Just another dent in the damage…

‘We British LOVE to queue’. I went to the post office the other day and there were three of us waiting to reach the counter – so we decided to form a queue. We talked about the weather but we must NEVER talk about the kids. In Iran a crowd fights to reach the bus first but as the doors opened the crowd backed down – ‘oh no no after you’, ‘no please my friend after you’.

It doesn’t sound so funny now does it? But believe me when Omid Djalili told it I was in stitches! I went to see him at the City Hall in Sheffield at the weekend and my God this guy is so funny. I was nearly crying when he started with the Taa’rof stuff because you can totally see it happening. That’s what’s so funny. I’ve never really been a big fan of stand-up comedy because mostly I see it as an excuse for disgusting old men to exercise vulgar toilet humour – the stuff that’s not funny unless you’re a ten year boy (or a disgusting old man). But Omid – now that guy’s funny. He’s like Peter Kay in that he knows his audience and knows that it’s far far funnier to tell a true to life story than some lame ass knock knock joke. The Dad-run, the weddings, the supermarket shopping and the garlic bread. Legendary!

And for your viewing pleasure:

10. Book Dumping:

I hate it hate it HATE it when a library user decides they no longer want to borrow the book and dumps it in the wrong place. Please please please if you don’t want it just hand it to a member of staff or place it on the hundreds of spare trolleys that are lying around for this very purpose. It saves so much time and energy this way, believe me!

9. Getting too Comfortable in the Soft-Seating Areas:

A university library is a place of work and study – not really somewhere you turn up to in your pajamas to chill out on the ‘comfy’sofas. Well this is exactly what I saw during the busy exam period last week. Yes a moronic student curled up with a cup of hot chocolate in her pajamas in the ’soft seating areas’. What an idiot.

8. Lost Books:

Here I’m referring more to carelessness that genuine ‘lost books’ I understand that from time to time things go missing at home – maybe a book gets left behind at a friends or the parent’s house, or it got packed in the wrong box whilst moving or it was left by mistake in the library and someone else moved it. But come on! If a book is issued to your account then it is your responsibility to make sure that that book gets returned! That’s not a hard task is it? Why are some people so careless with other people’s property?

7. Filthy Students:

I work in one of these ‘new libraries’ with cafe facilities and designated ’snack areas’. I don’t work in one of these libraries that allows users to eat and drink a full course meal at their desk and I hate it that students think it’s OK to leave their mess anywhere they feel like it. I’m so surprised at how disgusting students can be actually. I don’t mind drinks being taken into the computer areas but I definitely draw a line at bacon sandwiches!!

6. Books from other Sites:

As a student it’s difficult to see why a book borrowed from one library site can’t be returned to another library site within the same university compound. It makes perfect sense right? WRONG. In returning a book from another site it greatly increases the delay in getting that book back to its rightful home, it stresses out the library staff when something ‘goes missing in transit’ and it ain’t half nightmarishly difficult to lug about very heavy boxes!

5. Technical Failures:

Whilst book sorters are a wonderful invention on the days that they decide they want to work they are absolute nightmares when they’ve decided they’ve done enough work for one day. In all honesty I just don’t think ours is big enough for the sheer volume of books that pass through everyday. Oh and we don’t have enough staff to regularly empty it so again I’m not surprised that it often jams.

4. University Staff:

Seen as it’s my blog I feel it’s quite OK to make sweeping generalisations – so, GENERALLY why do members of university staff seem to think that they are exempt from library policies and procedures? Well know this you infuriating members of university staff – you DO have to renew your books from time to time and should you fail to do this I WILL charge you the fines accumulated on your account and NO I do NOT waive fines just because you have ‘been busy teaching’. PAH.

3. Uncollected Reservations:

We get hundreds and hundreds of these every day! Why? Because annoying students a) decide they can’t be bothered to come in and get them, b) forget they made the reservation, c) fail to check their emails or d) don’t need them anymore because the deadline has passed. Not only does this waste time but it delays the process of getting books back on the shelves and issued to borrowers that are desperate for them. Damn you.

2. Poor Reshelving:

A fundamental rule of running a good library is having a good system of reshelving. My library is massive and it is impossible to keep on top of the shelving due to the lack of interest library assistants/support staff have in getting shelving done. It wouldn’t hurt to do an hour a day surely but apparently it does. I hate the whole attitude of ‘it’s not in my job description’, ‘I’m far too senior to involve myself in such menial tasks’ – ER wrong! If you work in a library IT IS in your job description.

1. Vandals:

The lack of respect library users show for library books! Look at these pictures I took this morning – Why do it? Would you do this to your own books? They are completely unreadable and the most annoying thing is I can’t prove who did it. But be warned Mr Webb! I AM watching.

(click to enlarge and excuse the creepily long fingers I have here).

I’ve been following Deconstructing Hairy for a while now since it was recommended by a good friend of mine. According to the author’s profile it is written by ‘an Iranian finally living in Iran’ and follows her adventures ‘on being and becoming an Iranian woman’. Recently there has been one particular post that really intrigued me… The Swimming Pool. Here she describes her experiences of a visit to the local pool where attempting to swim a lap round the pool turned out to be just as dangerous as crossing Vali Asr Ave in a hurry.

The ladies were walking, or bouncing, back and forth, the width of the pool which was about 4-5 meters. I figured I could manage to dodge them each time, but that proved impossible as their speed was never consistent and sometimes they would even stop somewhere in the center. So I’€™d swim to a point and turn around before reaching them. But then strange things kept happening. Some of the women started swimming the length of the pool also, they’€™d take a couple laps, always right where I was swimming, stop in random places, continue the bobbing in the shallow end. Other women continued some sorting of bobbing in the deep end, I’m not sure how. I was constantly changing my route. At one point I could have sworn a concerted effort against my lap swimming (I guess it’s not so common here).

In having ‘women only’ areas women in Iran seem to have a better time of it than some of those in the UK who have faced ridicule for exercising their right to, well, exercise! Here, Obsolete (hap tip: Deconstructing Hairy) discusses a story published in the Sun about a Muslim women in Oxford causing outrage by swimming in a public pool wearing ‘full hijab robes’. But it seems the Sun never quite get their facts right as she was in fact wearing a rather trendy Burkini.

I had to laugh out loud at the description of swimming in a pool in Iran. I had exactly the same experience.

My first experience with women’s only swimming in Iran was in Arak where many of the women wore sheer body stockings instead of swimsuits! The horror!