Holidays. And Books.

A holiday without books – sacrilege ! Part of the excitement of packing for a holiday lies in calling ahead and finding out which books are available at the relative or friend’s house or hotel you are going to stay at, then selecting which books to carry with yourself, factoring in how much free time you will have, what sort of mood you will be in, maybe even where you will sit and read – in a hammock, in an easy chair, curled up near the fireplace, on a bench with a view of the hills and trees etc.

At least one book that I read during a vacation (apart from a guidebook) matches the place that I am travelling to; the atmosphere of the place helps me get so much more involved in the events in the book. I like to carry a book about mountains or mountaineering when in the hills; for instance, ‘Into Thin Air’ by Jon Krakauer (though not advisable while on a high-altitude trek, it’s about a climbing tragedy on Mount Everest), or ‘Nandadevi’ by Bill Aitken or ‘Silk Road on Wheels’ by Akhil Bakshi. When trekking through forests, I revisit chapters about Mirkwood or about the Ents from the ‘Lord of the Rings’ trilogy. If visiting Buddhist monasteries in Sikkim, Ladakh etc, a book on Buddhism does very well – the autobiography of the Dalai Lama, something by Pico Iyer etc.

It’s always nice to have one thriller or suspense novel at hand too – an Agatha Christie, a Perry Mason. And a light, humourous novel in case the murder mystery gets too scary – P.G.Wodehouse and Terry Pratchett are old favourites; some fibre for the brain to chew on – Amitava Ghosh maybe, nothing too heavy though, no Kafka, no tome on microeconomics, not for me. A collection of poems by various poets is also nice to dip into every now and then.

For one person to lug so many books around is a bit much, even after combining categories by selecting an author such as Bill Bryson (travel writing and humour). Hence I have learnt that choosing travel companions with care is very important. Choose them not for the quality of their conversation, or their enthusiasm levels, or good humour when faced with a ticketing ba**s-up, or the grace with which they lose to you at taboo/scrabble/pictionary etc; choose travel companions for the books they read and you cannot but enjoy the vacation.

By,
Zen