I am an admitted book junkie, and used bookstores are like
my Mecca. While living and traveling in foreign countries, the lack of
English-language bookstores has been the most difficult adjustment. Bookstores
are few and far between, and when one does find a good one it is almost
certainly expensive, catering to us “rich” tourists and such. But, having no
other choice, I still will spend a good hour selecting a pricey, yet
tantalizing, stack of literature to hold me over until our next book
expedition.
Living in Chiang Rai, I have been lucky enough to find one
decent bookstore carrying primarily English books. The selection isn’t great,
but the owner is lovely. He pays very well for trade-ins (used books have
become a currency with which I buy more used books). And, as the next closest
bookstore is three hours away, beggars can’t be choosers.
I never miss a chance to swap for more books the second I
finish reading, and have therefore perused every single bookstore we have come
across in our travels. Bookstores are as necessary to me during travel as local
cuisine or national monuments. Many of the books I have bought abroad are just
as well-traveled as we are, working their way around Southeast Asia, picked up
in one country and traded in another. I find books with stamps from bookshops
in Koh Tao, Bangkok, and Koh Phi Phi. They have stickers from Bali and Vietnam,
price tags from Laos and Cambodia. So far, I have yet to see a book stamped
with a bookstore I haven’t visited.
This system of reading is hands-down the worst way to check
any of the books off my intended reading list, but thanks to a combination of
curiosity and desperation, I read a slew of books in the past year and a half
that I would have otherwise never even heard of. Several that surprised me, in no particular order, off the
top of my head: Giraffe by J.M. Ledgard, Birds Without Wings by Louis de Bernieres, A Case of Exploding
Mangoes by Mohhamed Hanif, Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai, The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafon, Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts (not that great, but apparently a must-read for travelers?), 2666 by Roberto Bolano.
As a traveler, I know that the lighter, easier, more
convenient thing to do would be to suck it up and buy a Kindle. And maybe, one
of these days I’ll be praising the wonders of my new e-reader. But for now, I
am willing to trudge along with a stack of paperbacks weighing down my
backpack. I will wade through the used bookstores to find a couple of gems at
decent prices. I will spend every kind of currency on overpriced books. I will
forsake the ease of buying exactly what I am looking for in one simple click
for the gamble and intrigue of not knowing what I will read next. Sorry Kindle, but I wouldn’t want it any other way.
