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A 9 year old tells us in this sweet piece, how books became his best friends, despite a crippling eye affliction.
In December 2015, we had #BookTalk, a theme based writing contest. There were some children who wrote in. Although we could not use these as contest entries, we appreciated the effort. Sharing the first one of these, by a 9 year old.
The cue was: “Books are the plane, and the train, and the road. They are the destination and the journey. They are home.” ― Anna Quindlen, How Reading Changed My Life
Here is what 9 year old Nimal has to say.
Imagine a life without reading. Reading is very good for our memory. It makes us involved. It also teaches us many words, idioms etc. Reading is also fun. I enjoy reading horror, mystery and adventurous books. We get so excited when we start reading an adventurous book.
I started reading books when I was 6 years. My mother used to tell me a lot of stories. She bought me a lot of books and I got used to reading them. First I started a book called ‘Tales of Panchatantra’ which has a lot stories in it.
It had big fonts and so many pictures. It had many interesting stories. As I started a book I started reading many books and asked my parents to buy more. I developed problems with my vision. And this became a big problem. The doctor asked me to wear a big, fat spectacles. At first I felt weird. It was very irritating that I felt like throwing my spectacles to the dustbin. My parents did not allow me read for a couple of months. After that my mother got me few more books. When I started reading first few pages my eyes started to hurt. Later my parents helped me. They helped with meanings for the new words. I started using these words again and again. And then my eyes started to hurt even more. I had to visit the doctor. The doctor said I could only read 5 to 10 minutes a day and not more than that.
I started to read 10 minutes every day. I increased the time day by day and now I can read without any difficulty. I enjoy reading books. Reading has helped me a lot in my life. It has calmed me down. If there’s no book in my life there would be no fun. Now my best friend is a book.
Image source: boy with a book by Shutterstock.
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