[:en]English Corner: Reading[:]

[:en]Since the topic is about reading, I think I should explain why reading is good for you before I start going into the books that I’ve read. The main reason when I said “reading is good for you” is because reading has some benefits. For example, it can help you gain new information, improve your memory, expand your vocabulary list, reduce stress, and it even doubles as entertainment! You may be thinking to yourself, “isn’t reading only good for memorizing information before a test?”. The answer is no! Yes, it is good for gaining information before an exam, but there are more types of reading than just reading from your textbook. For instance, you can read novels, fairy tales, comics, or even YouTube comments from that one funny YouTuber you like.

Okay, enough explaining. Let’s get into the good stuff, which is the books that I’ve read over the past few months. The author is called Risa Saraswati and she’s written a ton of novels that tell the stories from her ghostly friends who died back in the 1900s in Bandung. Their names are Peter, Hendrick, Hans, William, and Janshen. As you might guess by now, Risa can see supernatural beings that we can’t see with our naked eyes, even though you might have seen a glimpse of a shadow figure walk past a few times, but that’s a story for another time.  But, there’s more about this writer. She was the author of the novel ‘Danur’ and she inspired the makers of that horror film. Currently, I’m reading her fifth novel, ‘Janshen’, but the novel that I’m going to recommend is her fourth novel which is about her unseen friend, William.

In this book, we learn that William was born into a wealthy family but he isn’t happy at all. His mother is very greedy and doesn’t even love him, but fortunately his father is very loving although he can’t refuse his wife’s orders to either buy her glamorous dresses, jewelry, and so on. The ending is actually a happy ending since William knows that if he dies, he will be happy since he won’t have to suffer from his mother who is always torturing and forcing him to follow her every order. It’s a really sad story about a broken but rich and wealthy family. The point that I’m trying to make here is that even though you have everything you want, that doesn’t mean that you’re automatically happy since you’ve got everything, it’s the complete opposite of happiness. After I finished reading William’s story, I realized that money isn’t everything. Trying to live a happier life, not caring about anything that involves race, religion, skin color, and so on, and just trying to accept yourself and others is what matters more than money, jewelry, and other expensive things that you can’t bring into the afterlife with you.

So yeah, I really recommend this novel to anyone who is into a bit of history and wanting to learn more about what it’s like to be a Netherlander back in the day. That’s all I have to say today, thank you for reading this long story and I hope you have a fantastic day!

By Tania Esmara 11 Social[:]