if there's something i consider one of my vices in this imperfect existence, it has been and always be books.
i don't know what it is in bookstores that it is sooo unusual [read: close to never] that i walk away without a book in tow. usually, ones in the bargain bins. hahaha. cheapskate me!
i have always had a serious, torrid, love hate, orgasmic affair with paper- and hard-bound that i can withstand being inside the bookshop for hours on end without looking at my watch, without thinking about the persons i have to meet up later or even if there is still a bus on my way home [when i was still in manila]. for the latter, good thing here in KL, Borders is just like 10 minutes away. another good reason to browse [and eventually, buy...if i have the money :)]
i never even consider it a splurge if i have in my arms, around 5 to 8 books for my read. i always reason that it does not go to waste at all. it is an investment, hahaha...my mom goes bonkers whenever i do that, saying i am building a library. which i think i am. at one point, way back grade school days, i even have borrower's card for my stacks. having the borrower sign up.
i do go as far as scrimping on transport/movies/concerts/dvds etc if needed be. i tend to think of scrimping on my other vice, FOOD, but nah! realistically, do you think i can forego food? hahaha...maybe not dine out, that far, but not altogether go hungry for books. i know a lot of peeps scrimping on food for fashion, but not me. i cannot live on bread alone. neither with water only. ghad!
in reference to my subject line, i just bought books yesterday night at Tropicana Mall's Borders. my original intention was to browse through the travel guides as i have plans this june to go Phuket with CVG peeps. instead, i had 3 books bought! one was a solve-the-mystery books from the creator of Encyclopedia Brown. know what, these books sustained me in Notre Dame a lot. it was like Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys with questions in the end as to who did it. and the good thing was, you solve it. think, i got my being OC for details there. i always go back and forth flipping the prosaic leaves for clues and whatnots until i agree with the author. hahaha.
in the interest of maximizing the breadth of my intellectual journey, i bought a MATH book. hahaha...i was never that good in math. except for algebra which i found so delectable. especially the one using matrices, proving, reduction to simplest terms...what i bought was not a textbook type. that's sooo not me. it was like a guidebook across math, in its basest form and its applications. very interesting. i came across all the terms that i have forgotten already. and i think it's fun to learn it once more since i will not have a quiz after nor a graded recitation. it will purely be for fun now.
the last one i have bought is a book by Nobel Laureate, Gabriel Garcia-Marquez. one of my sooo favorite an author. i have read his One Hundred Years of Solitude way back freshman high, and was i in love. the tapestry of magic realism held its spell on me until i discovered isabel allende too. haay. how time flew really. now it's Love in the Time of Cholera. i have just started straddling the first 2 pages and i put it down already. hahaha. not of disinterest of course. more on, i wanted to spend time with the book in the most convenient time. not pressed for errands etc. it's what i call lovemaking with prose. you set the mood, tuck yourself comfortably and start the read. that way, all nuances and trembles are captured, nourished, frolicked, savored, and lulled into one's being.
i guess teddy locsin jr said it sooo truthfully. when you hold a book and you don't end up finishing it, you are just not ready for it at that time. attempt once more after a period of months, even years if need be, then you will know why it didn't happen the first time.
i can go on and on exploiting this desire for the bound pages of letters and sentences and paragraphs but it is a disservice to the readers. for a book is not merely for sharing, from another speaker. it should be your personal experience with it. that is the wonder of book reading. to each his own. each of us will have our own truths with it. our own realizations. our own dawnings of consciousness.
it was never the intention of most good writers to provide life's solutions in between those pages, but it is to bring to another world, maybe not our own but desirably, a better one from what we may be thinking we are on. better in the sense that, our life after all deserves its own edition, its own publication worth writing, worth knowing.
P.S.
i would have wanted to start all my paragraphs with letter i. didn't succeed with the paragraph for Garcia-Marquez. to do such is to reduce his significance to caprice. which i won't.
i don't know what it is in bookstores that it is sooo unusual [read: close to never] that i walk away without a book in tow. usually, ones in the bargain bins. hahaha. cheapskate me!
i have always had a serious, torrid, love hate, orgasmic affair with paper- and hard-bound that i can withstand being inside the bookshop for hours on end without looking at my watch, without thinking about the persons i have to meet up later or even if there is still a bus on my way home [when i was still in manila]. for the latter, good thing here in KL, Borders is just like 10 minutes away. another good reason to browse [and eventually, buy...if i have the money :)]
i never even consider it a splurge if i have in my arms, around 5 to 8 books for my read. i always reason that it does not go to waste at all. it is an investment, hahaha...my mom goes bonkers whenever i do that, saying i am building a library. which i think i am. at one point, way back grade school days, i even have borrower's card for my stacks. having the borrower sign up.
i do go as far as scrimping on transport/movies/concerts/dvds etc if needed be. i tend to think of scrimping on my other vice, FOOD, but nah! realistically, do you think i can forego food? hahaha...maybe not dine out, that far, but not altogether go hungry for books. i know a lot of peeps scrimping on food for fashion, but not me. i cannot live on bread alone. neither with water only. ghad!
in reference to my subject line, i just bought books yesterday night at Tropicana Mall's Borders. my original intention was to browse through the travel guides as i have plans this june to go Phuket with CVG peeps. instead, i had 3 books bought! one was a solve-the-mystery books from the creator of Encyclopedia Brown. know what, these books sustained me in Notre Dame a lot. it was like Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys with questions in the end as to who did it. and the good thing was, you solve it. think, i got my being OC for details there. i always go back and forth flipping the prosaic leaves for clues and whatnots until i agree with the author. hahaha.
in the interest of maximizing the breadth of my intellectual journey, i bought a MATH book. hahaha...i was never that good in math. except for algebra which i found so delectable. especially the one using matrices, proving, reduction to simplest terms...what i bought was not a textbook type. that's sooo not me. it was like a guidebook across math, in its basest form and its applications. very interesting. i came across all the terms that i have forgotten already. and i think it's fun to learn it once more since i will not have a quiz after nor a graded recitation. it will purely be for fun now.
the last one i have bought is a book by Nobel Laureate, Gabriel Garcia-Marquez. one of my sooo favorite an author. i have read his One Hundred Years of Solitude way back freshman high, and was i in love. the tapestry of magic realism held its spell on me until i discovered isabel allende too. haay. how time flew really. now it's Love in the Time of Cholera. i have just started straddling the first 2 pages and i put it down already. hahaha. not of disinterest of course. more on, i wanted to spend time with the book in the most convenient time. not pressed for errands etc. it's what i call lovemaking with prose. you set the mood, tuck yourself comfortably and start the read. that way, all nuances and trembles are captured, nourished, frolicked, savored, and lulled into one's being.
i guess teddy locsin jr said it sooo truthfully. when you hold a book and you don't end up finishing it, you are just not ready for it at that time. attempt once more after a period of months, even years if need be, then you will know why it didn't happen the first time.
i can go on and on exploiting this desire for the bound pages of letters and sentences and paragraphs but it is a disservice to the readers. for a book is not merely for sharing, from another speaker. it should be your personal experience with it. that is the wonder of book reading. to each his own. each of us will have our own truths with it. our own realizations. our own dawnings of consciousness.
it was never the intention of most good writers to provide life's solutions in between those pages, but it is to bring to another world, maybe not our own but desirably, a better one from what we may be thinking we are on. better in the sense that, our life after all deserves its own edition, its own publication worth writing, worth knowing.
P.S.
i would have wanted to start all my paragraphs with letter i. didn't succeed with the paragraph for Garcia-Marquez. to do such is to reduce his significance to caprice. which i won't.
2 comments:
sooo true! since i'm bored right now, i'll go buy a book or books! lol! First stop: BOOK SALE! don't you miss this shop??? hahaha
Arggh... made me wish that I bought that book in Cebu when I had the chance.
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