Our Bucerias Library was built and stocked by volunteers and donations, mostly from the "gringo" population of Bucerias. Our dream is providing a library to the Spanish speaking community that offers a supportive base of resources in Spanish and English to the public schools and families, especially the children, of the Bucerias community.

The long-awaited dream of the Asociacion Bahia de Banderas Cultural, formed in 1998, to build and operate a library in Bucerias, has finally become a reality. After many years of organizing, fundraising, acquiring land and construction, the organization opened the library's doors in 2011.

We are thankful for Sue Usry, a newcomer to the Bucerias community, who took on the task of coordinating the opening and operation of our library. Sue, a retired teacher originally from California, lived and worked in Mexico City for more than 20 years. She says she wanted to take a leadership role in the library project because she was starting to feel a bit lonely after almost a year without having children around her.

"I have been committed to the promotion of literacy for 40 years of my life, so when I heard about the library, it was the answer to what I felt was missing in my newly retired life."

Sue coordinates the day-to-day operation of the library, recruits volunteers and develops community outreach programs to bring Mexican children and adults into the facility. She has lots of ideas to encourage children and their families to come to the new library. Among other things, she plans to network with local public schools and begin a "homework helper" program in both English and Spanish.

"It is important to get our collection of more than 1,000 books in both English and Spanish into the hands of the people ... books on shelves are useless."

Our Rey Nayar Library is a great opportunity for volunteerism if you love books and/ or kids. Located at the back of Bucerias, near Colegio Bucerias, we are a fledgling library with a small collection of books, mostly in Spanish, for both children and adults.

Volunteers are needed to staff the library weekdays between 10:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. Donations of books, particularly books in Spanish for children, are needed, as well as craft supplies, table games, child-sized furniture and tech equipment, such as laptops and learning software, both in English and Spanish.