Right before I moved to South Africa,
the school that I now volunteer in was given 1,000 books to start a
library. When I arrived, I took on the task of being the school
librarian, and began to know the students who regularly came to the
library to check out books. 1,000 books are not a lot if you think
about it. About 250 of those books are English Readers (the books
that we got in grade school with at level English stories). Another
500 of the books are primary school books (Where the Wild Things Are,
If You Give a Moose a Muffin), and the remaining 250 books are middle
school chapter books and adult chapter books (it ranges from The
Magic Tree House books to How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents).
It quickly became apparent that many of
my regular library visitors had read and reread many of the stories,
and that the library desperately needed expanding. Luckily for me,
two other Peace Corps Volunteers announced that they were going to
start working on a grant so that schools and drop in centers around
South Africa could receive new books to start/expand libraries. Of
course I said I would help out with raising money, and that my school
desperately needed new books.
I was lucky because I was not exactly
part of the grant, but I did help fundraise, and help with organizing
the books arrival in Polokwane. When we finished fundraising, and the
grant went through with Peace Corps, the money was sent to Books for
Africa. Books for Africa, collect, sort and ship books from America
to the different countries in Africa who have a high demand for books
for libraries, or textbooks for schools. When you apply for BFA, you
have to raise $10,300 to send a 40-foot sea container of books. This
may sound like a lot of money, but the amount of books in one
container can range from 20,000-28,000 which would average each book
to cost less then 50 cents. The best part is that BFA doesn't just
send whatever is in the warehouse, instead each person requests what
their school, drop in center, or community needs. This insures that a
primary school isn't stuck with 50 boxes of health textbooks.
When the money is sent to BFA, the
books get transported by boat from Atlanta, Georgia to a port (in
South Africa this port was Durban). From Durban, the books are put
onto a truck and are driven from Durban to the place where the books
will be sorted again and then distributed to the different
organizations (this was 12 different organizations that Peace Corps
works with around Limpopo, Mmpumalanga, and KZN) around South Africa.
Luckily for me the books were to be
sorted and distributed at my place. We rented another chalet and a
group of PCVs came to help with unloading of the books. The books
were to arrive on Tuesday, but Tuesday came and left and the books
didn't arrive.
Finally on Wednesday morning the truck arrived, and we
began unloading the boxes on boxes of books. It was an absolute work
out! Each pallet had a section of books, the English Literary books
were the lightest and the heaviest were the maths textbooks.
Due to bad luck, the weekend following
the unloading of the books was Comrades, and Bush Fire. Pretty much
all of SA29 was at one of these two events, and we wouldn't be able
to start sorting until after everyone returned.
Once we returned, the sorting began.
This was one of the best parts. I loved opening the boxes and finding
the treasures inside. The English Literary books were fantastic. We
all found favourites in each of the piles. I looked out for Dora the
Explorer books and Magic Tree House books, since these were two
series that my students loved. Sorting took about two days, and it
was hard to make sure that everyone got the books they had requested.
On the Monday and Tuesday following
this week the PCVs who had ordered the books had someone from their
organization drive up to Polokwane to collect their books in trucks.
Of course this did not go as planned. Some people came in small cars,
and others didn't make any plans at all. Each organization got about
2,000 books each, which fit into 50 boxes. There was no way to
transport these books without a truck.
But finally all the books were gone,
and were safely delivered to their final destination. When I brought
my books to school, one of the students exclaimed “Mam! Are all
these books for us?” “Yes, they're all for Sebotsi Combined
School.” Which he responded by saying, “Mam, you are working so
hard, you are doing such a good job, thank you!”
