LIS 181 Journal Entry #3: Day One: The First 8 Hours

Ma'am Iyra told us during our first meeting in LIS 181 that UP students doing OJT has garnered a bad reputation of being late. I want to change that so I woke up 5:15 AM. My OJT starts at 8 AM. It was a Monday and I am not sure what the traffic situation is. I really don't want to be late, especially on the first day! I left at 5:45 AM and arrived at Ateneo by 6:45 AM. Hahaha! I came so early. While waiting for the library to open, I brought my Pol Sci 14 textbook and studied the required readings. It was 7:30 AM. I went to the director's office. In there, I met Ma'am Flor, the library director's secretary. She first guided me to the reference service area of the library. I was very nervous at that time. I'm not sure I could do reference work because I'm shy. Fortunately, she then sent me to the Ateneo Library of Women's Writing (ALIWW).

Based on the Rizal Library's website:

The Ateneo Library of Women's Writings (ALIWW) is an archival facility, constituting a special collection, within the Rizal Library of the Ateneo de Manila University. The principal mission of ALIWW is the collection of writings by and about Filipino women in all areas, for the purpose of promoting their circulation among contemporary readers, as well as preserving these for posterity.

I am glad I am able to work in an archival facility because I am really interested in Archives and Record Management. I someday wish to become an archivist. In the ALIWW, I met Ms. Montejo. She is the head librarian there and my supervisor. I was then oriented. I also met Reg. She is a staff in ALIWW. She is the one who guided me on my first day as OJT. She graduated LIS in UST and recently just passed the board exam this year. She is kind and pretty. So what task did they assign me to do at ALIWW? I was instructed to sort the personal collection of JD Constantino or Sister Teresa of Jesus. She is a columnist turned nun who donated her collection, which consists of correspondences, journals, notebooks, newspaper clippings  greeting cards and others, to ALIWW. Reg told me she was to arrange them but I should sort them first so she could do her job faster. My job was somewhat simple however, the huge amount of items in the collection made it a challenge. A funny thing that happened while doing my job was that I was able to find 600 pesos in one of the greeting cards in the collection. I really didn't know what to do with it so I just surrendered it to Reg. I didn't know what then they did with the money I found. Another job I did aside from sorting  was to return some of the archival materials used from an exhibit to their respective storage. An important lesson I learned on my first day of OJT was that it really, really, really is more fun to be a student than to work. I did enjoy my OJT though. 142 hours left!

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So here is the love story part:
We were able to meet that day. It was during my first break in the morning. We had snack together at the canteen and talked a bit. The break should have been just 15 minutes but I returned after 30 minutes. I wasn't scolded though. Hahaha. Unfortunately, she was busy and not available during my lunch break and afternoon break. Nabitin ako sa kwentuhan namin. I'm not worried though, there are still plenty of opportunities to talk.