We all met in the lobby and made our way to McDonald’s for breakfast..yep you read that right. We made this choice since it was close to the library, affordable and halal. We were able to have a meeting in the McD’s before we started the tour and gave everyone a chance to ask any questions.
When we got to National Library of Singapore (NLS) we were met by Lian Geok and Shankari and given an overview of their structure and the steps they have taken to achieve their current level of success. It was nice to see TPL’s statistics along with NLS’s. The Sigli team were quick to point out ‘Toronto’ when the word turned up on the Power Point screens.
We were then given a tour of the many of the floors of the NLS. The focus was on the many galleries and Asian collections. The staff were quick to point out items that were familiar and ideas that they could apply to Sigli. The highlight of the tour was to see the circulating collections on the basement floor. The place was abuzz with people and it was colourful and welcoming. Special attention was given to the Children’s section where the furnishings and contests received a lot of attention from the Sigli staff. They were able to see the different ideas that Katherine and I have been talking about.
Roy took us to lunch at an Indonesian restaurant….we were slow to leave and got caught in a torrential downpour. The ever gallant Roy borrowed my umbrella and dashed across the street to the NLS and got us all umbrellas. We then walked through the Raffles hotel complex and then on through the shopping complex maze and made our way to the community library called the Library@Esplanade that was located in the Esplanade performing arts centre. The Esplanade is akin to Hummingbird Centre and is a focal point for the arts….Broken Social Scene are performing there in March.
The arts library focused on four villages: music, dance, theatre and visual arts. We were shown the collection, including an incredible array of scores. There was an amazing view of the harbour, as there was from the pod of the National Library. These downtown libraries take full advantage of the highlights of downtown Singapore.
We then went to the Merlion for the classic tourist shots. BY then there was a lot of walking and we were a bit concerned about the footwear…but the Sigli staff charged on. We had the sense that the SIgli folks were not used to this kind of all-day walking. So we generously gave them one hour rest at the hotel before taking them off to Little India that night.
Roy accompanied us on the MRT (two transfers) and they got their subway experience, complete with getting their own tickets from the automated machine. We ended up taking a city bus too. All new experiences. We shopped at Mustafa Centre, luggage seemed to be the main items purchased…they didn’t seem to enjoy the Indian food…too hot. Aceh food is really not that spicy…Simon was OK with it because it was similar to the Padang food from his region. We then piled into taxis to get back to the Pan Pacific for the night.
Saturday, January 12, 2008
Wednesday – travel day
We headed out to the airport to make the to trip to Singapore. We were all on the first flight together and then for the flight from Jakarta to Singapore we were on separate flights. Due to the late departure of the flight from Jogja, Katherine and I had to make a mad dash to get to the next flight. We made it with about 5 minutes to spare…time enough for Dawna to buy Dave a magnet, but not for Katherine to get a coffee.
When we got to Singapore we were happy to see Roy Won at the airport. Katherine and I had met Roy in Toronto in November when he came to tour TPL for a couple of weeks. We discovered that our flight flew into one terminal and the Indonesian team was on a flight coming into a different terminal. It was actually the first day that this new terminal, T3 was open. We took a couple of trams to get there and meet them.
When we got there the Indonesians were nowhere to be found. The luggage carousel for their flight had stopped and there was no one left to come off the plane. We paged for Simon, the FCM staff person who was traveling with the Indonesia team. We waited and waited. Katherine and Roy went back to our original terminal, thinking that perhaps we had missed them and they were trying to find us. Four hours passed!
Eventually another fight from Jakarta came through and the team was on it. We had used Roy’s cell phone to call Simon and we were able to get through to Simon once they had landed. Our relief was palpable and it was so good to see them after the long wait. Lesson learned – we should all travel together and we should have cell phones to keep in touch when plans go astray. We were so thankful to have Roy with us, logically working through the steps until we were all reunited.
We taxied to the Pan Pacific hotel. It was a tremendously grand hotel and we were all in awe. The elevators were liked jewelled globes going up the interior and exterior of the building. We checked in and had to explain the rigorous no smoking laws and the fact that one would be charged for even touching a bottle in the mini-bar. (There was an electronic sensor in the mini-bar…you had to call room service to get it deactivated and emptied in order to use the fridge to keep your own stuff cooled.)
Roy took us all out for a walk and orientation around Singapore. We were able to walk from the hotel through a maze of shops and covered walkways to the MRT (subway system). He gave us an overview of how to use the MRT and also walked us to the National Library where our first scheduled meeting was set for Thursday. We walked back to a food court where we had our dinner and then found a money changer.
By the end of the day we were all exhausted but keen to get ready for the days of touring in front of us. Katherine and I stopped by Club Sev (7-11, where you can buy beer at a price much cheaper than any bar or restaurant) and had a relaxing drink in one of our rooms before we called it a day.
When we got to Singapore we were happy to see Roy Won at the airport. Katherine and I had met Roy in Toronto in November when he came to tour TPL for a couple of weeks. We discovered that our flight flew into one terminal and the Indonesian team was on a flight coming into a different terminal. It was actually the first day that this new terminal, T3 was open. We took a couple of trams to get there and meet them.
When we got there the Indonesians were nowhere to be found. The luggage carousel for their flight had stopped and there was no one left to come off the plane. We paged for Simon, the FCM staff person who was traveling with the Indonesia team. We waited and waited. Katherine and Roy went back to our original terminal, thinking that perhaps we had missed them and they were trying to find us. Four hours passed!
Eventually another fight from Jakarta came through and the team was on it. We had used Roy’s cell phone to call Simon and we were able to get through to Simon once they had landed. Our relief was palpable and it was so good to see them after the long wait. Lesson learned – we should all travel together and we should have cell phones to keep in touch when plans go astray. We were so thankful to have Roy with us, logically working through the steps until we were all reunited.
We taxied to the Pan Pacific hotel. It was a tremendously grand hotel and we were all in awe. The elevators were liked jewelled globes going up the interior and exterior of the building. We checked in and had to explain the rigorous no smoking laws and the fact that one would be charged for even touching a bottle in the mini-bar. (There was an electronic sensor in the mini-bar…you had to call room service to get it deactivated and emptied in order to use the fridge to keep your own stuff cooled.)
Roy took us all out for a walk and orientation around Singapore. We were able to walk from the hotel through a maze of shops and covered walkways to the MRT (subway system). He gave us an overview of how to use the MRT and also walked us to the National Library where our first scheduled meeting was set for Thursday. We walked back to a food court where we had our dinner and then found a money changer.
By the end of the day we were all exhausted but keen to get ready for the days of touring in front of us. Katherine and I stopped by Club Sev (7-11, where you can buy beer at a price much cheaper than any bar or restaurant) and had a relaxing drink in one of our rooms before we called it a day.
Day 2 in Jogja
We were taken to a community centre that the Sleman library staff had strong connections with. This centre had a variety of supports for the community, including a small library funded by the Coca Cola Foundation. It was interesting to tour the various rooms and spaces and see how the community made use of the space. There was a music room, that was really quite something, with traditional instruments, big gongs. They said that quite a few men came in to use that space. They had a bakery and a room with sewing machines, along with the library.
The next stop was to visit a bookmobile stop. There were a lot of children making use of the bookmobile and it was a good opportunity for the Sigli staff to see how another library handles bookmobile stops. They even had a computer on the bookmobile.
We got some great photo ops with Dawna doing ‘Round and Round the Garden’ with the local children. The kids got a big bang out of it and it demonstrated immediately the benefit of this for early literacy because the kids tried to mimic the rhyme. Later in the van Yurni showed us a similar Indonesian rhyme. So it seems universal that there is a benefit to link tickling with early literacy
We ended the day with a temple tour, this time it was a Hindu temple. Earthquakes had caused substantial damage to the area and we were not able to walk too closely among the ruins. Because of the damage we weren’t able to enter the temple or closely tour it like we could Borubudar. Truth be told, we were really beat by the end of the day…we may not have been able to truly appreciate this spot because we were all so tired.
The next stop was to visit a bookmobile stop. There were a lot of children making use of the bookmobile and it was a good opportunity for the Sigli staff to see how another library handles bookmobile stops. They even had a computer on the bookmobile.
We got some great photo ops with Dawna doing ‘Round and Round the Garden’ with the local children. The kids got a big bang out of it and it demonstrated immediately the benefit of this for early literacy because the kids tried to mimic the rhyme. Later in the van Yurni showed us a similar Indonesian rhyme. So it seems universal that there is a benefit to link tickling with early literacy
We ended the day with a temple tour, this time it was a Hindu temple. Earthquakes had caused substantial damage to the area and we were not able to walk too closely among the ruins. Because of the damage we weren’t able to enter the temple or closely tour it like we could Borubudar. Truth be told, we were really beat by the end of the day…we may not have been able to truly appreciate this spot because we were all so tired.
First 24 Hours in Jogjakarta
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.Getting the blog going again
We haven't had internet access beyond what we can scavenge at the airport terminals....so today we worked at trying to capture all of the excitement, ups and downs but MAINLY huge ups....that we have been expereiencing over the past week or so.
I will make up several posts, breaking the trip down into various parts.
I hope you enjoy it along with us.
Dawna.
I will make up several posts, breaking the trip down into various parts.
I hope you enjoy it along with us.
Dawna.
Friday, January 11, 2008
more about Singapore
I'm throwing in this picture of Borobrudur - outside of Jogyakarta, hope I have the spelling right. We didn't get much in the way of pics posted this time so am doing after the fact but can't always put them in the right spot.
We didn't really note the slogans and sayings this time in Singapore. Went to the National Library, a regional and community library and the Library Supply Center. This shopping obsession here really hits everyone. It seemed every arrangement revolved around when and where the shopping would be.
Hit the Night Zoo last night and had a very brief visit with my friends in Singapore.
The Indonesian group weathered the culture shock quite well really - and we were in a very fancy hotel and the libraries were so beyond anything they imagine to be possible.
We'll get to Banda today and hope to see our friend Sosi who was our translator last time.
Singapore **WOW**
It was intense..the library was fabulous, amazing...so much for our group to take in. We did have a bit of 'herding cats' sensibility working with a group that couldn't speak English.
We only have a few minutes as we are about to board the plane and will post again once we have more time.
We can't say enough about our guide from the National Library of Singapore, 'No Worries' Roy who troubleshooted and got us through various wrinkles and semi-stressful moments. All's well and we're just getting ready to hit Medan.
More later,
D&K.
We only have a few minutes as we are about to board the plane and will post again once we have more time.
We can't say enough about our guide from the National Library of Singapore, 'No Worries' Roy who troubleshooted and got us through various wrinkles and semi-stressful moments. All's well and we're just getting ready to hit Medan.
More later,
D&K.
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