KITAB AND CAFÉ — two favourite words set side by side in a diary, years before there was a room to hold them. It opened in Bengaluru in 2023, and found its Goa chapter in Arpora in 2026.
MERI KITAB KI KAHANI
Read my story →Hola! (Spanish) · Ciao! (Italian)
Konnichiwa! (Japanese) · Ni Hao! (Chinese)
Salaam · Namaste!
Chapter one
Trust me — I hadn't read many books. Not in school, not in college. I always scored better in languages than in physics or maths, because English, Kannada and Hindi had kahaniyan in them. I always wanted to become one of the characters in the story — and lose myself in it.
Reading is essential for those who seek to rise above the ordinary.— Jim Rohn
1But when I started reading — really reading — it made me see the whole world, and the people in it, completely differently. Whenever and whichever books I have read, they have been nothing less than life- and game-changers. I tell myself: if you're not reading that day, just read one page.
A day without reading is like… just kidding, I have no idea.— Anonymous
2The hardest part has always been the same question — what's my next book? If I've read forty or fifty, I must have stopped at least two hundred after the first eighteen pages. The reason could be anything: the subject, the language, the writing. Sometimes I stopped because I thought, okay, I know this about life now.
If you don't like to read, you haven't found the right book yet.— J.K. Rowling
3Yes, I love The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari — but I love my monk with a Coke more. And no Ferrari yet: I sold my BMW 5 Series and my Harley Davidson (twice) to buy and sell some coffee.
Reading one book is like eating one potato chip.— Diane Duane
4Kitab Café — I wrote this name in my diary six or seven years ago, because these two words held two of my favourite things. Around 1997, a friend asked if I'd seen The Godfather. I said, "What's that?" We watched it more than ten times — nine of them just to understand what the hell the Godfather was saying.
The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who cannot read.— Mark Twain
5Then, to understand one character — Luca Brasi — I was introduced to Mario Puzo. I read The Godfather, and what a film I saw in that book. In 2010 I used to reach college an hour before the doors opened — so I could sit on my favourite stairway and secretly finish my book.
So many books, so little time.— Frank Zappa
6The idea here is simple, and it's the whole reason for this place: read. Just read. Fiction or non-fiction, autobiographies or GK, Paulo or Manto, self-help or The Godfather. I can give you my reasons — but they can't be yours. My reason can't be your inspiration to read.
A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies. The man who never reads lives only one.— George R.R. Martin
7Doston,
please read.
Swaroop
Founder, The Kitab Café
