. An email that said..."we are impressed and will give you 7 cartons" ah! You should have seen the joy on my face. The excitement with which i found florence and told her the good news. The way i run home to tell my family that we were going to get books. Books from America. How in the world does a girl get so lucky. I slept and dreamnt new books

We received those 7 cartons with alot of jubilation. We stared at the books, we smelled them, we opened them. No one wanted to be passed by. The other kids came in. We oohed and ahhed. Arranged
them and rearranged them. I have never in all my life seen books read so fast and repeatd again and again. By this time the number of children that were attending our  "library " was rising to above 20.With few books , me working and only the weekends available , this was indeed an adventure. A full time one 

I was still struggling with the question of ... can i quit my job and do this full time?Where would i even begin? At this time many years ago, i did not know what i was getting myself into. Was i ready? No. Was i a "qualified librarian" ..No but i had the passion to do what i do. I had no clue as to what i was doing except kids enjoyed reading and reading can and has continuously made a difference. And i enjoyed having them come to my place.

The librarian@Inspire

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