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May Day: Bookstore in Review

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A glimpse into Delhi’s only ‘Leftist bookstore’ and what truly makes it one of its kind…

As you step out of a crowded metro coach on the blue line of the metro at a little station called Shadipur, you will see nothing significant out of the blue. At Shadipur, a settlement nestled in the folds of West Delhi, plain good ole Delhi shops and residential areas will greet your eyes. But if the explorer side in you is awakened and you look deeper, you will find an amusing art space. The mundane streets of this area hide a unique bookstore whose sign reads the word ‘May Day’ in Devanagari and English.

The May Day Bookstore is a joint for bibliophiles with a different touch. Right from its location and a look at its door (which reads ‘8 hours for work, 8 hours for rest, 8 hours for book and coffee’), you will get a breath of fresh air. This is no big shot book retailer’s outlet and neither is it a shack of pirated paperbacks. May Day can be referred to as a CCCP, which was the same Russian abbreviation used to denote Soviet Union. In May Day’s case, CCCP can stand for a Cultural Communist Coffee Space and that’s what it is. As the name suggests, the store was founded about six years back on the first of May, the worker’s day celebrated by Socialists and Communists worldwide.

The store’s pages and its wall’s faces bleed out the red shades of the Leftist school of thought. This becomes evident from the fact that it is managed by Leftword Books, which has been producing books that emphasise the views and issues of the Left in India and South Asia. So naturally, you can find racks here filled with books on peasant movements, trade unions, tribal activists and many other such themes. You can scan through these paperbacks under the watchful eyes of painted murals of Marx and Che Guevara, feminist posters and handbags featuring the faces of Bhagat Singh and BR Ambedkar. Within the bookstore, there is also a performance space for theatre, dance, talks and other cultural activities, called Studio Safdar.

The approach and setting of this place hence make it a spot worth exploring. It’s still funny if you think it out in your head if today a Right-wing bookstore also opens up in some corner of the city. What controversy would that brew! Well, that can be a debate for some other day. Till then freedom of speech for all!

But apart from the looks and books, it is not exclusively meant for Leftists and is open for readers of all types. Second hand books, classic bestsellers and works by up and coming writers from small independent publishers are also available at May Day. So, it is not necessary if red is your favourite shade or if you believe Karl Marx is Santa Claus to be a part of the May Day family. Therefore, if you are a bookworm in Delhi looking for a new store to raid, or if you are plain bored and wish to explore a spot with artsy aesthetics for your Instagram stories, or if you are a passionate Delhiite trying to run away from the capitalist malls on the lookout for a humbler milieu, then you may like to pay a visit to May Day…

Feature Image Credits: May Day Bookstore

Shaurya Thapa

[email protected]

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Biblio

Review: Pragati Maidan Delhi Book and Stationery Fair 2018

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wallahs, entrepreneurial in their endeavors as they are, willing to take you to the book fair. Initially, it seemed like a bad idea since the fair was at a short walking distance, however, owing to all the construction in and around Pragati Maidan, it made sense to us after we had walked till gate no. 1 but to no avail. The rains have not really helped in the process and have only made the situation worse by turning the whole way into an obstacle course, with waterlogged muddy pathways. Once you are inside, there is a shuttle bus system that is in place and would take you to Hall no. 7, where the fair was. The queues were long and it took us a while to reach our destination. The book fair in itself was smaller in size as compared to the one last year. The publishers were pretty much the same, with close to no new offerings. However, if you had not been to the book fair before, this was definitely the time to. We found various English classics and a lot of course-related books for DU students. If you are good at navigating through busy crowds and making your way to the heaps of books that can be bought at the number of 3 for 100, you are doing book fairs right. Personally, the collection wasn’t as varied as one would like it to be but still worth a visit for any book enthusiast   Feature Image Credits: India Trade Promotion Organisation Anoushka Singh [email protected]]]>

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QWERTY

Not Dead Yet! – App Review: Facebook Messenger 4

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Thought Facebook lost to WhatsApp & Viber? Well think again! The social networking giant, is still aspiring to make a mark in the world of instant messaging (guess buying your peers ain’t enough : P).

Facebook recently rolled out updates for its Messenger app for Android and iOS users & is simultaneously disabling the inbuilt chat feature present in the Facebook app  . For Android, the Facebook Messenger app has been updated to version 4.0, and for iOS to version 4.1.

Can this be a game changer? Let’s find out!

The Android update introduces features seen in the Facebook Messenger 4.0 for iOS released in end of March. This includes group messaging, as well as photo & message forwarding. The interface has been redesigned, and provides a great user experience. Also, much like WhatsApp, users can now pin contact shortcuts to their home screens – a feature also available in the new iOS app. You create a shortcut icon of any conversation with any of your friends and   the shortcut will open that particular chat window directly.

One feature that provides Facebook an edge over WhatsApp is the app’s ability to make free calls (via Wifi or mobile data) in all countries! Similar to Viber & Skype, users can call active friends without incurring any carrier charges. Had Facebook introduced video calls, it would have overpowered Apple’s FaceTime as well, hands down!

Facebook Messenger showcases enough features to blast the competition. For instance, the Chat Heads feature alerts you when you have a new message: while you are using some other app,  a bubble with the sender’s face pops up, and you can access the chat by tapping the face.  There’s a good collection of free sticker and smileys available. You can display your exact location to friends when you send a specific message or hide your location. Facebook Messenger has a Record Voice feature, which lets you record audio and then send it, similar to WhatsApp.

favebook4

Messenger allows you to group chat with up to 250 people at once (unlike Viber’s 40 and WhatsApp’s 30 group participants).You can also text those in your contacts, whom you aren’t friends with on Facebook!

Apart from the absence of Video Calling, another letdown is the apps inability to send videos, contacts, etc! Also, in a group chat, the option to leave the group is – missing! The app doesn’t allow you to log out as well (that’s creepy!).  Having a separate application for chatting is also very strange. Why can’t they integrate the same in the existing Facebook app? In fact by removing the messaging feature from the Facebook app,  Messenger is more of  a compulsion!

Barring these minor flaws the app is very efficient & looks refreshing. It offers all the features touted by the peers and even more!

The App / Update is available for Free on Google PlayStore & Apple AppStore .

 

Sidhant Malhotra

[email protected]


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DU Dhaba

Food Review: Cha Bar- Oxford Bookstore

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Books, Brownies and Beverages…

What more can a human being want?

If you are of a similar ideology, then Cha Bar is the place for you. Located in N block, Cannaught Place, opposite Statesman House, Cha Bar redefines the concept of Book Cafes. Opened inside Oxford Bookstore, the entrance has a graffiti made with bent tube lights and a showcase with a few coffee table books. The chamber opens into Cha Bar on the right and Oxford bookstore spread over in some 200 sq. yards. The place has books on every possible genre and the most comfortable and alluring places to sit and shuffle through them. Long with books, movies and magazines, it also has a few handmade items like diaries, wrapping papers, photoframes etc.

Cha Bar2

Cha Bar runs along the right hand corner of the bookstore. This small, intricately designed café can seat about 35 people at a time and has some excellent options for a quick bite. The food isn’t permitted into the main bookstore but if you order non greasy food and are nice enough, they may be willing to serve at the back where wooden benches have been placed for the ones who prefer to just read and not buy.

The food is more of salads and sandwiches. It also has beverages and desserts on the menu. If your going their for the first time and confused by the wide choices, you may want to go for the cottage cheese and panini sandwich along with five spiced cookies for dessert. They wont disappoint you.

Cha Bar1

Along with an excellent ambience, good service and superb crowd, the place is refreshingly affordable and doesn’t make you think twice. An elaborate meal for two, complete with dessert and beverage will cost well below a grand.

In conclusion, this is the place to spend a quiet Sunday afternoon.

Image Credit: Greta Khawbung for DU Beat

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Arts & Culture

Spell & Bound Bookshop and Café: A review

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The musky smell of crisp, new paper emanating from stacks upon stacks of titles sinks in the moment you enter Spell & Bound Bookshop and Café, the newest place to have moored its enticing anchor in the bustling area of SDA.  With its polished wooden floors and spiral staircases, Spell & Bound radiates a cozy, old-world charm that is immensely wanting in chain bookstores today.

The store itself is tiny; with the basement and ground floor dedicated to books, while the first floor serves coffee and kathis (the latter of which deserve a paragraph to themselves, as shall duly follow!). The stock is neatly shelved according to category, lined from end to end and packed tight with titles ranging from the latest in Indian and International fiction, to prizewinners, classics, and must-reads.

From Jack Kerouac to Henry Miller, from Tina Fey to Anthony Bourdain, liberally interspersed with Graham Greene and James Joyce as well, the oeuvre of the store is admittedly massive, and it is evident that they take their reading very seriously, and many a bibliophile can be found perusing through titles at complete leisure. Not limited only to fiction, the store has an entire section dedicated to coffee table tomes, some of which include books of images from the Victoria & Albert Museum, works of iconic photographers such as Angelika Taschen and Raghu Rai, to the exclusive limited edition book of Pucci prints (published by Taschen, sold out in most other parts of the world and legendary in every way).

However, the one area where it falls short is the prices: Spell & Bound, for all its inviting warmth of teak and mahogany, and musty paper smells, unfortunately does not go too easy on the pocket. Apart from smartly dressed yuppies often seen frequenting the place, the prices of vintage complete editions of Fitzgerald and Murakami (while thrilling to touch and covet) aren’t very conducive to the average college goer’s budgets. However, that isn’t always the case as the basement does stock the cheaper Bantam, Penguin Classic and Simon & Schuster versions as well.

However, if the hardback edition of Mohammad Hanif’s Our Lady of Alice Bhatti (Rs 499) is a bit out of range for you, despair not and head to the first floor instead to sink the distress into the absolutely delicious kathis served there. With quirky Delhi-inspired artwork on the wall, and the prices almost reasonable (before the vat kicks in), it’s usually flocked with people furiously discussing their downstairs purchases with the gusto only someone who reads is capable of.

C-11, Shop No 2, SDA Market, Opposite IIT Main Gate, New Delhi, India 110016

Iva Dixit
[email protected]

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Reviews

Bookstore review – New Book Land, janpath

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Situated down the sidewalk of Janpath is this tiny round store, stacked from floor to ceiling with books of every imaginable shape, size and colour. One of the oldest bookstores in the city, New Book Land has been around for well over five decades and continues making brisk sales even now.new book land “Salim uncle”, the owner of the store has a reputation for never sending a customer back empty-handed and though you wouldn’t guess so looking at its diminutive size, the shop has virtually every book you could need, ranging from the latest hard covers to books on world history, Indian culture, religion and the usual bestsellers. All you need to do is name the book and it magically appears in Salim uncle’s hands, fetched in an instant from some secret nook of his snug booth. In the rare case that a book is not available or out of stock, he even offers to order it for you. Free of all the customary dawdling and long queues that are so typical of the fancy bookshops around the city, this is one store which really values its customers’ time. If it’s some quick book-shopping you’re looking for, this is the place for you. Instant gratification comes at a price, though. And a fixed price at that, as the manila cardboard sign screaming “NO DISCOUNTS” would tell you. True to the board’s words, no bargaining is tolerated here and “window-shopping” is also a practice that is actively discouraged. Purchases, orders and inquiries can also be made via phone: 011 41530938.]]>

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Gadget Review : Mac book pro

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Like always, Apple never fails to go beyond one’s expectation in providing the best computing technology that has ever been produced, and the MacBook Pros are truly a part of it.

Made out of a single sheet in crisp silver aluminium, the Laptop is available in 13 and 15 inches respectively. It has an ambient light sensor keyboard, which lights out from below in the dark, and an auto light adjustment screen. The screen is LED and offers high resolution, making it very apt for those who are into film editing and photography, and for those who would like to enjoy a music video or a movie. The speakers are loud enough and offer excellent sound quality. The multi-touch track pad is a pleasure to use, as it offers various touch features similar to the iPhone, or perhaps more easy to use features.

Apple now offers its new operating system Mac OS Snow Leopard, which is the most advanced operating system in the world, and also the most user-friendly system, also making it accessible for physically challenged individuals like the deaf, dumb and the blind. The operating system also offers various applications and utilities making it a complete whole.

Starting at Rs. 68,000, the Macs have various versions available in the market and is truly worth every penny spent on it. Currently Apple is offering student discounts till September 26 where you can save upto Rs.15000, so hurry get your Mac now.

Rating: 9/10

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Uncategorized

Review: Facebook

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Let haggling after university courses becomes a thing of the past. With social networking sites ruling the roost, let’s explore the most hankered after course these days: facebook honours. Perhaps, the next big thing, this course enjoys a global range of diligent students. Age no bar unless you belong to the insignificant little age of 13 or below. Yes you little ones, slog your rear ends of with academics. Yes this one of a kind course believes in freedom of expression. It also believes in the freedom of whining and blabbering through the most random bizarre groups, blasphemous status messages and nonsensical notes e.g. I Want to Punch Slow Walking People In The Back Of the Head and The drunken text appreciation society. Yep, freedom of expression never got better.
However, prospective students oughtn’t to think FB Hons to be a cakewalk. One has to master its rather mind boggling applications. The wide range of subsidiary subjects is also one of the reasons for its mass popularity. While Compare people and top friends take Darwin’s theory of natural selection to a different level, well thought out elaborate quizzes offer useful lessons in psychology. So move over Sigmund Freud. Could you have ever told us which Buffy The Vampire Slayer Character we truly are? Word challenge and scramble are specially designed to increase language proficiency.
The course requires at least an hour of study daily even though many students may agree it’s hardly a burden. In fact the subject matter at hand becomes so engrossing that it threatens to take over your entire life.
However, during the past year, the course matter is being repeatedly revised to make it easier for the technologically retarded. This unfortunately hasn’t gone down well with many as it makes it even more confusing than ever.
Rating: four and a half stars
* Yawn, back to twitter, mate
** Not bad enough to make one change courses, not good enough to make me attend classes.
*** I’m flunking Facebook again
****- I study, study all night long
*****- I’m thinking along the lines of a Facebook Ph .D

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DUB Review: Rocky Aur Rani Ki Prem Kahani

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This article is an insight on ‘Rocky Aur Rani Ki Prem Kahani’ and how it delves to the social paradigm of our country.

As I walked out of the theatre feeling that I have been called poor by Karan Johar in 3 languages I couldn’t help but wonder, are over the top popcorn flicks the one stop solution of inducting social cues in the Indian audience.
Beneath Flashy costumes and larger than life setting Rocky and Rani ki prem kahani slips in commentaries on social hierarchies and prejudices . Be it the textbook feminist Rani Chatterjee’s relentless pursuit of a ghoonghat free Randhawa palace, Rocky’s glamour doing a solid uno reverse the overt sexualization of female heroines in Bollywood or the gender no bar kathak performances, the movie does not shy away from inclusion.

One might find the rom-com a little dismissive about matters that set televisions reporters (and seemingly the nation) on fire, be it the discourse on racism , profiling of gender restrictive talents or patriarchal set ups in general. Through the clash between a stereotypical ghoonghat clad loud Punjabi family with a high end cultured Bengali intellectuals, the subtle undertone that hit was about how quick we are to dismiss notions that do not quantify well in our spectrum. For example Rocky Randhawa’s speech after Rani’s father’s classical performance is publicly shamed by the hip Punjabi audience is one for which the dialogue writer deserves a raise if not a superior mandate into any conversation that mentions the ‘woke culture’ in the Indian society . What really struck a chord in his monologue was how accurately it portrayed the cultural bias we have nurtured
through our social settings. The contemptuous outlook at everything that doesn’t resonate with our presumably superior understanding of the world deserves nothing but a dismissal followed by a grunt.

The lionising of culture contrasted with the seemingly steep curve of understanding presented a dilemma that any diversified culture would relate to. Him reiterating again and again the need to have a more comprehensive understanding of different point of views hits the bullseye in the current social climate , given that every contentious issue divides the public into three spheres where one group hold the higher ground of intellectual injunction, the other of dogmatic persistence and the third being the ones who are at this point too afraid to jump into the complex web battling information and misinformation. The fear of being ‘cancelled’ by the woke culture leaves little to no room for them to inculcate new world views, something that our protagonist seemingly struggled with through half of the movie and culminated into a quirky yet thought provoking monologue.

I’m afraid that the monologue in  Rocky Aur Rani Ki Prem Kahani has done more for West Delhi gym guys than for feminism. Although the reactions to the movie can range from the audience bursting into loud ‘awws’, to scornful side eyes to the melodramatic social messages, the movie does provide a handful of insights that serve well to the ‘Dharma-tic’ audience.

Image Credits: Mint

Priya Shandilya
[email protected]

 

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Arts & Culture

DUB Review-Kyun?-Dastan Khoj Ki

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A collection of poems, ‘Kyun-Dastan Khoj ki’ by author Suraj Singh discusses fundamental aspects of life ranging from wealth to love and friendship. Read on to learn more. 

‘Kyun?- Daastan Khoj Ki’ is a thought-provoking book that delves into the profound question of “why” and its significance in our lives. With a target audience of young adults, college students, and university goers, the book aims to inspire and guide readers as they navigate their aspirational goals and explore the depths of their curiosities.

The book’s investigation of the “why” question is one of its central themes. Although, it encourages readers to contemplate the reasons behind the major aspects of life, invites them to embark on a journey of self-discovery and understanding. And challenges them to seek answers, unravel mysteries, and find their own unique perspectives. The book severely suffers from a lack of coherence and thematic consistency. The poems seem disconnected and randomly placed, making it difficult for readers to find a unifying thread or sense of purpose throughout the collection. The absence of a strong thematic foundation leaves the reader feeling disjointed and disengaged, preventing any meaningful connection with the poetry.

The author, Sooraj Singh, a recent graduate of Hindu College, University of Delhi has demonstrated a empathetic understanding of the target audience, recognizing their aspirations, dreams, and challenges in the book. Through his poems, he aims to inspire and motivate young individuals to question, explore, and pursue their passions.

Additionally, Singh tries to spark readers’ curiosity by incorporating the “why” question throughout the book. This is done in the hopes that the readers’ future endeavors will be guided and shaped by their curiosity. Often times, though, these lines come out as unoriginal and overused, lacking the inventive wording and novel analogies that make poetry engrossing.

In conclusion, “Kyun Dastan Khoj Ki” by Suraj Singh is a good read  for those who enjoy contemplating profound questions and exploring certain aspects of philosophy, but is not recommended for those who are seeking an impactful exploration of Thematically-rich Hindi poetry.

DU Beat

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