La Antigua Guatemala Daily Photo

Wow, that’s what I call a ‘reading area’.

“… Nothing became Something. For many in the community this Something is the realization that their kids, who barely had touched a book, can read something because they like it. The biggest change we see it in the problematic children, those who can hardly stay put. We let them read laying down on a carpet, aloud or in silence, right-reading or backwards, or we give them audio books, and little by little they end up reading all of them…” —Kyle Passarelli (fragment freely translated from the article Biblioteca Caldo de Piedra as it appeared in Spanish in the latest issue of Revista Recrearte)

Whatever Kyle and Cassandra are doing, it is working and working just fine. I leave you with other shots taken at the Caldo de Piedra Library Project. I hope that you guys find a way to support this commendable initiative; even some kinds word will do.

Kids reading to kids; now we are onto something!

While reviewing the wishlist for the Caldo de Piedra Library Project, I occurred to me who little things can make a difference. Some items in the list include wooden signs, cd player, dvds, pigeon hole cupboard… an so on. Check it for yourself. I know I will be donating a set children’s books in Spanish and others little things in the list.

I am a firm believer of library projects and non-institutionalized education since I, myself, was one of those kids. Like the motto for the Probigua’s bibliobús reads, “if you read, you succed“. With the quote below, I finished last year’s overview of the Mobile Library Project of Probigua.

…I am living proof that education, reading and libraries are a solid ladder through which one can climb to success, whatever one decides that is. If I was not an Art Director/Graphic Designer, I would be a librarian.

Boy, do I have a soft spot for libraries! Often I highlight library projects like the Bibliobús of Probigua, which I nicknamed the Mobile Library Chicken Bus. Back in the first week of December 2007, we did a little tour through Compañía de Jesús Library as well. I am sure it does not come as a surprise that we cover yet another library around La Antigua Guatemala.

The Caldo de Piedra Library Project in San Antonio Aguas Calientes is the work of Kyle and Cassandra Passarelli who moved just 10 months to San Antonio Aguas Calientes, a must-visit little town just outside La Antigua Guatemala. As explained by Kyle and Cassandra, they were inspired to open a library for children because they were used to a mobile library bus (chicken library bus, pues) which came their way on the Isle of Arran often and provided books, movies and newspapers on loan. After they moved back to Guatemala they realized that some services they were accustomed to or that were taken for granted, were not available anymore; like the library. After moving to San Antonio Aguas Calientes, they asked themselves if they could open a children’s library since there were none in the village. Inspired, again, by the reading of the Caldo de Piedra book, they approach a group in the community to see there were interest in having a children’s library and sure enough the community responded and a very short time they had a small room half a block away from the parque central of San Antonio and books donated by the community and their friends.

The Caldo de Piedra Library Project has a web site where you can learn all about the project, read their recent accomplishments and to send your book donations. For those who can read Spanish, there is a great little article about the Biblioteca Caldo de Piedra in the most recent issue of Recrearte Magazine.