The Sunday Haul

Finding another Book

I had not really meant to pick another book last Sunday but I couldn’t help picking up what I found at Abids. I had missed the Abids trip on the first Sunday of the year and on the second Sunday I had made a rather hurried trip late in the afternoon though picked up three magazines. It doesn’t really feel like a real trip until I spend more than two hours at Abids spending time looking over a lot of books. So it was with a lot of eagerness that I was at Abids on Sunday much before eleven in the morning because later in the evening I was starting on a short trip, my first in the New Year. I had thought of keeping my resolve of not buying any book but it was impossible.

Somewhere in the middle of the trip at Abids I found a travel book by a writer which was tantalizingly sub-titled ‘A Writer’s Year in the Bearn.’ Normally I find it impossible to resist buying travelogues but when it is listed as ‘Writer’s Year’ than it is totally impossible to ignore it. I haven’t heard of Celia Brayfield’s ‘Deep France’ before but on finding it I thought I’d better buy it. So I got it, though for only ten rupees which for a book published in 2004 is quite a bargain. The book was almost brand new and promised to be a good read on the lines of ‘A Year in Provence’ and ‘Under the Tuscan Sun’, both of which I have with me.

Inside, I read that Celia Brayfield has written nine novels and two books of non-fiction. One of her non-fiction books is ‘Bestseller’, a guide to story telling in fiction which sounds very interesting. It seems her ‘Pearls’ is a bestseller but I don’t seem to have to come across it anywhere but now I can look forward to coming across it somewhere soon. ‘Deep France’ was the only book I picked up last Sunday and I was content finding just one good book.

Hyderabadis and the Kingfisher Calendar

It is the time of the year when talk about diaries and calendars fills the air. Not that I care much about things like calendars and dairies but the word ‘calendar’ brings to my mind something I’m sort of upset about- the Kingfisher Calendar. I’ve heard a lot about it and also got sneak peeks into what’s in it thanks to certain magazines and newspapers. Being a guy I guess it is only healthy that I get curious about the contents of the calendar.

I don’t drink beer or anything for that matter (I get all my kicks from Irani Chai so thank you). But I feel my beer guzzling fellow Hyderabadis have been given the short shrift by Kingfisher & Co. I read somewhere recently that Hyderabad ranks first or second in the country when it comes to downing beer. Which means, that when they’re not drinking Irani chai they are busy guzzling beer by the case. And Kingfisher beer seems to be the top choice for some reason. I personally know of someone who drinks only Kingfisher beer and he drinks them at the rate of three or four a week.

So it wouldn’t be stretching things to assume that nearly three fourths of the total quantity of beer consumed in Hyderabad must be Kingfisher beer. Which means, once again, that every time a Hyderabadi downs a bottle of Kingfisher beer Kingfisher & Co becomes richer. And a Hyderabadi downs beers almost all the time whether the occasion demands it or not, which means that Hyderabadis are making Kingfisher & Co very, very rich. So rich that they bought not just one jet but an entire airline. You’d think they’d be grateful to us Hyderabadis in some way for adding to their wealth almost every minute. No, instead what Kingfisher & Co does is send all those Kingfisher calendars to the sort of rich blokes who don’t need them in the first place. They are the sort of people who anyway hang out with the models featured in the calendar, and also aren’t likely to hang the calendar on the walls of their posh homes.

No, sir, it probably didn’t even cross Kingfisher & Co’s minds that probably half of the company’s wealth comes from us Hyderabadis. I don’t think they even care for Hyderabad or Hyderabadi’s. There’s no reason why they should, unless they are very interested in potholes. But if any of the top bosses of KF & Co do come to Hyderabad then there’s something I want to ask them on behalf of my fellow hard drinking Hyderabadis who aren’t even aware of the Kingfisher calendar. Which is exactly what I want to ask them -the Calendar.

The New Year's First Haul

Sometime on Monday I happened to drop in at a second hand bookstore which was near my office. I told myself that I’d not pick any book since I had resolved not to, and hence would only browse what was on display. I was there for quite a long time, checking out the titles most of which were uninteresting. It wasn’t until the end that I spotted a title that had me agitated and restless. It was a book by one of my favorite writers and I found myself in a dilemma. Here I was full of resolve not to buy even a single book until March while on the other side was the title beckoning me with an overpowering appeal. One of the best advices I’ve read about getting out of a dilemma was to disappear from the scene altogether. Which is what I did as I fled the bookstore without buying the book.


You’d think that solved my problem, but no. It actually increased my agony. The moment I was out of the bookstore a voice began in my head, ‘Whaaat, you’re not buying Pico Iyer’s ‘Falling Off the Map?’. It was a question that buzzed in my head all day. ‘What do you mean you have resolved not to buy any book until March? This isn’t ‘any’ book. It is one by Pico Iyer, the Pico Iyer who you trumpet all over is one of your favorite writers.’

I managed to turn a deaf ear to that voice for two days. But whenever I was near books (which is all the time because there are books everywhere in my house) the voice in my head would begin again.

‘I cannot believe that you have left that book in the bookstore. You say Pico Iyer is your favorite writer yet you don’t bother to pick up his book. Imagine, just imagine what Pico Iyer would think if he comes to know that one of his ardent readers doesn’t want to pick up his book even if it was a second hand copy. He’d stop writing altogether.’

That was what made me change my mind. If Pico Iyer stops writing altogether it would be terrible. Not that he would do it for this silly reason but I did not see the merit in my resolution not to buy any book for some time. This was Pico Iyer’s ‘Falling Off the Map’, something I’d been looking all over since a long time. It was a hard cover edition though with a faded and torn cover and very ancient looking. So off I went to the store on Thursday afternoon and picked it up for fifty rupees which was a very small price to pay for a masterpiece by Pico Iyer. I am glad I bought the book because it would have been otherwise very difficult to silence the voice inside my head.

The Sunday Haul - 3 Magazines

On Sunday, my modest but growing collection of Condé Nast Traveller magazines got a quantum jump with the addition of three issues. It looks like I am destined to be a non-paying subscriber of this wonderful magazine. There were actually six magazines on the pavement but I picked up only three. I was glad I did not pick up all the six for a reason I will come to shortly. I got the three magazines for only fifty rupees which was quite a bargain. Since I had decided not to buy books for a while I thought it was okay to splurge on magazines hence the magazine haul.

Maybe I would have picked up a book on Sunday at Abids but I was there only for a very short time, about thirty minutes to be exact. I was with a friend the whole day so missed out on the trip to Abids. If I had come in the morning I would have looked carefully and no doubt, would have found something worth picking up. I am wondering how long I will hold out without buying a book. There are fifty more Sundays to go through.

Condé Nast Traveller is for those who take their travel and holidays in beautiful, exotic places seriously. For government types like me it gets a bit too much, all that luxury and opulence. However it is fun to read about it all though I may not ever go to any place described in the magazine.

Of the three Condé Nast Traveller issues one was of December 2008 (263 pages) and the other two were the November 2008 (268 pages) and September 2008 (204 pages) issues. It would take me a long time to read them but I flipped through the three issues and also read a few interesting articles. The December 2008 issue has articles by five well known travel writers on senses. I liked the one by Rory Maclean on ‘Hearing’, a vendor's cry in Burma that remained in the writer’s memory. The article on the outback in Australia promises to be great though it is too lengthy.

The September 2008 issue had a lengthy, evocative article on Havana by Robert McCrum, author of ‘My Year Off’. Another piece in the same issue gave me an idea for an article I felt I can do without trying too hard. The article was ‘25 Reasons to Go to Barcelona’ and my idea was for an article titled ‘100 Reasons Not to Go to Hyderabad’, the first of which, needless to say will be- potholes. Someday I am going to do the article. Watch this space.

But my joy on finding my favorite magazine was short lived soon as I started flipping through the issues. I noticed that someone had torn off a few pages in each magazine- lists of hotels and such useful information. I felt sad but not angry. It is one price that one has to pay picking up second hand stuff cheap. The only consolation was that I got a clue as to where these magazines were coming from. I found a piece of hotel stationery with the name of the hotel on it. I’m not going to name it but the hotel is on Banjara Hills.

Finding another Second Hand Bookstore

On Thursday I accidentally stumbled upon a second hand bookstore at Punjagutta. I was passing through Punjagutta area in the afternoon and I happened to see a board of ‘The Book Store’ in the lane behind Model House. I checked out the store which was a smallish affair but well stocked. I was surprised when the guy told me the store was existing since three years. I wonder why I did not get to know about it. But now that I found it out I am glad to add to the list of second hand bookstores in Hyderabad. I have to do a post on them soon.

The address is: The Book Store, 6-3-456/A/7, Dwarakapuri Colony, Behind Model House, Punjagutta.

Back to the store, I saw a couple of books by Naipaul I should have picked up but didn’t. Almost all the books at the store are priced above hundred rupees. It has a pretty decent collection including computer books and stuff like that. I browsed for sometime hoping I’d find a nice book but I did not find any. I wasn’t disappointed though since I plan to return sometime soon for a more detailed browsing. Incidentally this is the third second hand bookstore in the Punjagutta area. There’s one on one side of the flyover and another on the other side. I was told the guy puts up books at Abids too on Sundays.

Goonda in Action

Not many dramatic situations shown in movies actually happen in real life. Though such situations happen sometimes, not many can be witness to them. One such scene happened when I was in Sultan Bazar yesterday. It isn’t a very dramatic situation but an interesting one nevertheless. I saw a hoodlum at work collecting payouts from street vendors in broadlight, and that too in the neighborhood of a police station.

I was hanging around Sultan Bazar on a minor errand. I was parking my bike when I noticed a guy with long, curly hair, a stubble on his chin and a paunch bigger than his chest say something to a woman standing near a sugarcane juice stall. He had a nasty look on his face. He did not even look at the woman but was staring in another direction while talking to her. The woman said to another person beside her, ‘Haven’t we paid yesterday?’ and the other person nodded his head. The woman gave the hoodlum twenty bucks which he thrust into his pocket and walked away.

I was watching this exchange with interest and he happened to glance at me for a second before walking away to another pushcart vendor. I watched fascinated as the vendor paid a tenner to the hoodlum who simply stuffed it in his trouser pocket and swagger to another vendor. I realized this was a small time operator if he is collecting just ten bucks a day from each vendor. He did not look a municipal tax collector and he also did not give any receipt for the money.

The police station was just a few steps away but what can they do if no vendor complains and instead pays dutifully? There must be scores of such pests around living off the earnings of vendors and such people in the city.

This and That

No Haul Sunday

Lying in bed, swathed in woolens wasn’t what I imagined myself to be doing on the first Sunday of the New Year but that was exactly what I was forced to do as I was down with the flu. Maybe the hectic activity in the previous month had got something to do with it. But whatever it is, I missed doing several things I had planned for Sunday. I had thought of doing the Necklace Road routine first thing on Sunday morning followed by a leisurely read of the Sunday papers in Adarsh Restaurant and later a visit to Abids. All I could do was lie in bed for the whole day on Sunday telling myself it wasn’t my fault that the flu chose to strike me. Needless to say, I am looking forward to the next Sunday quite eagerly.

On the other hand, the positive (if you can call it positive) thing is that for once there wasn’t an influx of books into the house on Sunday. I have decided to drastically cut down on book buying until I finish reading at least six books a month until March.

15 Years on the job

On the first day of the New Year I began my sixteenth year in this job. Another five years and I can actually retire, a prospect that I find very alluring. Mine isn’t a very interesting job though if I had tried I could have made it very interesting although I spent half my service in interesting posts without even trying. On the whole it has been a very dull period for me and I sometimes feel sad that I had spent a great part of my life doing practically nothing worthwhile.

The only consolation is that I have lived in the rural areas and have seen the life of the farmers and the rural folks up close. It is an experience worth gathering. When I was posted in a far off place without either a boss or an assistant I wondered what I had got myself into, but that initial hardship that lasted for three and half year is priceless when it comes to telling off the guys who spent their whole lives in offices pushing files. Having field experience is a valuable asset, I discovered long back. Add to it a stint with the cops in civvies and one can actually be a loose cannon which I try to be sometimes in my office.

Some of the experiences I had in my first posting form a major chunk of my book. Prior to this job I had been a copywriter in a smallish advertising agency for about two years which also forms part of my book. I don’t know how those who read my book (if it gets published) will find it but I enjoyed writing the first draft though I cannot say the same about revising it. It is taking a horrendously long time. But I plan to finish it sometime by March or later.

I’ll Do it Twice a Week Now

Writing three posts a week on the blog is pretty tiresome though not impossible. So far I have managed to maintain the schedule of posting thrice a week on the blog but now I am thinking of doing it twice a week. One reason is that it gets boring for those who read it to find that I am writing only about books, some trips and other stuff which may not be half interesting than what they are doing in their own lives. Another reason is that writing a post takes up a lot of time not to mention the effort spent thinking of an idea for it. Sometimes the ideas present themselves quite easily but most of the time it isn’t just so.

Another reason is that there are not many people who read my blog if the hits I get are anything to go by. I get an average of twenty hits a day, down from twenty five a few months ago. It is one indicator that I am not exactly setting the blogosphere on fire with my posts. So I’ve planned to write only two posts a week (Tue and Fri) in the hope that I might get better at my writing if I have the time to revise the posts.

Those who want me to continue writing three posts a week can take heart. I can be easily persuaded to do so since all that is required is send me a cheque for a couple of million dollars…

The Trip to Vizag and Beyond

The problem with traveling, even if it is to smaller places, is that one soon begins to compare the places one visits with one’s place. I am no exception and as a Hyderabadi, it is perhaps expected of me. However, Vizag is hardly the place to compare with Hyderabad especially since it doesn’t have anything even remotely resembling the Charminar to begin with nor does one get Irani chai though I have seen boards advertising Hyderabad biryani on offer. But then, you don’t get the same sort of feeling eating Biryani just about anywhere other than in a dirty Irani hotel staffed by surly waiters.

The only thing I liked about Vizag was the fact that if one felt like taking a dip in the ocean one needn’t catch a plane and travel thousands of miles to the nearest beach. The beach was so close one only has to gather a towel and stroll towards it. Apart from that, the other thing I envied about Vizag was that there wasn’t even a single pothole on the roads. I looked and looked hoping to find even a small pothole but I was terribly disappointed. On the other hand I was glad, proud in fact, that I come from a city whose municipal engineers have no peers when it comes to laying roads with the maximum number of potholes per square metre.

As earlier planned I was at the beach at the crack of dawn though not on the last day of the year, to catch the sunrise. I had thought I’d be alone but there were several other citizens of Vizag some of whom were walking briskly, jogging or simply sitting on the parapets waiting for the sunrise. The sea was calm and in the light of the dawn had a magical quality to it. There were ships in the distance their lights twinkling and closer, fishermen sailed by rowing their country boat. Then the sun appeared, just a slice of it from behind the clouds and then it came out whole, shining brightly, lighting up the day. That sight alone was worth the visit to Vizag.

The rest of the trip was uneventful as I traveled along with other officers to villages to meet farmers. The farmers here seem to be a meek lot pouring out their litany of woes. Somehow I feel no has done enough for the farmers of our country since they are always in problems- if it is the drought one year, then it is unremunerative prices another year and so on. There is just no end to the travails of the Indian farmer, especially the small farmer who doesn’t have the capacity to withstand risk of any kind. I was reminded of something I had read in a book I had bought a couple of weeks ago.

Somerset Maugham wrote this in ‘A Writer’s Notebook’: ‘When I was leaving India people asked me which of all the sights I had seen had most impressed me. I answered as they expected me to answer. But it wasn’t the Taj Mahal, the ghats of Benares, the temple at Madura or the mountains of Travancore that most moved me; it was the peasant, terribly emaciated, with nothing to cover his nakedness but a rag around his middle the color of the sun-baked earth he tilled, the peasant shivering in the cold of dawn, sweating in the heat of noon, working still as the sun set red over the parched fields, the starveling peasant toiling without cease in the north, in the south, in the east, in the west, toiling all over the vastness of India, toiling as he had toiled from father to son back to back for three thousand years when the Aryans had first descended upon the country, toiling for a scant subsistence, his only hope to keep body and soul together. This was the sight that had given me the most poignant emotion in India.’

Things are no different now.

Vizag wasn’t the only place I went. We were at a border village from where I noticed that Vizianagaram was only twenty kilometers away. It was close to lunch time and when I expressed a desire to have lunch at Vizianagaram no one refused. So off we went to Vizianagaram. Half hour later when we were taken to a rather swank hotel I was surprised and a bit embarrassed. I was surprised to find such a good hotel in a place like Vizianagaram. I had said we’d have lunch at some simple hotel but our hosts would have none of it and I was practially led me by my hands inside. They insisted that we have lunch at that hotel and fed me fish curry. Maybe they wanted to show off to us that they have hotels like we do in apna Hyderabad.

It was embarrassing because we were coming straight from the fields, caked with dust from head to toe. But then, in Vizianagaram one hardly expects anyone to notice such things so we had lunch without getting stared at. Later we did a whirlwind sightseeing tour checking out the fort of the Gajapathi rulers, the Music college where, I was told, the giants of Telugu background singers learnt their basics. I paid a quick obeisance at the Pydi Thalli temple which I am told holds a powerful sway over the three north coastal districts. I prayed all potholes in Hyderabad be made to disappear overnight but when I landed the next morning I saw my prayers went unanswered. I should have asked for a less impossible wish.

The Final Sunday's Haul

At Abids, the surprises seem to be getting better. Last Sunday I got lucky finding the latest issue of a magazine I love to read- Conde Nast Traveller. I was there at Abids on the twenty eighth of December but I got quite a turn when I spotted the January 2009 issue of Conde Nast Traveller Magazine on the pavement. I don’t want to blame whoever gave it away because I was lucky getting it for only thirty bucks. At Walden or Odyssey the same issue would have set me back by at least six hundred bucks not that I would want to buy it there. Apart from this magazine I found one more magazine and a book which I swore would be the last book I would pick up for sometime.

Actually the first find of Sunday was a book- Edward Abbey’s ‘Desert Solitaire’, which is about the time the author spent all alone as a ranger in a National Park in the US- the Arches National Monument in Utah. Sometimes I fantasize doing things like that. When I was in the Andamans I wondered how it would be to spend sometime alone on an uninhabited island but, fortunately or unfortunately, I left before I could put that idea into action. The first line in ‘Desert Solitaire’ reads: ‘This is the most beautiful place on earth.’ The book promises to be an interesting read.

The second find was a magazine- the October 2008 issue of ‘National Geographic Traveler’ that I got for twenty rupees. Inside there was an article by someone called Monica Bhide on Mumbai and the Taj was featured in it. I wonder what they must be thinking now after all the bombings in the hotel and the shootings in the city. I guess they must have carried some kind of follow up story but I will never know unless I happen to come across the latest issue.

Conde Nast Traveller too in its January 2009 issue carried a short feature about the best hotels in Mumbai and needless to say, the Taj was listed. I am surprised that they did not mention that the hotel was almost completely burnt down recently. I wonder what it would have to say if someone who read the article in the magazine decided to book a room at the hotel? Maybe the magazine will carry some kind of correction in its next issue.

The same evening I was traveling to Visakhapatnam by train and despite my resolve not to pick up any books I couldn’t resist going to Abids in the morning since it was the last Sunday of the year. I did not want to end the year that way so I had gone. Strangely enough, the entire haul of magazines and the book I found on Sunday were about traveling- the very thing I was doing.

The Year's Haul of Books

This is the haul of books I made during the year. In all I bought a hundred and thirty books which is about fifty books fewer than the previous year. I guess there are far too many books in my house than there are in a small library so I am planning to cut down on book buying in the next year and restrict myself to buying only very good books that I simply cannot avoid buying.

JANUARY

1. ‘Memories of My Melancholy Whores’ by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
2. ‘Writer’s Digest Handbook of Short Story Writing’ edited by
3. ‘Travel’ by Granta
4. ‘The Artist’s Way’ by Julia Cameron (3rd Copy)
5. ‘Your Own Words’ by Barbara Wallraff
6. ‘Tropical Classical’ by Pico Iyer
7. ‘The Art of Reading the Novel’ by Philip Freund
8. ‘Getting Even’ by Woody Allen
9. ‘From the Mothership’ by Jacquelyn Mitchard
10. ‘Two Women, One Friendship’

FEBRUARY

1. ‘What I Saw at the Revolution’ by Peggy Noonan
2. ‘The Lonely Sea and the Sky’ by Francis Chichester
3. ‘Winesberg, Ohio’ by Sherwood Anderson
4. ‘Dave Barry’s Guide to Guys’ by Dave Barry
5. ‘Goodbye to Gandhi: Travels in New India’ by Bernard Imhasly (New)
6. ‘Getting Things Done’ by David Allen (New)
7. ‘The Writer’s World’ by Linda Woodson
8. ‘Global Soul’ by Pico Iyer

MARCH

1. ‘Radical Forgiveness’ by Colin Tipping (New)
2. ‘Growing Up’ by Russel Baker
3. ‘The Running Life’ by George Sheehan
4. ‘Emperor of Emperors’ by Ryscard Kapuscinski
5. ‘Great Railway Bazaar’ by Paul Theroux
6. ‘A Postillion Struck by Lightning’ by Dirk Bogarde
7. ‘Perils of Pesticides’ by Mukund Joshi
8. ‘Run River’ by Joan Didion – 20/-
9. ‘Thy Neighbor’s Wife’ by Gay Talese- 20/-
10. ‘The Electric Cool Aid’ by Tom Wolfe- 20/-
11. ‘Coffee, Tea or Me’ by
12. ‘The Writerly Life’ by RK Narayan 100/-


APRIL

1. ‘Writing Your Novel’ by Lawrence Block- 100/-
2. ‘Uncivil Liberties’ by Calvin Trillin- 20/-
3. ‘Dave Barry Turns 40’ by Dave Barry (my Nth copy) 10/-
4. ‘Good English’ by Norman Lewis- 10/-
5. ‘National Geographic Guide to Digital Photography’ 150/-
6. ‘News of a Kidnapping’ by Gabriel Garcia Marquez- 50/-
7. ‘The Old Gringo’ by Carlos Fuentes- 10/-
8. ‘The Liar’s Club’ Mary Karr- 10/-
9. ‘Writing Clear Paragraphs’- 30
10. ‘Survival Handbook’ – 10/-
11. ‘Blackbird House’ by Alice Hoffman- 10/-
12. ‘Close Range’ by Annie Proulx
13. ‘Writing of One Novel’ by Irving Wallace – 10/-
14. ‘Paro’ by Namita Gokhale- 20/-
15. ‘Writing with Style’ Scholastic- 20/-
16. ‘Out of Sight’ by Elmore Leonard- 10/-
17. ‘She & He’ by Sasthi Brata- 10/-
18. ‘Here Lies Eric Ambler’ by Eric Ambler- 20/-
19. ‘Understand Fiction’ by Cleanth Brooks and Robert Penn Warren- 20/-


MAY

1. ‘A Choice of Words’ by David King and Thomas Crerar- 15/-
2. ‘A Year in Provence’ by Peter Mayle (multiple copy)- 15/-
3. ‘Mudrarakshasa: The Hunted’ by Subhash Chandra- 20/-
4. ‘Mr. Stone and the Knight’s Companion’ by VS Naipaul- 10/-
5. ‘Old and New: 18 Stories’ by RK Narayan- 10/-
6. ‘Education of Richard Rodriguez’ by Richard Rodriguez – 10/-
7. ‘The Year of Living Dangerously’ by Sebastian Koch- 10/-
8. ‘Without Feathers’ by Woody Allen- 10/-
9. ‘The Hunted’ by Elmore Leonard- 50/-
10. ‘The Moonshine Wars’ by Elmore Leonard
11. ‘Poona Company’ by Farrukh Dhondy
12. ‘Middle Passage’ by VS Naipaul
13. ‘Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’ by Douglas Adams
14. ‘Nose Picking for Pleasure’ by Richard Flickert (yuck, and sorry I had to mention it)


JUNE

1. ‘Strange Adventures of Donald Crowhurst’ by Nicholas Tomlin & Ron Hall
2. ‘Packrat Papers’ Volume- I
3. ‘Vintage Book of Indian Writing’ Ed by Salman Rushdie, Elizabeth West-100/-
4. ‘Touch’ by Elmore Leonard- 10/-
5. ‘Return to Paris’ by Colette Rossant-10/-
6. ‘The Impressionist’ by Hari Kunzru
7. ‘Finally…I’m a Doctor’
8. ‘The Tax Inspector’ by Peter Carey- 10/-
9. ‘Soul of a Chef’ by Michael Ruhlman- 120/-
10. ‘Home and Other Black Holes’ by Dave Barry- 20/-
11. ‘The Men Within’ by Harimohan Paruvu
12. ‘Down and Out in Paris and London’ by George Orwell- 10/-
13. ‘Hali and Other Stories’ by GV Dessani
14. ‘Deep Revision’
15. ‘Collected Essays’ by Graham Greene- 20/-
16. ‘Great Railway Bazaar’ by Paul Theroux- 20/- (2nd Copy of the year)

The second half of the year yielded fewer books than the first six months of the year. Or maybe I picked up fewer books considering that my house was being filled up with books everywhere. Maybe next year I will buy only one book per week or else I may have to buy a bigger house, which looks impossible unless I get a massive advance on my book.

JULY

1. ‘Way to Happiness’-10/-
2. ‘Paperweight’ by Stephen Fry- 90/-
3. ‘I, Gracias’ by Henri Nouwen
4. ‘Dance of the Happy Shades’ by Alice Munro- 40/-
5. ‘Writing Home’ by Alan Bennett- 65/-
6. ‘Mother Tongue’ by Bill Bryson- 65/-
7. ‘The Bookshop’ by Penelope Fitzgerald- 20/-
8. ‘For Love and Money’ by Jonathan Raban- 90/-
9. ‘Rules of Thumb’ by Tom Parker- 10/-
10. ‘Old Ace in the Hole’ by Annie Proulx- 30/-
11. ‘Unknown Man No. 89’ by Elmore Leonard- 15/-

AUGUST

1. ‘The Practical Writer’ eds Therese Eiben and Mary Gannon- 135/-
2. ‘If You Want to Write’ by Brenda Ueland- 100/-
3. ‘How to Write a Movie in 21 Days’ by Vicki King- 100/-
4. ‘Literary Occasions’ by VS Naipaul (New)- 225/-
5. ‘The Shipping News’ by Annie Proulx- 20/-
6. ‘Heavy Water and Other Stories’ by Martin Amis- 20/-
7. ‘Secular Commonsense’ by Mukul Kesavan- 20/-

SEPTEMBER

1. ‘My Year Off’ by Robert McCrum – 50/-
2. ‘Hardboiled Wonderland and End of the World’ by Haruki Murakami
3. ‘Fires’ by Raymond Carver- 50/-
4. ‘Warriner’s English Grammar and Composition- 50/-
5. ‘Kafka on the Shore’ by Haruki Murakami- 100/-

OCTOBER

1. ‘Trading Reality’ by Michael Ridpath- 25/-
2. ‘London Walks’- 30/-
3. ‘Lost Continent’ by Bill Bryson- 10/-
4. ‘Wild Mind’ by Natalie Goldberg- 50/-
5. ‘Groucho and Me’ by Groucho Marx- 20/-
6. ‘Portrait in Sepia’ by Isabel Allende- 20/-
7. ‘Stick’ by Elmore Leonard- 50/-

NOVEMBER

1. ‘Age of Kali’ by William Dalrymple- 55/-
2. ‘Being Indian’ by Pavan K. Verma
3. ‘The Last of the Savages’ by Jay McInerney- 10/-
4. ‘For the Time Being’ by Dirk Bogarde- 50/-
5. ‘Switch’ by Elmore Leonard- 50/-
6. ’84 Charing Cross Road’ by Helene Hanff- 30/-
7. ‘Bachelor Brothers; Bed and Breakfast’ by Bill Richardson 10/-
8. ‘The Art of TS Eliot’ by Helen Gardner- 30/-
9. ‘Behind the Wall’ by Colin Thubron- 90/-
10. ‘In Cold Blood’ by Truman Capote- 10/-

DECEMBER

1. ‘A Writer’s Notebook’ by Somerset Maugham- 75/-
2. ‘Arabia: Through the Looking Glass’ by Jonathan Raban- 25/-
3. ‘Reservoir Dogs’ by Quentin Tarantino- 10/-
4. ‘The Writer and Reader’ by Neil Ewart- 25/-
5. ‘A Year in Provence’ by Peter Mayle- 10/-
6. ‘Hands of a Stranger’ by Robert Daley- 10/-
7. ‘Ordinary People’ by Judith Guest- 10/-
8. ‘The Hotkid’ by Elmore Leonard- 10/-
9. ‘On Writing’ by Stephen King- 100/-
10. ‘At Random’ by Bennet Cerf- 100/-
11. ‘Double Vision’ by Rudy Wiebe- 20/-


Gifts of books I got during the year from my (good) friends:

‘Hombre’ by Elmore Leonard
‘Of Human Bondage’ by Somerset Maugham
‘The Good Earth’ by Pearl S Buck
‘One Hundred Years of Solitude’ by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
‘Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff’ by Richard Carlson
‘By the Lakeside’ Garison Keillor

On Another Trip & the Year That Was

As the year begins to fade away my travel stars seem to be shining brighter. I’m setting off on another trip, the third one this month. I haven’t been anywhere this year for a long time and suddenly as if to compensate for it I am being sent here and there. This time I am being sent to Visakhapatnam. Vizag is infinitely better than the other two places I have been in the past couple of weeks- Guntur and Zaheerabad. Apart from many things in its favor Vizag is a seaside place and I simply love being near the ocean. I will be in Vizag on New Year’s eve so I plan to spend the last day of the year watching the sunrise by the sea. It would be a nice way to end the year which has been a mixed one for me so far.

The one major highlight of the year was that I finally managed to complete writing my book. I guess it brought me within inches of being a published writer. However I haven’t been able to stick to my deadline of completing the revisions by the end of the year but that’s okay. I will do it in the first two months of the coming year. Other than that, writing the blog regularly has been another source of satisfaction. I’ve managed to write two hundred and twenty two posts in 2008. Though I did not have anything published in papers and magazines (as if I do it quite regularly!) I am satisfied with the posts on the blog which has brought me more friends than I could make otherwise. The blog has brought in a haul of friends I am happy to be in touch with regularly.

As far as books are concerned I found plenty of them, a hundred thirty to be exact. My friends are envying me for finding some really good books. I picked up many books by my favorite writers- Elmore Leonard, Dave Barry, Paul Theroux, Pico Iyer and others. I have listed all the books I have found this year somewhere on the blog. But when it comes to reading I haven’t read as many books I should have for various reasons. Whatever books I have read have been good so far, books that changed something within me. I will continue to read more books though I might be picking up fewer of them owing to a space constraint at home.

Of course, the high point has been getting a Mont Blanc fountain pen as a gift. I also found a couple of nice fountain pens the latest being the ‘Swarna’ black fountain pen I picked up at Guntur about a week ago.

On the job there haven’t been many highs though I have learnt a lot of people in a particular industry hate me for sticking to rules. I am glad I had the opportunity to show these greedy and rapacious industrialists how it feels when the government flexes its muscle. The surprising thing is that there have been no attempts to shift me from my post and instead there’s a new respect for being unbending and straightforward. But it is very tough to remain unruffled when there’s wholesale corruption all around you.

I made a few trips on the job and had excitement at the end of the year in form of the anti-corruption operations in December. I will remember the one where I was part of an operation to trap a corrupt cop. It felt like I was in a movie chasing someone through heavy traffic. The low was that I was not promoted this year too and maybe next year I will move a step up the ladder.

I am not making any resolutions for the next year because I haven’t been able to keep the resolutions that I had made last year. I wasn’t able to listen to music and was also not able to buy an iPod. The other resolution was that I wanted to learn to cook but I was nowhere near the kitchen. I just ate.

So that was a little bit about my experiences in the year that’s gone and I hope none of you have fallen asleep while reading this post which is one of the lengthiest I have done so far. I hope and am also confident that 2009 will be a better year bringing every one success, happiness and lots of money which is something I badly need. Why? I have to buy bookshelves! Where else can I keep my books?

Wish You all a Happy New Year. Keep reading the blog. Thank You very much.