Yuletide Treats!

Once again, the Yuletide season has crept up on possibly the worst holiday season shopper in the Philippines, yours truly. While more responsible gift givers accomplish their holiday shopping well before even the hint of the ghost of the season rears its gaudily decorated, cheery head, I'm scrambling to even make out a list of gifts.

At the risk of ruining the delightful surprise which normally accompanies the ritual of opening gifts on Christmas eve for my friends and loved ones, my "go-to" gift is normally a book. Earlier, as I braved the pre-lunchtime shopping mob at SM Megamall, I dropped by both National Bookstore and Powerbooks, and I found out, much to my joy, that there are some fantastic bargains to be had in the midst of all the Dan Brown paperback book sets.

One such gem comes from the Dover Thrift Edition imprint, where one could get The World's Greatest Short Stories edited by James Daley for less than Php 200. The short story collection includes a sentimental favorite of mine, the wonderful short story by the Japanese master Yasunari Kawabata, "The Grasshopper and the Bell Cricket". I would've bought the book, which includes a creditable selection of works by Tolstoy, Chekhov, Joyce, Kafka, Updike, Pirandello, and Mann, for that story alone. Allow me to share a how this beautifully realized vignette, (a collection of observations, really, about rather ordinary things) coalesces, in the sure hands of a master craftsman, into a quietly lyrical meditation on life and love:

Even if they remembered forever that Fujio had given her the cricket and that Kiyoko had accepted it, not even in dreams would Fujio ever know that his name had been written in green on Kiyoko’s breast or that Kiyoko’s name had been inscribed in red on his waist, nor would Kiyoko ever know that Fujio’s name had been inscribed in green on her breast or that her own name had been written on Fujio’s waist.

Fujio! Even when you have become a young man, laugh with pleasure at a girl’s delight when, told that it’s a grasshopper, she is given a bell cricket; laugh with affection at a girl’s chagrin when, told that it’s a bell cricket, she is given a grasshopper.

Even if you have the wit to look by yourself in a bush away from the other children, there are not many bell crickets in the world. Probably you will find a girl like a grasshopper whom you think is a bell cricket.

And finally, to your clouded, wounded heart, even a true bell cricket will seem like a grasshopper. Should that day come, when it seems to you that the world is only full of grasshoppers, I will think it a pity that you have no way to remember tonight’s play of light, when your name was written in green by your beautiful lantern on a girl’s breast.

Another cool buy would be the Vintage imprint edition of The Elephant Vanishesby Haruki Murakami, which is available for less than Php 400. For those who would want to get into Murakami, but could not afford to before due to the prohibitive prices which normally accompany his works, this is your chance to get to know the author. Normally, I would affix a multisyllabic compound descriptive to accompany my recommendation, but words fail me. Trust me. It's good stuff.

Photo Credits:

Picture of the frontcover to the Dover Thrift Edition imprint of The World's Greatest Short Stories comes courtesy of Dover Publications

Picture of the frontcover to the Vintage Imprint Edition of The Elephant Vanishes comes courtesy of Random House Vintage