More than two decades have passed but Cebu City public librarian Rosario “Ruth” Chua remembers it like it was only yesterday.Back in the early 80s, she tells , she would brace herself as the clock strikes 5 p.m for the loud thud of footsteps of schoolchildren ascending the staircase leading to the library’s doors. Like bees to a honeycomb, grade school pupils of six to 10 immediately head towards the fiction section where books like Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew are displayed, its crisp pages an open invitation to kids to worlds of adventure and fun. “Magpalumbaanay dayon na sila kinsa ang pinakadaghan og gihuwaman ug pinakadali og nahuman (They will then compete as to who borrowed the most books and who finished them first),” a seemingly wistful Chua said. Fast forward to 2008 and Chua said she has long forgotten the sound of footsteps, let alone the sounds of happy schoolchildren leafing through the latest adventure books. And for this dismal predicament, Chua could only blame the emergence of a new medium called the Internet in early 2000. Since she started as a librarian 27 years ago, Chua noted an alarmingly steady drop of 50 percent of children aged five to 12 visiting the Cebu City library located at Osmeña Blvd., (formerly Rizal Library). “They (schoolchildren) equated the Internet as a medium of entertainment and information. Books to them are dull,” she lamented. Developing the habit The drop in attendance at the city public library is smaller but no less discouraging for persons aged 15 to 30, Chua added. Still Chua holds no resentment for the World Wide Web and other similar media which ensnared the (now) short attention span of the once avid reading public. “It has something to do with our culture, I guess. We are not raised to think that reading can be a source of entertainment, too. Books, as we know it, are just used when you study hard in school,” she said. Chua shares her ruminations on this subject as the country marks National Children’s Book Day, an annual celebration which seeks to restore both the culture of reading and a lost love for books on young children. Chua said they join the celebration by re-launching the public library’s storytelling sessions with day care students and parents as the main audience. The sessions are expected to take shape on the last Wednesday of this month and will run for the rest of the year. “What we want do is to encourage reading because it creates better citizens. It’s wonderful to start with young children because we can easily develop the habit (of reading in them).” Library friends Chua reiterated the benefits of reading, saying it enables people to pass board and bar examinations, enriches vocabulary and keeps people updated of daily happenings. Chua said they set up an organization called Friends of the Cebu City Public Library (FCCPL) last year as part of a joint initiative to strengthen the culture of reading in Cebu City. The group also builds links between the library and the public, Chua said. At present, FCCPL already has 17 members across media, business, the academe and other sectors of society. “The FCCPL also facilitates the connection between the library and more people. It aims to increase the awareness of the public on the presence of the library.” Chua said those interested to participate in the FCCPL can visit the public library any time and ask for an official form. Students pay an annual P100 membership fee while young professionals or regular members pay P200 as annual membership fee. Prompt returnees With these initiatives, Chua said, she envisions Cebu as taking a lead role in promoting reading as a learning tool and educating more people the way Europeans and Americans do. Chua shared that foreigners are the “prompt returnees” of borrowed books and return the books in very good condition. “Unlike fellow Filipinos who have many alibis or reasons why they lose books, foreigners are the exact opposite. That is why we allow them to borrow books even though library rules provide that we should only allow books to be borrowed by permanent residents and not transients.” Chua, however, admitted that the public library staff members themselves share part of the blame for the apparent lack of awareness. “As librarians, we should not limit ourselves to the confines of the library. We used to have a book mobile but stopped because of lack of resources,” she told in an interview. Falling in place Chua also said the library lacks connections to organizations which have substantial resources that can help them expand the number and quality of books in the library. Asked what books the city public library needs, Chua said there is a dearth of local history books. “People often look for those books here but most of these resources are found at the Central Visayas Studies Center of University of San Carlos (USC),” she said. The Cebu city public librarian urged persons or groups with local history resources to contribute them to the library because “not all people can visit a private library like the USC.” The Cebu City public library at present is not charging any fee to those using its resources, making the task of maintaining and updating books more difficult. “But if we charge fees, all the more that young people will not come here. We even have senior citizens who stop going here because they don’t have money to pay the daily jeepney fares,” Chua said. Despite these challenges, Chua is optimistic that things will fall in place this year. She said plans are underway to improve services and public attendance in the library. “Library staff will undergo theater workshop so we can hold storytelling sessions for children even without the volunteers,” Chua said. | 
