Undergraduate Library Services, IUL-Bloomington

Australia for 6 months, Aug. 16, 1998- Feb. 22, 1999, was not only a dream come true, but a supurb cultural education, both personally and professionally. It met my expectations, and then some. Living in another English-speaking country was not entirely new to me; some 28 years ago I worked in London for 6 months and the experience sparked an interest in travel both in and out of the United States. Australia was a place I had wanted to visit for many years, and when the opportunity to work there arose, I was keenly interested. I knew that an exchange would afford an experience far richer than that of a tourist, and was eager to become immersed in the daily routine of my exchange counterpart, Linden- a librarian at the University of Sydney. I was also interested in working at a centralized reference desk in a busy research library, understanding that it would be vastly different from my experience at IUB. After 10 years working in the IUB Main Library, I was ready for a change. Linden and I "conversed " via e-mail for over a year in preparation of our job swap- not only comparing our respective responsibilities at work, but our homes as well, since we exchanged them, too. We both were confident that our skills would transfer to the other culture, and, if not, we woul