Sunday, April 27, 2008

Mumblings of a Deranged Bookwork

"Do you like books? Do you love books? Do you hate books? How many books do you like to read? Who do you like to read a book for? Where do you like to read?"

--- 2 months of teaching EFL classes have reduced my vocabulary and sentence construction to a bare minimum. In addition to that, my average of 40 books per month (excluding e-books and what nots) has become a mere 3.5 and that is only thanks to some abandoned English novels in a backpacker motel in Saigon and my sister, who accidentally left a novel she packed for the flight to and fro Vietnam. I constantly try to engage people in conversations regarding novels and the mention of books makes my heart flutter --- well, maybe that's an exageration --- but come on, 24 years of book addiction did not prepare me for book starvation in a country where a handful speaks and reads English and where the books are almost all translated to their native language.

It's a wonder that self control prevailed and prevented me from bringing out my credit card and purchasing all English language books in Saigon. I had to physically restrain myself from mauling a book peddler (I dunno if other countries have them but they are a constant in Viet Nam's old capital) and it was a good thing that I was broke because if my pockets hadn't been empty --- Oh dear!

I have e-books but they do not satisfy my need for the written word. Sounds like a lot of bull to a discriminating amateur to the world of bookworms --- but quite true in my case. And here ends my mumblings... (Kinda sounds like an epitaph "Here lies the body of Angela, We laid her here because she died of book starvation").

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