The Sunday Haul

The Sunday Haul- Two Books and a Magazine

It sounds ironical but contrary to my dreams of traveling to new, bigger and exotic cities I’m traveling backwards- going to smaller towns and still smaller villages where there’s nothing but dung, bare fields and all the dust in the world. I’m becoming bored of my official trips to villages, so numerous that I am finding it difficult to remember afterwards where I’ve been because all villages, in essence, are the same everywhere. But there are other villages I am getting to know, if not in person, in books and magazines. Last Sunday’s find was one such book about life in a French village.

Helen Stevenson’s ‘Instructions for Visitors’ was the first book I found at Abids on Sunday. I found it in a heap of books selling for twenty rupees only after some careful sorting. It is a pity that these guys don’t arrange books in an orderly manner but throw them in heaps like they are selling vegetables. However, it has its own thrills. Coming across a good title that one is looking for is one of the many joys of going through heaps of books. ‘Instructions for Visitors’ is a travel book, memoir, a meditation and lots more if the blurbs on the back of the book are anything to go by. But going by its looks and the first chapter it promises to be a good read. It is about life in a French village as seen by the author who has escaped to rural France after an ill-fated love affair. I hope it is a good read, something on the lines of Frances Mayes ‘Under the Tuscan Sun’ and Peter Mayle’s ‘A Year in Provence.’.

Another book I found at Abids was a book that appeared to be a classic at first glance. Though I had seen just the cover on earlier occasions, last Sunday I picked up the book for a more detailed examination. The title appeared very familiar, one that I had read about sometime ago. It was Erich Maria Remarque’s ‘All Quiet on the Western Front’ which I got for only fifteen rupees. The blurbs on the back say that the book is ‘hailed by the critics the world over as the twentieth century’s definitive novel on war.’ Other famous writers rave about it on the back cover so I picked it up without a second thought.

The third find of Sunday was my first Conde Nast Traveler in 2010. It was the September 2009 issue that I had earlier missed buying. I paid thirty rupees for it but it was in a good condition, almost new. One of the articles in the magazine was about how taking vacations is good for one’s health. There was an article by Amy Wilentz about traveling in Haiti. It is worth reading especially now that things might be a lot different after the earthquake.

Though I cannot afford them I like to read about luxury articles that one day I might get to buy (like the …) if my writing stars shine brightly in the coming days. I bought a special supplement (titled ‘COLLECTION’) of the latest issue (January 2010) of the ‘Robb Report’ which is a magazine which millionaires with class and taste subscribe to. I don’t know which millionaire decided to dispose of his magazine but I felt lucky finding it. Lucky because now I know how much a second hand Rolls Royce Phantom of 2004 vintage costs- $ 150,000. One has to keep track of such things just in case…