I’m still in Delhi. I felt lazy and decided to take the train tomorrow morning.
Yesterday, after a very bad time spent with some screwball relatives, I went with my family for South Indian food at Naivedyam in Hauz Khas village. After that, we went to nearby Aurobindo Market to buy books at Midlands.
To be accurate, just me and my brother did that. My parents first went back home to drop off my grandmother and bua, and then came back. But before coming to Midlands, they first spent some time buying clothes. This gave me and Bhavya the opportunity to have a nice long browse.
Midland truly hit the jackpot yesterday. We spent over two kilorupees on the following things:
- Bend It Like Beckham DVD
- Lean Six Sigma
- Discover Your Sales Strengths
- The BusinessWorld guide to B-schools
- Dave Barry: Hits Below the Beltway
- Making the Minister Smile, by Anurag Mathur
- A thriller by William Diehl whose name I forget
- Carpe Jugulum, by Terry Pratchett
- The Rainbow and the Rose, by Nevil Shute
- Mastermind India 4
Only the fact that Midlands had still to receive it’s shipment of Gotham comics- the Indian syndication of MAD, X-Men, Spider-man, DC Comics Presents, Hulk, and the like- prevented me from plonking down a further one hundred and fifty rupees for that month’s comics and five hundred and forty for the quarter’s super specials.
Sober reflection also made me realise that Harry Potter V would eventually come out in paperback, and waiting for a while rather than plonking down six hundred and thirty-five rupees for advance booking would not only be fiscally prudent, but also good for the soul.
Be that as it may, the fact remains that my family purchased over two thousand rupees worth of intellectual property in a little less than thirty minutes. This may not seem like a lot when you convert it into dollars- but books are much cheaper in India than anywhere else. Even then, people don’t buy them in such quantities as we did yesterday. My father admits himself that he would rarely spend so freely on anything else- clothes, or even food- but books are special.
So, if you’re a stranger reading this, and you’re ever in Midlands and you see the guy behind the desk smiling with delight- say hi to everyone else in the shop. One of them will probably be a Khanna.