The Book That Found Me

22 August 2025

This evening, I was roaming around the lanes of Chandni Chowk, searching for Plato’s Republic as my professor had suggested reading it, and I was genuinely interested too, at least until I started reading.

I have been to these lanes many times before, but today, walking alone, they felt strangely unfamiliar. New shops, new turns that I felt I had never seen before kept appearing. All I remembered was that you had to take a left from the point where Jama Masjid becomes visible, or maybe that memory stayed with me only because I have always been fascinated by how life unfolds around such great monuments.

The crowd in the lanes kept reminding me that I was not really alone. I asked several shopkeepers about Plato’s book. Some said they did not have it, others told me to come back the next day. Slowly, I began to feel useless, how could I not find a book in the very hub of books. My thoughts were wandering like cluttered rooms in my head. Then suddenly, a man with a loudspeaker passed by, shouting random things, perhaps drunk. People around started laughing, and for a brief moment, the whole lane lit up with smiles.

Just then, a boy standing nearby asked me, Bhaiya, kitab loge?

I quickly said, Yes, yes, Plato ka Republic.

I was so eager to not feel defeated that I was not even sure he had heard me properly.

But he nodded and took me to a shop. After checking a few shelves, he said he needed to look in the storeroom and left me there for a while. I began looking around the shop. Just as I was about to sit on a chair, I noticed an old book lying on it. Without even glancing at it, I picked it up and placed it on the table.

A few moments later, my eyes went back to it. The cover was torn, the pages yellowed with age. Inside, on one of the first pages, there was some scribbled text, probably from someone who had read it before. It said a lot, but in short, it felt like a message, You must read this in your lifetime.

I was about to read the introduction when the boy returned with The Republic in his hand. Here, I found it, he said, adding that his shop had many such books and that I could come anytime. I agreed and was about to pay when, out of nowhere, my eyes returned again to that old, torn-paged book. I asked the boy how much it cost. He said, seventy rupees.

Without even knowing the author or much about the book, I bought it. For a moment, it felt like the universe itself wanted me to read it.

Fast forward, though I have only read a little of it so far, somehow it already feels like it carries the answers I was searching for. I think that is how life works, the things you chase often run away, but the things you are meant to find come to you at the right time, maybe not when you are looking for them, but when you are ready to understand them.

This is not the first time I have felt that the universe sends me things like this. But it always happens in its own mysterious timing, when I am finally able to notice and understand. I hope that when life sends you such moments, you are able to receive them with an open heart.

A Suggestion:

• https://nnanda-15.medium.com/irrfan-khan-20-life-lessons-from-his-20-quotes-6035e8f67826

• https://www.instagram.com/reel/C4Dgkz5Sfsg/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=NTc4MTIwNjQ2YQ==

Have a great life ahead! Goodbye!