Sunday, October 14, 2012

A Day of Books, Plates & Moo Cow..



It has been almost a year since I last step foot inside Amcorp Mall in Petaling Jaya (story here). I remember that trip well because it marked my very first venture into BookXcess, that sprawling, totally unpretentious store on the third floor, where books were sold at stunningly low prices. 

Today once again I was Amcorp Mall bound; it was my day out with the eldest, Naj, and the youngest, Awwa. An outing with Naj is a rare occurrence, then and now. A journo's life is a hectic one; having been one myself, I know the score. So when he called to ask if I would like to go book-shopping with him, I jumped at the idea. 

Today's haul was a good one; Peter Carey's Parrot and Olivier In America, Jon Katz's The Dogs of Bedlam Farm, Bill Bryson's In A Sunburned Country and Shakespeare: The World As Stage, Jim Wight's The Real James Herriot - A Memoir of My Father and Asne Seierstad's The Bookseller of Kabul.

Touted as 'a comic masterpiece' by New Yorker and 'fizzing with fictional panache' by Sunday Times, Parrot and Olivier In America details the picaresque travels in the New World of a French aristocrat and his Englishman servant. Going by the blurbs alone, I think I am going to enjoy this one.

Peter Carey is twice winner of The Booker Prize (for Oscar and Lucinda and The True History of The Kelly Gang) and the book Parrot and Olivier was shortlisted for The Man Booker Prize 2010. (Howard Jacobson eventually won it for his The Finkler Question).

Jon Katz's The Dogs of Bedlam Farm can't go wrong with people who love animal stories. Yorkshire vet and master storyteller James Herriot got me started some 40 years ago, and I haven't looked back since. 

There's Vicki Myron's delightful Dewey, about a cat adopted by a small town libraryand John Grogan's Myron & Me, about a dog that changed a man's life, on the shelf at home, not to mention the whole gamut of Herriot's humorous take on his rural practice. Simply said, I'm a sucker for animal tales.

Of Bill Bryson, of course he needs no introduction. I'm a fan through and through and the two books complete my collection of all his work. In A Sunburned Country, his dry take on equally parched Australia continues his travelogue tradition and in Shakespeare: The World As Stage, Bryson, with his trademark wit, wades through the muddles of time to reveal Shakespeare as the poet really was.       

In The Real James Herriot - A Memoir of My Father, son Jim Wight ventures beyond his father's life as a veterinarian to reveal the man behind the stories, the private individual who refused to allow fame and wealth to interfere with his practice or his family.

As for The Bookseller of Kabul, I must confess I had neither read nor heard of Norwegian writer Asne Seierstad before. The book is an international bestseller and "the most intimate description of an Afghan household ever produced by a Western journalist.." (New York Times Book Review) is enough to capture my attention.

With the exception of Bill Bryson's "Shakespeare... at RM19.90, the rest were priced at RM17.90 each, working out to less than RM110 for six brand new books. If that's not a decent enough damage I don't know what is. In ordinary book stores, I'd probably have to fork out more than twice as much for the same number of books.   

It being Sunday, the flea market was in full swing so we joined the teeming crowd... and got ourselves these cake plates at RM10 for six pieces (you can mix and match). Couldn't resist lah, darn cheap, so I settled upon these two patterns. These are brand new plates; the factory is in Puchong.

One Utama was the last stop before going home; I was lamenting about the disappearance of my favourite yoghurt swirl from Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf's menu (the line was discontinued effective 26/9 recently) when Awwa suggested I should give Moo Cow a try...

My verdict: SEDAP!  







30 comments:

Faten Rafie said...

What flavor Moo Cow did you have? My favorites are black sesame and green tea :)

Kama At-Tarawis said...

faten: oreo & pumpkin seeds. as you know, coffee bean has discontinued its yoghurt swirl line.. there goes one of my fav .. the kids suggested i should try moo cow. i like it!

لف توف™ said...

Awat tak pekena dadih¿

Kama At-Tarawis said...

lap: dadih is bland. at least this yoghurt thingie asa macam2 flavours.

Ciknoni said...

Naj didn't pay for the books? Sian Mak ...

لف توف™ said...

Dadih is as bland as our imagination.
There is a "blank look" one and there are "up to our imagination looks" dadih.

Kama At-Tarawis said...

lahai ciknoni, i forgot to add naj belanja the books.. in return i belanja them lunch at a thai restaurant on the gorund floor of amcorp mall.. :-D

Cat-from-Sydney said...

Aunty Puteri,
Rasa nak nyanyilah....
And a moo moo here
And a moo moo there
Everywhere anywhere moo moo moo!

Pardon the liberal take on old mcdonalds....

Mama just sign up loyalty card with Borders....must be the cute guy at the counter! purrr....meow!

mekyam said...

nice haul! :)

Faten Rafie said...

Try JCo, their JCool froyo is yummy! Great range of topping too + the don't go by weight ;)

I meant the froyo's flavor, or did you go for the original flavor?

Anonymous said...

I've noticed that you have not written for long.. and I must say I have been busy myself. I must tell you in the months of the absence of updates from your blog, I have met a really nice man, ( don't know if its because I haven't spent a lot of time online or if it is fate). I do not know if you remember me, but I commented once or twice about finding Mr Right/left and hinted favourably on your male offspring... do make do'a that everything will go on well and despite the fact he isn't Malaysian,neither I for that matter, I would opt for a Malaysian wedding in the center of London, at the end of winter inshallah.
Glad that you're back.Maasalama.

Anonymous said...

Nasib baiklah Aunty Putri baru tahu tentang Book Excess. Kalau tak teruklah Naj asyik nak pergi saja. Mama saya memang dah lama beli kat situ. Tak laratlah sebulan dua kali. Kita jadi escort dia dan bayar. Hahaha.
P.S. Jangan pergi sana selalu. kesian Naj.

Anonymous said...

Your son sebijik muka your ex ya.


Kawan lama

D.N.A.S said...

Salam Kak!
BookXcess came to our office a few weeks ago and I bought 10 books! Their prices are really low. Got myself a few hardcovers.

Kama At-Tarawis said...

Faten: I shall give it a try..

Cat: Naj's mama likes cute guys too.. hehehe

Massalama: I remember you! alhamdulillah you hv found yr Mr Right.. may you two be blessed with happiness..

anon 10.02: i want to make it a monthly trip.. :-D

Mek Yam: very nice indeed..

anon 10.27: indeed you are right. in fact, naj looks more like his "Wan" (paternal grandpa), arwah TS Rahman Hashim.

DNAS: waah.. the books came to you... bestnya..

Al-Manar said...

I envy people like you enjoying readings a wide range of books. Mine is limited. I enjoy buying but hate to admit that my small library proves that I buy books and that is all it proves, full stop.

Kama At-Tarawis said...

Assalamualaikum Pak.. lama sungguh kita tak berinteraksi. saya hardly on blog these days. indeed, i am fortunate to be able to buy/read at will. syukur sentiasa..

hanna said...

Naj didn't pay for the books? Sian Mak ..
Learn quran

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