When the water could finally be cleared, almost half their stock of 20,000 books had been destroyed
A week ago, Grace Karim and Somia Anwar had resigned themselves to the fact that Bookends, their beloved second-hand book shop, would never reopen.
The Bookend store in Dubai Silicon Oasis, known as one of the largest second-hand bookstores in the United Arab Emirates, was submerged by nearly a meter of water in the April 16 flood.
It took four days for the water to finally be purified, by which time he had disposed of almost half of his 20,000-volume inventory.
“For safety reasons, authorities have instructed us not to enter the area until the water is pumped out. So we can only watch helplessly and think about what we have lost. There were about 13,000 books that could no longer be stored, as well as much of the shelves and furniture,” Karim said.
In the building’s basement, floor-to-ceiling bookshelves and an overflowing book storage room were completely at the mercy of flooding. With nearly half of the books destroyed in one day, the co-founders initially saw the flood as a sign to give up and close.
But the outpouring of support they received from the local community encouraged them to keep trying to get back on their feet.
Community Flood Relief
Karim said: We posted a message on social media explaining what had happened and were soon flooded with messages from local readers asking what they could do. And the next day, dozens of volunteers appeared out of nowhere,” she added.
Since then, Bookend has hosted a group of approximately 30 volunteers each day.
“Some volunteers have brought their laptops as all submerged books must be removed from the online shop. The remaining books will also need to be recorded and re-sorted in numerical order.” said Karim.
Sorting sunken books is a difficult and time-consuming task. Work is expected to take at least another week.
Karim said: “Most books that get wet can’t be saved anymore. Some get moldy or have a very unpleasant odor. Even if they dry, you can’t open them anymore. But even if they get a little wet, about 100 After all, our books are like babies. Even if it doesn’t look perfect, has 20 shelves, and costs a lot of money to repair, I’ll keep it. “Water marks on the walls indicate that the water was more than 80 centimeters deep,” she added.
Encouraging reading in the UAE
Those who donate books to Bookends normally receive store credit in payment. But, since the floods, many readers are donating books and expecting nothing in return.
Launched initially as an online store in 2020, the goal of the business has always been to get more people reading.
Karim said: “I’m from Lebanon and my co-founder is from Pakistan. We both felt that books were too expensive in the UAE and so we decided to create a way of making reading more accessible and affordable. Our prices start from just AED 10, and initially we were focused just on kids’ books, but now we serve so many avid adult readers across the UAE.”
“We’ve found that there is a huge appetite for second-hand books here. With the support of our wonderful community, we are determined to come back stronger than ever,” she concluded.
Anyone keen to help with the clean-up of the store or contribute books is invited to get in touch with the team via the Bookendsae Instagram page.