We didn’t know what to expect with the exposure tour in Jogja….we just knew that we were going to visit the library that won the ‘top’ library award in Indonesia.
The day began by us being a half hour late….traveling in a group of 8 means you don’t get anywhere in a hurry. We were met by about 12 staff from the Sleman library. (Slemen is the district that the library is in, just like Pidie is the district the Sigli library is in.) It was really quite a formal morning; there was a head table for the Vice Bupati and Mr.Mukhtar, along with the head of the Sleman library.
There were microphones and it took place in a community hall, that wasn’t part of the library. There were a lot of formal speeches, all in Indonesian, with no translations. They seemed very long and there didn’t seem to be any jokes. We had to follow along and nod whenever we heard our names mentioned.
Both libraries gave power point presentations. Sleman library had a video describing their services. It was pretty cool (Katherine just told me this was sounding pretty dry so I added the word cool) because the videos helped with the language barrier for us. It was great to see Mukhtar’s presentation….the bar graph showed that between October and December the number of visitors to the library shot up. December was ten times higher than October. The difference seemed to be that in December they increased their open hours, by two hours…so they are now open some days until 4:00. The best part was that the Sigli staff was thrilled about this growth, almost as much as we were. It was really exciting news.
It turned out to be so good to visit Jogja because the size of community that they are responsible for is almost the same as Pidie. It demonstrated that a lot of the ideas that we are proposing are almost the same as what Sleman is doing and for which they are winning awards. We then drove about 500 yards to actually visit the library because it was in the middle of a torrential down pour. We toured their ‘technical services’ room where they process and load the book information on to their catalogue. They are semi automated but for reasons we couldn’t get answers for….they are still hand charging items at the desk. You’ll laugh, but they drill all of their books with holes along the spine and then sew them together for extra protection. And, very much like Sigli, they have never withdrawn a book from their collection.
The library had several rooms. Two notable spaces were the Children’s room and the Computer Centre. You take your shoes off to go in the Children’s room. There were a few shelving units for children’s books, but they didn’t have enough money for shelves. There was a computer station in the children’s room and while you couldn’t borrow any movies or music, they did have them for kids to enjoy while they were at the library. They had several programmes for kids, including storytelling.
The computer centre was also pretty cool, well it was sorta cool. They had a photocopy machine, for which they were charging. They were also charging for the use of the internet. It looked like an internet café with cubicles. There was a point of interest, the room had a metal grill that was pulled over the door at night, along with a CCTV for branch video surveillance. The room had somewhere between four and six work stations. The room was about 8 x 10..maybe a little bigger but not that big at all.
The most significant thing about the Sleman group, was that all of the staff were involved. A number of staff gave presentations. There was a real pride in their work. The whole structure of the system was community based library service.
We all went out for lunch to this really snazzy place with separated eating huts and a little waterway ran through it with koi.
There were rice paddies in the background and still there was the proverbial motorcycle noise and trucks roaring by. Nevertheless it was a delightful place and it was very amenable. We were all seated on the floor around tables. The food was a bit scary at first…pretty much all whole fishes (with their heads on) but there were familiar dishes too, like calamari. There was no cutlery and Katherine had to remember to use her right hand to eat (she is left handed). She ended up sitting on her left hand. We took the plunge and just started tearing into the fish with our hands and were surprised at how good it was.
What was really special was that after the meal there was a group discussion with all the staff, and everyone was free to make comments and asked questions. The best part was that the Pidie staff and the Sleman staff really connected. Very little translation happened, which was fine…it was all about them talking to one another, learning and networking.
There was gift exchange…which actually happened pretty early on. Interestingly, the Pidie people brought a plaque with the insignia of the District. The Canadians gave maple cookies! And it should be noted that the Protocol office of the City of Toronto supplied pens, calculators and pins with the Toronto logo.
In the afternoon we were able to do some touristy stuff. We drove to Borubudur, which is the largest Buddhist temple in the world. The building of it began in the 8th century. Dawna bought a book about it if anyone wants to know more. It was tremendously beautiful. The day was overcast which made hiking up the many stairs and around the different levels enjoyable. There were thousands of images carved in relief in the brick rocks that made up the temple. It was clearly a spiritual place and the relief work was stunning.
We just left the cerebral peaceful walk among the Krishna carvings.
Katherine commented on how serene it all was…then as we stepped out of the gates we were overwhelmed with hawkers. The kind of hawkers you had to be rude to, just to be able to step forward. They were insistent on us making a purchase. We ended up buying masks and puppets and even two huge patchwork bags. We had to run to the car and the hawkers even pushed their hands and wares into the car through the window. It was too much! The funniest story from the hawkers was about the patchwork bags…I really liked the look of them, they reminded me of my family of quilters. The price began at 150,000 rupiahs…we said no. They kept following us and they brought the price down to 50 rp….Katherine told me not to weaken, that I didn’t need a big patchwork bag. Finally the bag man shouted through the car window…30 rp! Katherine said, “We’ll take two!” Now we have these big honking patchwork bags. Katherine has loaded hers with stuff already. And for the curious…they ended costing us $3 each.
The day began by us being a half hour late….traveling in a group of 8 means you don’t get anywhere in a hurry. We were met by about 12 staff from the Sleman library. (Slemen is the district that the library is in, just like Pidie is the district the Sigli library is in.) It was really quite a formal morning; there was a head table for the Vice Bupati and Mr.Mukhtar, along with the head of the Sleman library.
There were microphones and it took place in a community hall, that wasn’t part of the library. There were a lot of formal speeches, all in Indonesian, with no translations. They seemed very long and there didn’t seem to be any jokes. We had to follow along and nod whenever we heard our names mentioned.Both libraries gave power point presentations. Sleman library had a video describing their services. It was pretty cool (Katherine just told me this was sounding pretty dry so I added the word cool) because the videos helped with the language barrier for us. It was great to see Mukhtar’s presentation….the bar graph showed that between October and December the number of visitors to the library shot up. December was ten times higher than October. The difference seemed to be that in December they increased their open hours, by two hours…so they are now open some days until 4:00. The best part was that the Sigli staff was thrilled about this growth, almost as much as we were. It was really exciting news.
It turned out to be so good to visit Jogja because the size of community that they are responsible for is almost the same as Pidie. It demonstrated that a lot of the ideas that we are proposing are almost the same as what Sleman is doing and for which they are winning awards. We then drove about 500 yards to actually visit the library because it was in the middle of a torrential down pour. We toured their ‘technical services’ room where they process and load the book information on to their catalogue. They are semi automated but for reasons we couldn’t get answers for….they are still hand charging items at the desk. You’ll laugh, but they drill all of their books with holes along the spine and then sew them together for extra protection. And, very much like Sigli, they have never withdrawn a book from their collection.
The library had several rooms. Two notable spaces were the Children’s room and the Computer Centre. You take your shoes off to go in the Children’s room. There were a few shelving units for children’s books, but they didn’t have enough money for shelves. There was a computer station in the children’s room and while you couldn’t borrow any movies or music, they did have them for kids to enjoy while they were at the library. They had several programmes for kids, including storytelling.
The computer centre was also pretty cool, well it was sorta cool. They had a photocopy machine, for which they were charging. They were also charging for the use of the internet. It looked like an internet café with cubicles. There was a point of interest, the room had a metal grill that was pulled over the door at night, along with a CCTV for branch video surveillance. The room had somewhere between four and six work stations. The room was about 8 x 10..maybe a little bigger but not that big at all.
The most significant thing about the Sleman group, was that all of the staff were involved. A number of staff gave presentations. There was a real pride in their work. The whole structure of the system was community based library service.
We all went out for lunch to this really snazzy place with separated eating huts and a little waterway ran through it with koi.
There were rice paddies in the background and still there was the proverbial motorcycle noise and trucks roaring by. Nevertheless it was a delightful place and it was very amenable. We were all seated on the floor around tables. The food was a bit scary at first…pretty much all whole fishes (with their heads on) but there were familiar dishes too, like calamari. There was no cutlery and Katherine had to remember to use her right hand to eat (she is left handed). She ended up sitting on her left hand. We took the plunge and just started tearing into the fish with our hands and were surprised at how good it was.What was really special was that after the meal there was a group discussion with all the staff, and everyone was free to make comments and asked questions. The best part was that the Pidie staff and the Sleman staff really connected. Very little translation happened, which was fine…it was all about them talking to one another, learning and networking.
There was gift exchange…which actually happened pretty early on. Interestingly, the Pidie people brought a plaque with the insignia of the District. The Canadians gave maple cookies! And it should be noted that the Protocol office of the City of Toronto supplied pens, calculators and pins with the Toronto logo.
In the afternoon we were able to do some touristy stuff. We drove to Borubudur, which is the largest Buddhist temple in the world. The building of it began in the 8th century. Dawna bought a book about it if anyone wants to know more. It was tremendously beautiful. The day was overcast which made hiking up the many stairs and around the different levels enjoyable. There were thousands of images carved in relief in the brick rocks that made up the temple. It was clearly a spiritual place and the relief work was stunning.
We just left the cerebral peaceful walk among the Krishna carvings.
Katherine commented on how serene it all was…then as we stepped out of the gates we were overwhelmed with hawkers. The kind of hawkers you had to be rude to, just to be able to step forward. They were insistent on us making a purchase. We ended up buying masks and puppets and even two huge patchwork bags. We had to run to the car and the hawkers even pushed their hands and wares into the car through the window. It was too much! The funniest story from the hawkers was about the patchwork bags…I really liked the look of them, they reminded me of my family of quilters. The price began at 150,000 rupiahs…we said no. They kept following us and they brought the price down to 50 rp….Katherine told me not to weaken, that I didn’t need a big patchwork bag. Finally the bag man shouted through the car window…30 rp! Katherine said, “We’ll take two!” Now we have these big honking patchwork bags. Katherine has loaded hers with stuff already. And for the curious…they ended costing us $3 each.
3 comments:
How many cool reps in the Canadian contingent?
Mary,
There are 2 cool Canadian reps..namely Katherine and I!
There are other FCM projects going on in Banda Aceh, Sigli and Aceh Jaya...we meet up sometimes. For the exposure tours it was just KP and I, as we are the ones looking after the library project.
Hope all is well with you and Nic.
D.
Hi Dawna and Kat
I'm interested in the temples - I'll look at that book when you're back!
Thanks for the long post.
You can put knitting projects in your patchwork bag, Dawna.
Kathy S
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