A Place That Understands Me

Since I moved to the busier part of Melbourne, I have found the perfect place for me to just sit down with my laptop and not care about anything else. Plus, the chance of meeting someone I know is very small which is heaven for me. Public libraries. They're great.

I have never been a person to get out of my room very often, especially when I still live in Indonesia. I have all the things I need in my bedroom; my laptop, a bed, snacks, water, guitar, and most importantly, internet connection. I only need to leave when I go to school or when my family decided to eat out. I have quite a few friends then and we hung out sometimes, but being an introvert that I am, I immediately went back home after we're done. I feel kind of bad now, though because I don't get to spend as much time as I would like and relish it with them anymore. I mean, we live in different part of the southern hemisphere now. They still live in Indonesia, though not all of them in the same area, and here I am all the way down in Melbourne. I wish I appreciate them more when I was able to be with them at all times. Now that I can only see them once or twice, at most every year, I miss them a lot. Anyway, we're getting a little off track there. We're here to talk about public libraries. Nostalgia will have it's own post in the future, so look out for that!

I don't have any photos of my uni library, so here's a blurry sunset photo :)

When I still live near my uni, I don't have internet in my room. I mean, I could've just have it installed, but I would have to spend extra money on it while I live so close to uni where I can access it for free. For that reason, going to the uni library often is a given for me. Well, I mostly go to the silent study rooms because the library could get very full, especially when the semester is going. It gets even fuller when it's exam period and it's gets really noisy at times. For those reasons, I don't really go to the uni library except when I have to use the printer or borrow a textbook. Also, I can't bring food if I want to go up the top floor, the quietest one, so that's out. You know I like my snacks.

I didn't take the pic. Source can be seen at the bottom of the post.

Another library that I sometimes go to, if I'm hanging in the CBD and have nowhere to go, is the State Library. It's pretty huge and very beautiful inside. There are so many books shelved from floor to ceiling. I actually have never checked out any books there. I have this weird intimidated feeling toward the humongous collection for some reason. It just seems so, I don't know, classy? It kind of scares me for a weird reason, like the books there are only for people worthy of reading it. I know that reason is super irrational but that's how I feel, so I usually just hang out there to browse the internet.

This time around, since I moved out of my old place, I found a small cute public library not too far away from where I currently live. It's set up like a bookstore, the vibe that I'm comfortable with. The shelves are just about my height and organised in an interesting manner. I would say it's an organised chaos but it's not really that chaotic. It's just not put up parallel to each other like most libraries, if you catch my drift? I don't know, man. Describing things isn't one of my strong suit. But it's really cute and cozy, so I would like to go there more that it's so close. Also, there are loads of cute puppies passing across every ten minutes, so that's a plus.

Isn't that the cutest?

Since I'm on my summer break now, I plan on using this library space to continue studying Korean. Mine is kinda rusty as it has been quite a while since I open my notes. I think it would be great if I get to at least be conversational in speaking it. I also live with Koreans so I can practice it when they're around. I have always been interested in studying languages and I'm kind of drawn towards East Asian languages since most of them don't use the Latin alphabet. I also watch a lot of anime and variety shows, so I think they suit my interests. I took Japanese when I was in high school but it didn't last very long. As soon as I got out of high school, I can't remember any of the grammar rules. I still know some random words and I can usually pick it up when I'm watching anime, but I completely forgot how to make a proper sentence. I can still read hiragana and katakana, though, so I guess that's not too bad.

I think that is all I have for you right now. I'm kinda rambly today, aren't I? Sorry about that. I have been quite out of it this past week and I'm still trying to get over it. There's just so many things happening right now and it's kind of overwhelming. Hopefully I'll get it all sorted soon and I'll be back to you guys with some exciting stuff. I have some posts already planned out (can you believe that?) and I'm super pumped to share it with you.

I'll see you guys next time!
Riz

State Library pic: "State Library at Night" by The original uploader was Decryption512 at English Wikipedia - Transferred from en.wikipedia to Commons by Bidgee using CommonsHelper.. Licensed under CC BY-SA 2.5 via Commons.