Student Assignment:

34th CHENNAI BOOK FAIR

I. Observations on the Exhibition:

We visited the 34th Chennai Book Fair at St.George’s School. The Exhibition was very nice. There were 600 books shops all around us. For the first time we visited the book fair. There were religious books, comics, Tamil literature books, Oxford Edition books, Cambridge Edition books, and many CDs for kids that assisted in telling rhymes and the alphabet. Most of the stalls aimed to attract the kids. We found competitive examination books, studies’ oriented books and some centum scoring books for plus two students. Catalogues were also provided to us. A reporter and a camera man came from Kalaignar TV and asked our views about the book fair.

II. FAVOURITE STALL:

My favourite stall was kizhakku pathippagam. This stall contains lots and lots of books. It gave the basic knowledge about the politics and great politicians. Here, most of the books were in Tamil language.

I really love the books namely “A Better India: A Better World”, “The Audacity of Hope”, “Change We can Believe In”, “Dreams from my father”, and political books such as Prabhakaran’s life history, about Sri Lanka, how DMK became a supreme power, Rajiv’s assassination, and exciting powers of the world leaders such as life history of Bagat Singh, Adolf Hitler, “Iraq Plus Saddam Minus Saddam”, Ambedkar, Periyar and Anna.

Some Tamil literature books like Parthiban Kanavu, Silapadhigaram, Manimegalai, Ponniyin Selvan, Sivagamiyin Sabadham etc., were also there. And, I really love the book by Patricia Narayan, who is the winner of 2010’s 'FICCI Woman Entrepreneur of the Year' award.

III. FAVOURITE BOOK

I bought a book “The Art of Happy Living” by G.D.Budhiraja. It’s a common-sense approach to lasting happiness. I bought the book from Pustak Mahal. It had the main topics of causes of unhappiness, The wisdom of happiness, and some thoughts on happiness from great leaders. It tells how to forget the fear, anger, and hostility, stress, worry, feeling of guilt, self-doubt, resentment and hatred. We get happy only through love and affection and the positive outlook. For a happy life we have to drop the past and enjoy the present life. Vernon Howard said that, “No doubt you have heard many times the advice ‘to be happy, make others happy’. The scientifically accurate declaration is ‘to make others happy, be happy yourself’. Finally, the book shows how a spiritual and holistic approach ensures happiness by helping us deal with life’s hurdles in a cool and calm manner.

IV. PROGRAMME

A programme was going on there about mass media. It was a debate. The heading was ‘Is Mass Media a blessing to Society or a Curse to Society?” One party said that ‘TV is the main media in mass media. It relays news, current affairs, educational programmes, dramas, films, etc. We have to thank communication satellites. The world has shrunk still further. BBC, Star Plus, Discovery Channels etc telecast wonderful documentaries enriching the knowledge of viewers on nature and scientific development – cartoon networks – delight children.

The opposing side said that Television makes children neglect their studies and sit down glued to the TV. Many commercial firms conduct entertainment shows involving student population. Unfortunately children view these cheap filmy entertainment programmes and western dance programmes and lose their traditions and style.

Really, we enjoyed the exhibition.

Done by:
Kiruba, G & Vanitha, M, I BSc Pbt