Vocational school student Rian Maulana and his fellow classmates busily browsed the books in the literature and fiction sections at the library of Tegal Parang subdistrict office in Mampang Prapatan, South Jakarta, on Wednesday afternoon.

'€œWe were supposed to study a fieldwork-training class, but the teacher did not show up. So, we are allowed to go outside while waiting for our lunch break,'€ he told The Jakarta Post.

Rian, who enjoys reading history, said he often visited the library outside school hours. The close proximity of the library to his home meant the place was one of his favorite sanctuaries.

Rian said he considered the library to be a fun place, because of the variety of books.

'€œI don'€™t have many books at my house, while the school library is rather boring,'€ he said.

The reference books in the library, however, are mostly out of date, so they are not much use for school work. Rian said he depended on the Internet to find updated information for his homework.

The Tegal Parang library shelves are home to around 15,000 books of various genres like science, art, history, fiction and literature and for a wide range of ages.

Visitors can find classic works such as Protes (Protest) by playwright Putu Wijaya and Layar Terkembang (Set Sail) by Sutan Takdir Alisjahbana. Religious books and popular comics like One Piece, Slam Dunk and Dragon Ball are also available in the library.

'€œAll the books have been donated by the Jakarta Public Library and local residents,'€ a librarian at the subdistrict, RJ Rustiana, said.

Rustiana said that because all the books were donated, the condition of them was sometimes poor.

'€œSome comic books for example, do not have complete chapters,'€ she said. She added that despite the library only being able to offer old editions, many residents, especially students, were still enthusiastic about visiting it.

'€œWe have on average 14 visitors a day and to date, we have 300 members,'€ she said, adding that a resident only needed to pay Rp 5,000 (4 US cents) per year for membership.

Although not all subdistrict libraries have adequate book collections and facilities, many still manage to become favorite destinations for local children and adults to hang out.

A small reading corner in the Kwitang subdistrict office in Central Jakarta, for example, is only equipped with three book shelves containing various books and a carpet to sit on.

However, many children enjoy the reading corner. Radit, an eight-year-old second grader at Kenari 3 Pagi Public Elementary School, for example, said he loved visiting the small reading corner.

'€œI love hanging out here on the way back from school,'€ he said while opening a fairy-tale book.

For some children in the neighborhood, colorful children'€™s books and books of fairy tales are a still a luxury. Radit said there were no story books in his house.

'€œI only have text books from school,'€ he said.

He said he also liked to play with other smaller children who could not read, but who loved to play with the books.

'€œWe pretend that this is a school and they learn to read here,'€ he said.

Unfortunately, not all subdistricts have a library or a reading corner.

Central Jakarta'€™s Duri Pulo subdistrict head Nur Komariyah said she had too much work to catch up on as a new subdistrict head and had no plan to provide space for a library in her office.

'€œI think we do not have enough space for a library,'€ she said.

Nur said that since having a library was an obligation for every subdistrict office, she would try to find an alternative like providing a mobile library that could travel from one neighborhood unit to another.

'€œA mobile library would be a good idea as a substitute for a library room,'€ she said.

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