Interlibrary Loan

I was at the Reference Desk and a lady came and she said she has moved in this area and would like to be a member of the library. I took her to the Circulation Desk and got her a new card. Her next question was- “Now tell me where your Russian book collection is!

For a second, I thought maybe I will loose this patron as we don’t have Russian books in our collection. But my Interlibrary loan (ILL) flag went up and I immediately explained it to her that we don’t have a Russian collection but whatever she needs we can get it for her and I can print a list of Russian titles, she can browse through the list and let me know which one she would like to get.

Yesterday was the day when she got her first ILL books. I can’t explain the happiness and joy on her face; she was holding the books like a baby, thanking me that these books are her life and how grateful she is for the loan.

Her parting remark was “I love this library – when I will get my next set of books?”

I read somewhere that one library can’t be all things to all people, but ILL can be all things to one library.

My Namaste
 
Manju Sharma