Kuala Lampur, Sept. 21 -- As a schoolboy, there was one shirt I desperately wanted to wear.

It was not particularly fashionable. In fact, it was simply a blue school uniform shirt.

But in my secondary school, that blue shirt belonged to the librarians. They stood out from the rest of us, and to me they represented something rather special. I hoped that one day I would be chosen to wear it too.

I never was. At the time, it felt like a small disappointment. Looking back now, however, I realise that not wearing the blue shirt mattered very little.

The librarians I admired all those years ago gave me something far more enduring than a different coloured uniform: They quietly taught me to keep looking.

Even as a young student, I was happi...