Journey To The moon--------- From Rs two lakhs to Rs 1470

       On Sunday, evening ``Beyond Moon and Mars (BMM),'' casually went to the Crosswords bookshop at Kemps Corner just to look around and see if there were any new new additions to space exploration and nuclear.

       There were none and BMM was not surprised!

       But, just as BMM was leaving, and when it did a final survey of the store, a particular book caught its attention which completely left it disoriented the whole night!!!

       Any idea which is that book. It was a huge coffee table publication called ``Moonfire,'' by none other than the legendary Norman Mailer, It is about the epic journey of Apollo 11 which was specially brought out to mark the 40th anniv of the first human landing on the moon.

       BMM grabbed the heavy book from the stand and flipped thru the pages. What pics and documents! It immediately left a deep and strong impact on BMM. What was the price? Rs 2100.

       The extremely amiable store manager told BMM that there was another version of the book he recently sold to an industrialist. Its price?  Rs two lakhs!!!!!  Why so expensive? The manager said along with the book where was a piece of the lunar rock too. What guarantee that it was a genuine rock!

        BMM recalls that when it was in the US it found pens being sold with a label claiming  that they were used by astronauts in space!  A terrific marketing gimmick indeed!

        Anyway coming back to the book, BMM came home from the bookshop[ very excited thinking only about this super publication  It made a loud announcement to its daughter, Rimanika and her friends. But, they took it very casually since they have been used to my never ending excitement about space exploration.

       Late at night, when BMM's wife, Usha, got back from a film, it told her about the book. She also heard it casually and gave me the `go,' to buy it. Wow!  That's great guys.

      On Monday at 11 a.m. BMM was almost the first visitor to the book shop It was hoping that the book had not been brought by any other space enthu like BMM. Who knows? .

     It carefully looked at the rack. Yes. It was there.

      BMM immediately brought.it.

      A further surprised awaited BMM at the counter.

      From Rs 2100, the book was sold for Rs 1470.

      What a journey to the moon folks.

      BMM has started reading it.

      Sometimes there is luck.


      



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