I've been an avid reader since I was a child. One of my favorite events as a child was shopping for books that my parents would buy me for Christmas. Years later as a high school student, I discovered the great little, Barbara's Bookstore, in the Old Town neighborhood in Chicago, and Kroch's and Brentano's in downtown Chicago. Generally, I am not a shopper, but put me in a bookstore, and I can spend hours shopping for books.
One of the pleasures of my four years in Lahore, Pakistan, was shopping for books. The selection was somewhat limited, but there were still enough books that interested me that I could spend several hundred dollars each time I entered one of Lahore's bookstores. One of my main regrets about leaving Lahore was that I never did make it to the used bookstores tucked away there that were rumored to have a stash of old and rare books left over from the days of the Raj.
During my Lahore years, I spent a fair amount of time in Bangkok as I needed to overnight there in order to catch the flight to Lahore the next day. I became familiar with Asia Books on Sukhumvit. Wandering up and down between the floors, I would always end up with more books than I had planned on buying. I particularly enjoyed searching for new books on the Southeast Asian region.
Life on a remote island has many pleasures, as well as a number of drawbacks. One of the main drawbacks for me is the lack of bookstores. The closest bookstore is on the neighboring island of Lombok, and that bookstore has a very limited selection of books in English. That leaves three options: 1) purchasing books during my annual teacher's conference when I get to travel to one of the ASEAN capital cities; 2) purchasing books in Bali during one of my two annual trips there; and 3) ordering books online. The first option is great, but I'm limited to ten books or so, by the luggage allowance. The second option has possibilities, but I've yet to find a good bookstore in Bali that is comparable to Asia Books in Bangkok, or the Times Bookstore in Singapore. The third option offers the widest selection of books, but has the drawbacks of paying a significant shipping cost, as well as the possibility that at some point during the four month journey, the books will disappear. I've only tried the Amazon option once, and I was very happy to receive my books intact after four months.
I recently finished an excellent book on the Silk Road which, while somewhat dense, was filled with fascinating information about the history of the Silk Road. Last night I completed William Gibson's book, Count Zero. While Count Zero is not Gibson's best work, it was nonetheless a joy for a techie like me to read. I'm about to start on several Graham Greene novels that I bought a few months ago in Manila.
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