BOOK LOVERS ALL

“One’s work maybe finished someday but one’s education never.” - Alexander Dumas

Went to the 29th Manila International Book Fair yesterday at the new SMX Convention Center and boy, what an event! The place is teeming with books and jam-packed with people – book lovers like me! I spend 4 hours going through the shelves for books and in the process bumped into several people, mostly my old classmates at MBA, relatives, business colleagues, and a high school classmate. I actually never expected to meet a lot of “old friends” in a book fair because I had this notion that “not great many” people read books. To say that I’m happily proven wrong on this is an understatement. In fact, I’m pleasantly surprised to discover that book fairs could be a place not only for looking up for new books but also to look up for old friends. Books sure can draw people together. Anyway, I was only able to buy 2 books from the fair not because I didn’t find any interesting books on display but on the contrary, I felt there are a plenty to buy this time around. The only problem is the book merchants don’t accept credit cards except for hard cold cash. The two books I bought is already worth around Php4,480 (which brings my total book purchase for the month to close about Php8,000). It actually burned a hole in my pocket and I actually had to break my bank – my long dormant ATM account just to buy the books. Anyway, it’s actually a good thing also since I might end up with books that I would regret buying. The two books I bought are: “Competing in a Flat World: Building Enterprises for a Borderless World by Victor Fung et al” and “Factory Physics, 3rd ed by Hopp and Spearman”. The first book is published by Wharton School and is hard bound while the second book is published by McGraw – Hills. With these two latest additions, my total book holdings now tallies at 249 plus the 62 college books that I had in my possession; all in all, my mini – library now holds 311 books (that is excluding my other siblings book holdings). I made a quick survey of the books I had and discovered that of the 249 books, I had only read about close to a hundred which leaves me with about 150 books yet to be read. As of now, I’m on my sixth book in my reading list and assuming that I could finish 10 books a year (with each book containing about 300 pages or more, or roughly 3000 pages to read in a year). The 150 books remaining would take me about 15 years! In short, I would be able to finish reading all my books I had right now before I turn 50 assuming of course that I stop buying books or attending another book fair from this moment on for the next 15 years, which is highly unlikely I supposed. Ahhh, so many books………. At the rate I’m buying books, I would probably be able to set up a public library sooner than later. Not a bad idea, though that entails a place and a librarian which means additional costs…….. Oh well, I guess I would keep the books to myself to read in the meantime.

P.S. The 29th Manila International Book Fair is held in SMX Convention beside the Mall of Asia and will end on September 16.