How can one make many activities with the little resources available? It is a question that is easily answered by the librarian, Tatiana Popazu, from the village Hîrtop, Taraclia raion.

Ms. Tatiana managed to transform the library into a useful and needed center for young people and adults, to attract tens of users and engage and turn the mayor into an active library supporter – all of these thanks to her outstanding commitment.

Located in the premises of the school that was closed as a result of the optimization of the pre-university education institutions, the public library from village Hîrtop has a warm and easily adaptable to any initiatives and projects space.

In the two rooms that the library has, one arranged both a computer room, where each village resident can receive free information through the computers that have internet connection, as well as a room for group and individual activities, where children can do their homework or read in silence or can take dancing classes and participate in other group activities.

Also, in the library there are meetings of the Scouts’ Club, whose leader is the librarian herself. The local Scouts’ Club attracts persons of all ages, offering the club members the possibility to enjoy the love for play, adventure, romanticism, as well as develop their physical, intellectual, social and spiritual strength, turning them into responsible and dignified citizens of the country.

During the summer, together with the leaders of other communities, the librarian from Hîrtop actively engaged in running the scouts’ camp.

At this year’s edition of the scouts’ camp, 198 children participated, who, equipped with food stuff, tents and good vibes built their life skills and learned to be active members of the society. According to the agenda, children had classes, drew and carved in wood, made paper applications and learned to knit. At the open air workshops, the participants learned to offer first aid, dance and sing scouting songs.

The participants also contributed to arranging the library space, gave a “hand” to the eldest community scout, as well as painted the walls in the kindergarten. All these activities were started by children and adolescents and were carried out under discreet, but careful guidance of the group leaders.

Ms. Popazu confessed that the number of participants goes up every year and there are more and more parents in the community who contact her and ask her to accept their children into the camp as well.

Since the school in the community was closed, the public library from Hîrtop is the only education and leisure center for the local residents, but in particular for children. In the library, the children can get IT training, can participate in activities that would stimulate their creativity and can participate in various activities by their interest, among which is the scouts’ club.

The mayor of the community noted that when he sees so much involvement and activism on behalf of the librarian, he can’t deny support for the library’s initiatives and every year he tries to earmark a bigger budget for the Hîrtop community, which is one of the three villages under the competence of this mayor’s office.

Thus, the Hîrtop library proves that a library can become modern even with limited resources, the important thing being the activities that it carries out and the services that it offers.