The Ooty Haul

A government job isn’t something that’ll normally take you places but the one I am doing has luckily for me turned out to be one that’s made me go quite a few interesting places. Over the years I’ve managed to be luckier than most people at my level in the government when it comes to travelling. I’ve been to Delhi about fifty times in five years, have been to Kohima, Itanagar in Arunachal, Guwahati, Bengaluru, Chennai, Kolkata, Bhubaneswar and since the past two years, to Ooty. I must be one of the fortunate few who get to travel to Ooty on work that’ll last two weeks.

This year too I am in Ooty for two weeks coordinating a trek for officers who are getting trained in the Institute I am posted in. I will write about it in a separate post because here in this post I want to write about the Ooty haul. In my previous visit to Ooty last year I chanced upon the Church Hill Book Store where I found three wonderful titles, one being a title by William Trevor. This year too when I was told I had to go to Ooty again I looked forward to visit Church Hill Bookstore. But when I saw that it wasn’t open for the two days that I dropped in there I was disappointed. 

 

Since I hadn’t brought more than a single title to read in Ooty I wanted to buy more books. So I dropped in at Higgin Bothams on the main market road. I was excited when I saw a new copy of Stephen King’s ‘On Writing’ on the shelf. I have bought about a dozen copies of this title over the years because I love it very much. Whenever I see a copy of ‘On Writing’ new or secondhand I buy it right away which is what I did at Higgin Bothams- bought the copy I saw. 

Next I spotted a copy of ‘The Greatest Tamil Stories Ever Told’ selected and edited by Sujatha Vijayaraghavan and Mini Krishnan that I decided to buy after I looked at the list of authors whose stories were in it. There were writers like Pudumaipithan, Ashokamithran, Sundara Ramaswamy, Perumal Murugan, Baama, Kalki whose stories I had read. There were thirty stories in all and I haven’t read the stories by writers I wasn’t familiar with. Though it was priced at Rs 699 I bought the beautiful hardcover copy for it was worth a lot more than what I paid for it. 

 

After several calls Arthy Vivek who runs the store told me over the phone that the store hasn’t been opened since more than five months and that she was thinking of closing it down. However she opened the store once and I managed to find two titles. I found a beautiful copy of ‘Flaubert’s Parrot’ by Julian Barnes that I was looking for ever since I read ‘The Sense of an Ending’ by Julian Barnes. 

The other title I found was ‘Rites of Passage’ by Sanjoy Hazarika. I had read a different title on the conflict in the North East by Sanjoy Hazarika and found it full of insights. Needless to say I picked up this title too. The biggest surprise was that I got both the above titles for hundred rupees each. However, I feel terribly sad that Church Hill Book Store is soon closing down. I hope it doesn’t happen.