Geeko Book Club

Disclaimer: The writer is not writing this to correct or compete with Su Chuen's post.

You know how disclaimers are usually written at the bottom of something. well, i decided to write it at the top.

This is the first time in a long time i have read a book. I can't say this is the first time i have read a book because it is not true and i wouldn't want to give nadia or now ai li as it seems a run for their money.

i have only in my whole life however read 6 books from beginning to end:
1) Bridget Jones diary 1 and 2
2) The curious incident of the dog in the nightime
3) Swiss Family Robinson
4) Harry Potter- all the episodes
5) some Enid Blyton books i read as a kid
6) Memoirs of a Geisha.....and this is where my story begins.

haha...cheh...drama-nya. ya well, that's how the book kinda goes as well.

i guess all the synopsis was already mentioned by chuen.

sadly, the story is completly fictional. aarrrgghhh...i was conned!! how stupid was i. i thought that when a book said "memoirs of a geisha" it meant- this book that you are now going to read contains memoirs of a geisha. just the same way one would expect "Baking Cherry Pies by Betty Bot" to mean -this book that you are now going to read contains cherry pie recipes by Betty Bot. well of course i overlooked the fact that if the book is written by ARTHUR GOLDEN it means that Memoirs of a Geisha is in fact not to be viewed in the same way as Baking Cherry Pies by Betty Bot is. i only discovered this truth when i was already 1/4 way through the book, and i glanced to the back of the book and to my horror there was the acknowledgements written by ARTHUR GOLDEN (who is not a geisha) saying "bla bla bla....completly fictional....bla bla bla"....GASP!!! the horror!!!!!!!

so i went through the rest of the book thinking.....aiyah....ya lor..where got this kind of thing happen in real life one.

anyway....the book is good. the grammar is sometimes very ununderstandable and the author uses alot of alliterations and similies.

the story is very touching. it is the kind of book that a true romantic would love.

in fact, if everyone in the world had read this book, then as i always say, there would be 2 kinds of people in this world- one who thinks Sayuri should end up with Nobu as her danna and the other kind who thinks that Sayuri should be with the Chairman.

i am the latter.

everyone takes with them a pair of glasses with which to see the world. these glasses have our past experiences, or values and dreams. when we read books or do anything else for that matter, we use these pair of glasses to do it. (and no i don't just mean those who don't have perfect vision). i guess this is why we all predict the content of books to mean different things.

to me this book was ironic. the main gist of the book was about destiny. it spoke about nothing but destiny and the paths in life from the beginning to the end. Japanese people especially geisha believed firmly that one couldn't avoid their destiny if it is already written for them. and yet the brave girl who is the star of the book, turned her destiny around. she refused to give into her destiny because she didn't like her destiny at all. if she gave into her destiny it would mark the end of her life( though not physically). She never let go of hope. Because a life without hope wouldn't be a life at all i guess.

This book reminded me that hope is one of the most important things in life.