Syl: The Reading Habit

Not sure about now but certain books were staple reading diet for teen girls waaay back....as Syl recounts below:



Most people believe that if you read a lot, you’ll write well.
So we were encouraged to read and to read all sorts of books. At a time when the internet was non-existent, trips to the National Library and a few main libraries like the Toa Payoh Library were necessary to get our literary fix!

SAC girls, of course, had access to our school library and we were frequent visitors. The library was manned by girls (pun intended) from the Library Club. Now, schools are quite big on student-led activities, well this was one student-led activity that brought some results.

Many girls visited the Library but I don’t think the readership rates of the school’s collection were high.

That was because the librarian on duty was an avid fan of the Mills and Boon series and she had a monthly subscription that would avail her to six titles every thirty days. Current titles were reserved for her own reading pleasure but she would loan out titles that she had already read. We visited the library and out from under the counter, she’d show us what was on offer. She’d then take our names and tell us when we had to return the books to her.
Forbidden fruit being sweeter, M&B were flying off the 'shelves'!
Did the teacher ever wonder why we always had 'azure seas and sailboats' in our compositions? Needless to say most of us aced our English exams. :)