The Book Shop

There is something about bookstores that attracts me. Probably it’s the childhood fascination which still has a strong hold on me. Last month I happened to visit a particularly old bookstore in Connaught Place, New Delhi. As a child I used to come here often. Then I grew up, and physics and chemistry textbooks replaced comics and novels. 

As I entered the shop, an old woman was sitting at the cash counter. I smiled at her and she nodded back in acknowledgement. Over the time I have realised that these simple gestures of courtesy can give you access to 15 to 20% discount on your purchase. I, being an opportunist, didn’t want to lose any chance of getting one. I noticed the long wooden bookshelves towering over me from all sides and went straight to the fiction section. “Chanakya’s Chant”, I read the name of the book and picked it up. After going through the overview I decided to go for it.

Going through the shelves I came across biography section. Now this is one area that I am not too fond of. Try as much as I could, but half way through someone’s biography or autobiography and I run out of patience. I have read Mahatma Gandhi, A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, Khushwant Singh, Lee Iococa, Warren Buffett and Richard Branson. In each one of them I ended up skipping the latter half. With full enthusiasm I used to start these books but in the middle they would get so slow and boring it would make reading each page impossibly difficult.

There was a little girl with her father in the children section. She was picking up books from the shelf and her father was holding them for her. With a pile of books resting against his chest and supported by his arms, he proceeded towards the cash counter and the little girl trotted behind him. Memories from the past flooded me at that instant and I flashed back to my childhood days when I used to get Rs.200 as monthly pocket money. Back then Goosebumps, Famous Five and Hardy Boys were my favourites. Each used to cost around Rs.100. So I had to save that much amount of money by month’s end in order to buy one book. It means I had to limit my spending to Rs.100 per month. Considering the cost of one cadbury dairy milk chocolate to be Rs.10, I could afford only 10 such chocolates in one month. It was tough, fighting against one’s desires. I had a fairly decent collection of story books back then. Me and my friends, we used to exchange our books on a weekly basis and read.

Moving on I came to the classics section. Two old men with white moustaches were sitting on the chairs kept on one side. One of them was wearing a hat, had a walking stick in one hand and a P.G. Wodehouse book in the other. He looked like a retired army colonel to me. They were discussing about books. I couldn’t help but over hear them. “The best part about books is that they never perish. People may come and go but books are passed on from one generation to another. They never fade away, they become classics”, one of them was saying.

I went to the cash counter with my book. “How much for this book?”, I asked. She took the book from my hand and saw the price which was Rs.200. “Rs.120”, she said. I gave her the money and came out of the shop. She had given me 40% discount. I turned to face the shop again and saw a banner on the side glass that read:

“Closing Down Soon

 40% OFF on all books.”

 I looked inside the shop and saw the woman sitting. It was only then that I recognised her. She was the same woman who used to be there when I was a kid. She looked at me and smiled. Probably she recognised me or probably she didn’t.