Reading

Books - that used to be the thing that I use to smack any creepy crawlies on the table or throw at any annoying cats and dogs that can’t stop meowing and barking; the heavier the better! Nah, I’m just kidding. Reading was never my thing; to me books were just pieces of papers compiled together printed with words that kept on appearing over and over again. For example in this paragraph, you can see the word that appeared six times! Haha, I know it’s a stupid justification on why I don’t like to read. Well, except for comics of course. I keep my comics in a special place in my room and I arrange them neatly. I just love reading those damn things. And I’d freak out if I find one of my collections is missing. But all that was before I heard my brother told me a story.

One day my brother told me he read a book and how he could feel the characters and he was deeply affected by it and the way he told the story was as if he was in it himself! I took the book and flipped the pages. What-?! No drawings? All words? I just looked at him and inside I was amazed how this silly book could make him happy, sad, excited, and burst out laughing. Then he told me that I should read it so that I could feel what he felt. I flipped the pages again and I turned to the last page. What the hell?! Over a hundred pages?! – Great.

I began reading the book and as I was reading, I started to feel something. I see what I was reading! I was the character. I felt myself at the beach, I saw this guy named Ray with his brown curly hair and brown eyes, I live in a big mansion overlooking the sea. Wow. I feel and see all these just by reading? I can’t believe I can read books without pictures! I continued reading pages after pages until I saw a familiar page – oh no, it’s the last page!

That was how I fell in love with reading. Since then I would ask my mum to drop me off to the library every weekend so that I could read and borrow some books to read. Ah, I could spend the whole day there just searching for a good book to read and find some quiet spot to enjoy it. The library was the place to be for me up till I finished high school. Ever since I entered college, the mall became the place ‘cause no one among my friends would waste their time in a building filled with books. *sigh*

After college, I entered uni and I was excited when I saw a big library building situated right in the middle of campus. Alas, all the books there were academicals, just not my cup of tea. My reading materials became less and so did my free time. At one point, I stopped reading fictions altogether and all I read was about how to calculate energy, how to do mass transfer, how to design a control system, how this, how that. Arghhhh! My brain failed to absorb any of the materials and all the how tos lasted only till the final exam. But if you ask me about the fictions I read years ago, ah, I could tell you the story as if it was fresh from the oven.

A few months back I remembered the book that first fell in love with. I wanted so much to read it and I kept talking about it to my friend. She then told me find it at e-books. I tried, but I failed. I don’t know what string she pulled or what magic she used, she managed to download the books from e-books! I started to read it day and night until all six books were finished in less than a week. I was on my laptop all day n night reading chapters after chapters. God, if only I am this focus and attentive with my academical books! *sigh*.

Although I’ve read the books before, I’m still in love with it and the impact I had the first time I read was still the same. This book, if you are wondering is none other than The Last Vampire by Christopher Pike. I just can’t get enough of it, I love all six volumes of it and I can read all six over and over again and never get bored. I’m crazy about his books. I’ve read most of his books and I love them all.

*sigh* I should stop here. There are piles of how tos books I need to read now. I wish I’m a 5000-year-old vampire tho so I can speed read and have a photographic memory just like Sita. That would make my life easier~ . OK, ok back to reality now. Books, journals, articles… die……