Day-Long Trip: Book Mania Continued!

I had always thought that Aussie weather forecast is damn accurate. Nope. I was wrong. It was predicted that there would be increasing showers today. Well, a few drizzles wouldn’t constitute ‘increasing showers’, would it?

But thank goodness for that, because finally I was able to embark on the trip to Fremantle. My housemate, JM (not Jiamun, but close!) woke me up this morning, saying that if I were to agree to go to Fremantle with her, she would skip volunteering at Bentley Park (an aged care facility). I looked out of my window, and thought: ‘Gee, I could hardly sleep last night. I really wanted some rest.’

But the thought of exploring more second-hand bookshops excited me so much that I decided to forego some beauty sleep (yes, I looked myself in the mirror when I was in Cotton On – my eyes were horrible swollen and puffy). Anyway, both of us took a bus to Fremantle and during the 45-minute journey, we talked. Well, she did most of the talking.

Fremantle is really a beautiful city, with well-preserved old buildings and wonderful atmosphere in the air. Really, in terms of shopping, it even beats the city of Perth itself. Oh, there are a couple of old churches and sculptures. They look so wonderful that I regretted not taking photos.
My housemate went on a little shopping spree at first (deviating from our original plan of buying books). We spent quite some time in Cotton On, due to the fact I urged her to try on the clothes she intended to buy. Who would simply buy anything without trying them on first? What if the colour doesn’t look good on her? Or what if the size is completely wrong?

After shopping, we walked around, looking for any bookshops in the vicinity. I remembered seeing a jovial old man singing some country songs on his guitar. Boy, was he good! I wished I had the time to listen to more of his songs. Fremantle is like that. There are a lot of live performances being played up for the tourists. In fact, some shops are only open on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays – special for tourists!

We went to two Elizabeth’s Secondhand Bookshop in Fremantle today. It is weird to have two branches of the same bookshop operating so near to each other. Then again, dear old TI has several Mastan Ghani restaurants and two Gulam Rasul restaurants – and TI is not that huge to begin with. Anyway, Elizabeth’s has quite good selections, generally speaking. I bought two books – The Drowning Tree by Carol Goodman and The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz. I picked the first because Jik Jane told me before about Carol Goodman’s books and I thought this one could be good too. Then the second is simply a random pick – I remembered reading about this book getting a particular literary award.

After two Elizabeth’s bookshops, we headed over to Bill Campbell’s Secondhand Bookshop. As I stepped into the place, I got very good vibes from it. The shop is small, but has that very personal feeling. It has that welcoming feeling lacking in most bookshops. The books are arranged in the shelves up to the ceiling (not that the ceiling is very high but still high enough for me not to reach it). It has a wide range of books – philosophical, crime, political, children’s books etc. The prices vary, but most are tagged at half of its original price. I bought four books there (it really is a book haven for me) – The Sonnet Lover by Carol Goodman, A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini, The Tenderness of Wolves by Stef Penney and The Horse Whisperer by Nicholas Evans. The first two novels are still in great shape; like they are still brand new but the other two have that worn, used look. I can’t promise myself to like all the books I bought, but hopefully I made the right choices.

I was feeling immensely happy but lugging around six novels could be a pain. We took a train back to the city and from there, we went to the State Library Shop (my second trip this week). I bought another book (Teacher Man by Frank McCourt – yay, I got all three of his books!) while my housemate bought four novels (I think).

From the State Library, we went to Northbridge where my housemate bought groceries for today’s dinner – tofu, kueyteow and some veggies. Then, we walked to Woolworth’s to meet Amy, my other housemate who was working at a juice bar. I was very tired because I had been walking the whole day. It is amazing how my housemate have the energy to keep on going like that and she walks faster than me too. I sluggishly tagged along, which was a pathetic sight.
Amy made juices for me and JM. I drank something with lots of berries in it. At first taste, it was horrible because it reminded me of the flavoured medicated syrup I used to take when I was little. I know medicated syrups are flavoured to make the medication less revolting for youngsters, but honestly those formulations just destroyed my first impression of the natural flavours that exist in our fruits! Okay, I got used to the fact that I was drinking a cool berry drink after a while. In fact, it was very refreshing that I got my energy back. Oh yeah, while I was there at Amy’s juice bar, we noticed a bunch of people in heavy makeup strolling into the mall. They went into some gift shops and took pictures of themselves. Amy said they were models (probably on some reality TV show). Ah, that explained the glamorous clothes and thick mascara. I saw them initially at the train station, but was too tired and too dense to notice that they were models.

After leaving Amy to chat with one of her customers (an old man – probably bored out of his wits), we went back home by bus. That is all for my trip today.

PS: And yes, lil bro... I know I bought more books today. In case you were wondering, my room still has got space for me to sleep in. Thank you very much for your concern.