The Keeper of Books - Old, Rare & New

On 26th May 1995, Mayi Gowda, a young student from a small village near Mysore called Rangasamudra, made his way to Bangalore. In the early 90s, Rangasamudra was a village of 150 families with limited exposure to the world beyond. Mayi aspired to become an electrical engineer – a career that he thought of purely based on the little he had heard about higher education from those around him. This was the only career guidance he had.

He discussed his intent of pursuing engineering with his family, but they didn’t have the resources to fund further education. Determined to support himself on the pursuit of his potential, Mayi decided to come to Bangalore. All he had was dreams, and a resolve to create a future for himself.

In Bangalore, he found himself a job at a factory, so that he could work nights and attend classes during the day. He could sustain this grind for one semester, but inevitably fatigue caught up and he had to stop working at the factory.

The struggle for sustenance now got tougher. Finding a place to stay was turning out to be a challenge. Following a lead for a hostel in Vijayanagar, he approached the person in charge with a request for accommodation, but things did not work out.

“That was the turning point”, he recounts, as he narrates his journey.

The next lead he got was for a hostel at Majestic, the area with the busiest bus terminals in Bangalore. There he got the accommodation, but it had no other facilities. Getting something as basic as water required a trip to the nearby police station. By now, he had decided to drop out of engineering.

While observing what was going on around the hostel, a makeshift pavement book stall caught his attention. He approached them and offered to pitch in and help. As he got familiar with the business of selling used books, an entrepreneurial thought inspired him to set up a pavement book stall at Mahatma Gandhi Road, or MG Road, a buzzing road with retail shops, restaurants, and offices.

Determined to implement his idea, Mayi set out with two bags of used books and set up his stall in front of Mayo Hall (thinking that this was MG Road), an elegant building located in the heart of the city.

His roadside book stall started doing well. He could see the potential of it becoming a venture that could fund his education. One day, it started raining and he picked up his bag of books and started walking ahead to find a place that could protect his books from the rain. As he walked further ahead, he saw a sign for MG Road, and smiled to himself realising that all this while, he had confused Mayo Hall for MG road.

At MG Road, he found a new place for his stall at the pavement right in front of Higginbothams, one of Bangalore’s oldest bookstores, which was then under renovation. The business picked up at the new location and Mayi began making enough revenue to get back to engineering.

He completed his engineering successfully and even got himself a job at General Electric. However, about 15 days into the job, he felt his heart was not into it. He decided to take up a small shop in Brigade Gardens and that is how Blossom Book House was born in the year 2002. For him, the name Blossom symbolises the journey of transformation from the footpath stall to setting up his own store.

For the last 20 years Blossom Book House has continued to grow, not only in terms of its presence and expanse but also in the hearts and minds of Bangaloreans who have made it one of the most visited bookstores in the city.

As Mayi shared his journey with me, he remarked how not getting accommodation at Vijayanagar was the turning point in his life. And that whatever happens, happens for good. Had he got that accommodation, he wouldn’t have started his journey of curating books that have brought joy in lives of so many bibliophiles.

“It has surely been a struggle, now that I look back”, he says with a gentle smile.

I asked him about the key insights from his journey and here is what he said:

1. ?If you feel inspired to do something, don’t hold back. Be open to making course corrections on the way but make a beginning.
2. Follow your intuition.
3. Remember, that struggles come and go, so don’t get bogged down by them.

There are many touching and memorable moments associated with Blossom Book House that he treasures. Here are some of them:

·?????A customer once walked in with her 6 year old who insisted that she wanted to celebrate her birthday at Blossom. This moved Mayi to tears.

·?????Once a customer walked into the store to find a book (Dune by Frank Herbert) that he had lost at an airport. He had written his name on the book, and he had a feeling that he will find the same copy at Blossom, and sure enough, he found it!

·????During the first wave of the pandemic, a customer called Mayi to ask how things were going and offered to help saying that he would do all he could to sustain Blossom because it has a special place in his heart.

There are many more memories that Mayi has collected on this journey. In fact, he knows of a few couples who first met at Blossoms and then ended up getting married ??.?

I for sure have made memories at Blossom, right from adding rare used books with frayed pages and notes written on the margins to recently celebrating the launch of my book, The Tenth Story. Blossom Book House will always remain close to my heart.

Getting to know more about the story behind Blossom Book House and Mayi's journey is my way of celebrating 20 years of Blossoms. I am glad I decided to speak to him and find out about his journey. It has helped me strengthen my belief in following one's intuition, grit and perseverance.

I hope you enjoyed reading this story!

My book is available for purchase at Amazon

Thank you for reading :)

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References 

www.thebetterindia.com

bengaluru.citizensmatter.in

cntraveller.in