DAY 3: A World of Shelves

I have mentioned in my previous entry how overwhelmed I was to see an entire corner of the large hall occupied by nothing but shelves. I have also spoke of how disheartening it is to see how much work we still have to do before we finish the work. I should not have spoke too soon because this day, I have lived in a world of shelves. 

JUNE 19, 2017 - MONDAY

Coming from the weekend, I was energized to take on any challenges this week'll throw on my way. For this day's agenda, it is the continuation of adding card catalogs to the shelflist. We got back to the routine we have became familiar of last week. Adding more to the difficulty of our work, we discovered that our groupmate Tricia along with our supervisor Ma'am Annie, would not be attending at the Cataloging Section for three days starting today until Wednesday because of the KOHACON happening at the Ayala Museum. It was just me, Edward and the rest of the catalogers for three days. 

We meet again, card catalogs.

Similar to last week, we counted how many titles there are and how many card there are for every title. As I was doing this, I was conversing with Edward about different things, to keep ourselves entertained while we were doing work. Once we were able to finish recording the statistics of a bundle, we would head to the shelves, take a good look at the cards and locate its corresponding shelf in accordance with the LCC, once the shelf has been located, we would also consider the Cutter number of the card catalog. If done correctly, we would be able to find a manually-written duplicate of the same catalog we are about to place. I can say that also a part of the challenge is taking off the metal rod and inserting it back in, making sure that the papers are in place. 

The Containers of Knowledge

We were able to finish the entire box that we were given before lunchtime! It was a good feeling because at the beginning of the shift, I never thought we would be able to finish the entire box of catalogs. We had lunch again, at the same time and at the same place, with almost the entire LIS181 class. It was good to hear them talk about their experiences and mostly their struggles in their own sections. 

We made sure to return before 1PM. It was then that we discovered that there would be another box of card catalogs to sort out, record and add to the shelflist. My heart sank and I felt exhaustion as I though that it would be over and that we would be doing something else but I knew that even in this way, we are helping the operations of the library. We resumed with our routine for the rest of the afternoon. 

The Hard-Working Intern? 

As I was going through the shelves, I can't help but think if some librarians do this for the entire day. I certainly cannot. To be able to a task like this with accuracy and precision requires the patience and discipline which I lack. Librarians are usually down-played as someone who just sits down on the desk with the sole purpose of quieting readers. If they only had an idea of what other responsibilities librarians do then maybe they wouldn't be so quick to judge. 

Edward and I weren't able to finish the second box as it was definitely bigger than the first one. We promised to finish the task the next day even if it would only be the two of us doing the task. This has been a day of nothing but shelves. It might be overwhelming but we should be familiar with it as this time would surely not be the last. 

Let's just pray I don't dream of shelves chasing me down the hill in my sleep.

- Sam, That New Librarian