Library staff are in the process of sorting out a gift from generous Chinese benefactors.
Next Thursday the Prince George Public Library will formally thank delegates from the Chinese Consulate General in Vancouver for the donation of more than 200 books for the local collection.
Chief librarian Allan Wilson called the gift, which arrived last month, "wonderful."
"We're hoping with our heritage tours this year to talk about the Chinese history in the area to take a more regional approach to a lot of things that we do," he said.
The relationship between the Chinese community and Prince George is strong and growing, said library communications co-ordinator Andrea Palmer. "It has strong ties as a northern hub for other areas they have inherent ties to, like Barkerville," she said. "They knew we were looking to beef up our collection, but we certainly weren't expecting such a grand gift."
The new additions span from history to contemporary photography.
Adding to the library's multilingual collection isn't easy, said Wilson. A revolving provincial collection is no longer in operation.
"So we do our best, but we really rely on donations or gifts, such as the [the one] from the Chinese community," Wilson said.
New donations notwithstanding, the Prince George library's language collection has 550 books in Chinese, Dutch, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, Punjabi and Spanish.
The junior multilingual collection is mainly French, with 225 out of its approximately 1,550 books in the aforementioned languages as well as Arabic, Bengali, Croatian, Farsi, Greek, Gujarati, Hindi, Korean, Romanian, Swahili, Tagalog, Turkish, Urdu and Vietnamese.
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Resourceful renos
The new reading materials aren't the only changes at the library. The Keith Gordon room is undergoing renovations.
"We're modernizing the room," said Wilson. The improvements include removing the aquarium and its enclosure. "Because it was an aquarium you used to get water vapour and stuff in there."
Friends of the Library are furnishing the room with a new aquarium and the board of directors has released $13,500 for the project, which also includes new carpet, paint and glass doors.
The room can hold 85 people and is used for a variety of events including children's programming and conferences. Wilson said he's a big believer in glass to open up the library spaces.
"This is a big building. It's heavy and filled with concrete," he said. "You're going to see a much more open room with an aquarium."
