Tuesday, August 05, 2014

The Curious Case of the Vanishing Bookstores - End of an era ?

About 10-12 years ago, during my school days, the most awaited outing in January would be to the Chennai Book Fair (I started going in 1999, and *touch-wood* haven't missed out on a single edition till date) while the month of May meant getting new Supplementary reads for English - another pleasurable shopping experience.

However, considering the way school curricula are being structured these days, with a focus only on molding them into functional robots that decide to become an engineer or a doctor or a chartered accountant, the pleasures of reading have been all but lost on the current generation !

To top it all, the city bookstores are all rapidly closing down - Odyssey in Anna Nagar is long gone, the iconic Landmark at Apex Plaza (the chain's first branch incidentally, popular for its bookshelf containing hand-picked suggestions from Hemu Ramaiah, its founder) and, now the vast, sprawling Landmark - Citi Center.

Whats more - while the City Center branch is offering upto 70% off on everything that's left in the store, the Landmark - Spencer's Plaza also has a flat 50% or above sale going on, instilling a shrill fear as to whether it's closure is also in the pipeline. Here are pictures from the last two shopping-sprees.




I'm really clueless about what's going to feed my hunger for books in the future - I'm not a big fan of reading novels on a device like the Kindle (yes, Old-school much, Thank you. Been there - heard that, not changing). I really hope someone opens up a bookstore like the one Meg Ryan owns in that beautiful movie starring Tom Hanks as well (You've Got Mail!) - that would be just the cure for my sickness !

-Quizzo.

Tuesday, July 29, 2014

Welcome to Blogging 101

Hey !

I've lost count of how many times I've started a blog, and then, over time, just let it die a slow, painful death owing to numerous reasons ranging from lack to time to boredom to even plan laziness on some counts. However, we all  go through a certain phase in life - sort of a quarter-life crisis - when you tend to feel like you're completely going bonkers and you've nothing utilitarian to do at the moment. That is precisely the phase that I'm in right now and thus, comes up this blog, as a means of some respite. Hoping that while the form is definitely temporary, the class can be permanent.

Adios.