KARACHI: Instead of what you are anticipating while waiting near the departure gate with your hand baggage next to you, an announcement informs you of the delay in the arrival and thus departure of your flight. How to while away your time now? Strolling in the passenger lounge at Jinnah International Airport, you find several gift shops, eateries, etc. But all, even the chemist for last-minute emergency buys, sell you stuff at exaggerated prices.

Stop and read!

Sure, you can stuff yourself with more snacks and savoury stuff or help yourself to the sweets and chocolates on offer but if you are the kind looking for some peace and quiet with something to read, you can always head to the Travellers Book Club and Book Shop, an initiative of the National Book Foundation in collaboration with the Civil Aviation Authority at the airport. “Feel free to read books, magazines and newspapers here (promotion of reading habits is our mission),” the plates on the counter and two little wooden entrances to the place say.

Membership option to acquire books at a generous discount.

So anyone is welcome to step inside, pick up any reading material which may interest you and take a seat on any one of the places provided by the shop to kill time while waiting for your flight. “Some travellers who may select a big book and get engrossed in it feel they can’t put it down after all and decide to purchase it from us in order to keep on reading during their flight and so on. So we also make sales this way,” says shopkeeper Fahim Mansoor.

Variety of reading material to choose from.

“That’s what just happened with this gentleman, who picked up Qudratullah Shahab’s voluminous Shahabnama and realised he couldn’t part with it,” he adds smilingly.

“We have so much reading material to choose from,” the shopkeeper points out while gesturing around him. There are no dog-eared books, all fresh and crisp new copies. Even the neatly lined copies of various newspapers on the coffee table in front are crisp. “Well, we take good care of our books, though we have to be extra cautious with kids, especially those with crayons, markers or their dad’s pen in hand,” he says. Also, those who borrow books to read are requested to do so inside the shop’s comfortable sitting area otherwise the shopkeepers would have a tough time keeping track of the people walking off with their books in hand in the passenger lounge.

A comfortable sitting area within the bookshop.

Besides assorted newspapers, which the shopkeeper says they purchase themselves everyday, there are children’s books, cookbooks, coffee table books, novels, biographies and others along with religious books on offer at the shop to read or buy. “We get the books usually from the publishers and, in the case of foreign books, the distributors, on a discount,” the shopkeeper explains. “There is also a membership option that works in your favour,” he informs. The membership and its annual fee is Rs110 only after which the books can be bought at 50 to 55 per cent off!

“Besides at Jinnah International Airport, we have our bookshops for travellers at the Cantonment Railway Station here in Karachi, Allama Iqbal International Airport in Lahore, the Lahore Junction Railway Station and the Rawalpindi Railway Station. We also hold our own book exhibitions in April and December besides featuring in exhibitions organised by others such as the Karachi International Book Fair. Then we have a mobile book van service of two vans in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, another two in Islamabad which is soon to kick off in Lahore as well. We are also talking to the Sindh government to start the service in Karachi,” says Syed Maqbool Ali, National Book Foundation’s regional in charge here.

Published in Dawn December 21th , 2014