The Bookworm In Me

When it comes to reading, I am not really a fan of autobiography coz its someone else's journey and usually famous people who made it! What about thousands even millions others who had the same dream but not the 'luck' or opportunity? Autobiographies are a bore to me unless maybe with the exception for interesting people like Abraham Lincoln, the man who brought new American Era with the Emancipation Proclamation or maybe Martin Luther King just for his speech 'I have a dream' or maybe one of the Pharaohs like King Tut or Ramesses II - given my fascination with the Ancient Egypt Civilization & Yes I had read all those mentioned above ;)

I am also not a fan of self help, motivation book! Err! This is boring redefine to the highest level! It is kind of cool to be sitting at the sidewalk cafe or for Malaysian is Starbucks or Coffee Bean holding (half reading without minding the words) one of these suckers! Like How to be a better person, how to value happiness and blah blah blah! For me, my life experience is made by jumping into the water and waddle my way through most of the time with nothing but The Bible as my guide or maybe some Max Lucado books! Other than that my life is not determine by  "To be Happy I need to take Step 1 then reflect on Step 2 and list down Step 3". I usually lost interest halfway through Chapter one! To be honest : One can be happy if they decide in their mind to push aside and rise above their fears and unhappiness not by reading some motivational ala self help book! Yeah right! Why not buy a Happy Meal instead?! Coz its a Happy Meal! 

Nothing compare to reading a management book. These books are usually very painful to go through. I hardly could keep up with the things suggested, what more to practice them! All the theories are too deep but nonetheless kudos to Donald Trump, John Maxwell, C.S.Lewis for all the writing but nah! I pass! I am not smart and I will not pretend to be! Ditto!

I usually enjoy good old fiction! I like to be imaginative! I am attracted to these books more than all those mentioned above! I love to imagine, a place far a way with characters that I do not know and do some snooping without feeling guilty and to feel what they are going through and when all those feelings unnerved me, I can just close the book and come back to it another time. 

I recently joined the public library here in Johor and I discovered a world full of books but sad to say that public libraries in Malaysia are so run down and not maintain in a good way, there are leakage here and there, books are old and shabby, the collections are very limited. How do you encourage people to read if your library is in a shamble? No wonder Malaysian's mentality that I faced when I browsed through the limited row of books that few girls exclaimed in Mandarin "How come so old still here in the library?" I stared at them in dismay to know that these are the future generations of Malaysia! A nation that stop to seek knowledge is a dead nation! What makes you think that we can only read when we are in school?! So what we do after school? We leave the books behind and turn our backs on them? Certainly not! We continue to read and improve our vocabs and knowledge! My goodness, it makes me sad! 

When I went to the UK, Europe and States, people read books everywhere they go! When they are waiting for tube, waiting in line or just casually lounging on the park, these people read no matter how young or old they are! They are never without a book! From small young tykes to grandmas tending their energetic grandchildren they read! Here in Malaysia we have our young asking why "a person after school" is here in the library! It is weird to be call old and above all sad to be jeered at for wanting to find a book to lost myself in! Sad!