Pikemminkin ystäväryhmä kuin työtovereiden ryhmä | Like a group of friends rather than a group of colleagues

Nesrin between library shelves

(Please, scroll down to read in English.)

Olen Nesrin Aydın Yürükçü. Kandidaatintutkintoni olen suorittanut toisen asteen matematiikan opetuksesta ja maisterintutkintoni on julkishallinnosta, politiikasta ja yhteiskuntatieteistä. Tällä hetkellä olen jatko-opiskelija Hacettepen yliopiston koulutushallinnon osastolla.

Työskentelin matematiikan opettajana yläkouluissa neljätoista vuotta Turkin opetusministeriössä.

Työskentelin Turkin eri kaupungeissa sekä valtion keskuskouluissa että paikallisissa kyläkouluissa. Lisäksi olen kiinnostunut sukupuoleen liittyvästä tutkimuksesta. Olen ollut mukana sukupuoleen ja naisiin kohdistuvaan väkivaltaan liittyvissä hankkeissa. Olen ollut mukana myös solidaarisuustyöpajoissa ja osallistunut näihin liittyville kursseille.

Olen iloinen voidessani jakaa kokemuksiani harjoittelijana Itä-Suomen yliopiston Joensuun kampuskirjastossa. Ensinnäkin haluan huomauttaa, että kirjaston henkilökunta oli erittäin ystävällistä, se vaikutti enemmän kaveriporukalta kuin työtovereiden ryhmältä.

He motivoivat minua aina parantamaan suomen kielen käyttöä, heidän kannustuksensa ansiosta tunnen oloni itsevarmemmaksi puhuessani suomea.

Nautin myös jokaisesta tehtävästä, joka minulle annettiin, puhtaasti siksi, että se selitettiin minulle erittäin hyvin, ja minua rohkaistiin esittämään kysymyksiä kaikesta, mitä en ehkä ymmärtänyt, mikä teki tästä kahdesta viikosta niin nautinnollisen.

Tuntuu mahtavalta olla osa tiimiä ja mahdollisuudesta harjoitella kirjastossa.

Lopuksi haluan kiittää kaikkia Joensuun kampuskirjaston työntekijöitä vieraanvaraisuudesta, huomaavaisuudesta, ystävällisyydestä ja avuliaisuudesta.

Nesrin with fellow workers

I’m Nesrin. I have completed my bachelor’s degree in teaching mathematics and my master’s degree is in public administration, politics, and social sciences. I am currently a graduate student in the Department of Educational Administration at the University of Hacettepe.

I worked as a math teacher at the secondary schools for fourteen years at the Ministry of Education in Turkey.

I worked in different cities in Turkey both governmental central city schools and local village schools. Additionally, I’m interested in gender studies and joined lots of activities and participated related lessons and courses about Gender, Violence Against Women, and Women’s Solidarity Workshops and Symposiums.

I’m delighted to share my experiences as an intern at the Joensuu Campus Library of the University of Eastern Finland. First of all, I should point out that the staff at the library were extremely friendly, it seemed like a group of friends rather than a group of colleagues.

They always motivated me to improve my Finnish, thanks to their encouragement, I feel more confident when speaking Finnish.

Also, I enjoyed every task I was given, purely because it was very well explained to me and I was encouraged to ask questions about anything I may not have understood, which is what made these two weeks so enjoyable.

It feels great to be part of the team and having the opportunities to practice at the library.

Lastly, I would like to thank everyone at the Joensuu Campus Library for being so welcoming, considerate, kind, and helpful.

 

Nesrin Aydın Yürükçü, kirjastoharjoittelija | library trainee

Time to say goodbye!

Four months have passed by, and it’s time for me to say goodbye to my trainee period in the library.

When I first entered through the doors of the library as a normal student who comes to the premises to complete their essays, assignments, or study for their exams, I never thought about how much time I would spend in the Carelia building of Joensuu, where our library is located.

This place has meant lots to me, not only when it comes to studying, but also to socialize, relax, feel comfortable and spend my days. The library is a very important meeting point in Joensuu, where friends find knowledge, not only in the books, but also in other people.

This place feels like home. The books, the computers, and the people – everyone is together here for a reason. This feeling has been proven to me in these past four months. Magic happens from the service desk onwards, but what about what’s behind? In my first blog I wrote about how curious I was regarding the machinery behind the shelves. The human machinery.

Non-stop working behind the staff doors: acquisition, review, cataloguing, shelving, information retrieval courses, and concern for the users. Nothing ever stops, and even though you, as users, don’t know the people working here, they know you and want to know you even more.

ihminen istuu tuolissa kirjahyllyn luona

This is why we designed a survey about the library services. We want to improve; they want to improve: From premises to services and problems with the noise. What is going on in the library is one of the main concerns of the people that make all this possible.

Regarding concerns, I also got the opportunity of selecting books for the Multilingual Month, creating a collection related to linguistic minorities, language endangerment and bilingualism, because the cultural and linguistic identity are very important aspects of our society, and I am very thankful, as a linguistics student, for being able to make such a selection. Discrimination also affects languages, and the equality of all of them should always be sought.

By this last post, I want to say thank you to all the people who work in the library and from whom I have learnt and enjoyed so much. The library always felt home, but now even more. I can confirm this after working for four months with all of them, with all of you.

Thank you for making this possible. For being library. For making history. For telling the story.

Gonzalo Maestro, Library trainee

Moi kirjastosta! Greetings from an international trainee

My name is Gonzalo, and I am a second year international Master’s student in the field of Linguistic Data Sciences in Joensuu. I arrived in Finland back in 2020 when the Covid-19 pandemic was threatening the world with restrictions. I started my master’s and my life in Finland close to a computer screen and quarantines, but I am now almost done with my programme and looking forward to graduating by this summer and find out what life has prepared for me.

Mies, hymy, kirjahylly. Man, smile, bookshelf.

Now I am honoured to be a trainee at the library of my university. But, how did I end up here?

Reading was a big part of my childhood. My grandparents had an enormous book collection at home. My grandmother was a professor and my grandfather a scholar specialised in Latin, Spanish, Italian and French literatures, so books surrounded me physically and mentally all over my childhood. Maybe this passion for Romanic literature was unconsciously the reason that made me study Spanish Language and Literature and Linguistic Data nowadays. Words. History and stories.

For me being in a library means calmness, but also responsibility. A library is like a museum. Everything is important. Every single book is there for a reason. A story to tell – and being told. Since I am a student, I spend most of my time here, at the library of UEF reading books related to my studies or some books that I read for pleasure. Even though my background is Romanic Languages and Literatures, I have passion for Russian literature. Names like Pushkin, Gogol and Dostoyevsky are authors that I always go to find.

Is this book childhood and library-like memories at my grandparents’ that made my passion for libraries big? One of the main reasons that made me apply for this position was finally getting to know what really is like to be on the back of the history. Why are these books here, in this language, on this shelf.

The human machinery behind this magic is amazing. I have only been here for three weeks, but they have already taught me how the services work, how to shelve books and how to acquire new books, for example. It is humans behind all of this, and we would not be able to enjoy a place like this without them.

I will be evaluating the library services from a customer’s perspective and coming up with ideas and possible aspects that could make the library a better place for the customer. I will also be – and I am – working and evaluation the Sci-Fi collection and the Romanic Languages collection, new editions, loan statistics and acquisition of new books.

I have also organized library tours to help the new international students to register and learn how to use our facilities and how to enjoy all of our books and services.

A library is the place where culture and knowledge remain. Every aisle, every book and every page smell like history. Story.

Hope you enjoy our library as much as I do.

Gonzalo Maestro Paredes, trainee