Dear All
In front of my Singapore shop is Canadian Pizza. From time to time, the manager will signal me to take the empty drinks cartons he's throwing away, before the karang guni guys who hunted these pieces come. Dont be surprise to see me carrying used boxes across the street. He knows I use a lot of them for packing our furniture and collectibles to Kuala Lumpur. He often sees me haggling with Ong, a weekend taxi driver and a karang guni man on weekdays, from whom I buy used cartons for packing.(Ong is not just a karang guni man. He is also my friend)
I have never used new cartons for packing. Apart from the fact that they are expensive, I believe in conservation. I consider SECOND CHARM as a conservation business. When I first started the business and coming out with my first simple flyer, the motto then was "recycle, reuse, restore, resell makes the world a better place." We are a bit more sophisticated now since we are dealing more and more with vintage furniture, calling SECOND CHARM - An ode to the past. I might just use Marcel Proust "remembrance of things past" for a change.
Nevertheless, I still believe that whether we call it antique, vintage, used, preowned, preloved - the essence is still conservation. I think SECOND CHARM is doing a great job of circulating things around, of maintaining, restoring and breathing new lease of life into old stuffs and of finding new owners for them, who will give them new meanings and new loves. Recently, a celebrity customer, Nadya Hutagalung (former MTV VJ, model, actress, jewelry designer , entrepreneur and conservationist) bought a few pieces of furniture from us in its original condition. One of them was a vintage chair in a very bad state and I was quite reluctant to sell it to her, offering to restore it for her first. She insisted on the original condition and what she said deeply touched me, " Let me see, whether I can give it a little love"- a true and passionate conservationist as she is. I become a fan of her facebook - Green Kampong because of that.
Coming back to the the empty used cartons across the street; while picking them up, I saw a few big boxes nearby. Most of them are sealed except for a few on top. Inside the open boxes are books. I still love books inspite of the power of the internet. I flipped quickly through them and my heart literally fluttered. Inside the open boxes, were books by Foucault, Daniel Boorstin, Derrida, Sartre, William Blake, a history of Chinese symbolism, a hard cover book on history of costumes, a big colourful book on Masterpieces of Western arts, Dostoevsky's Brother Karamazov, a stack of interior designer magazines, Harvard Business review journals and mangas etc.
Fancy finding Foucault, Boorstin, Derrida, Sartre and Dostoevsky dumped outside Canadian Pizza on a small lane in Singapore. They were my reading list back then. I remember reading Boorstin 'The Image" from cover to cover and struggling through Foucault, Sartre and Derrida. Either I'm slow or Frenchmen are difficult to understand. Back then, among my friends, mutterings of Foucault, Sartre and Derrida, gives one the sidekick of being a would be intellectual. Give me Lu Hsun and Fanon instead! As to Dostoevsky, simply love him and other late 19the century Russian thinkers and writers. I still treasure them as part of my collection. On the second level of my shop in Singapore and in my office in KL, are some books which some of my customers have been trying to lay their hands on but are not up for sales. They are there because we run out of space at home.
Curious, I asked the manager about the books. He mentioned that they belong to a guy who just close shop upstairs, and the books were supposed to be sold to the library. (I dont think library buys secondhand books). And that someone was supposed to take them away, he said. Acting on instinct as sometime we business people have to, or call it risk taking, I made a quick offer to the manager to be relayed to the owner, that I'm interested to buy the whole boxes even without opening the rest.(I already have an idea of his book taste) I was prancing up and down my shop, waiting in excitement. He came back a few minutes later with a slightly higher quote than mine. He must have included his commission. Fair enough. Everybody needs to make a living. As a close business friend of mine would says; "cari makan, beb". I paid him immediately. In this business, cash is really king, especially when dealing with the runners and dealers, who expect immediate payment.
Afraid that the owner might change his mind, I hurried my helpers to ferry the books across. 12 boxes of them. I spent the whole afternoon going through them. Great surprises like this sometimes gives you the feeling of discovering buried treasures. Those close to my interests will definitely be for keeps and the rest will be put up at my new blog at www.secondcharmbooks.wordpress.com. It may not grow to be as big as Amazon.com. I still believe that small is beautiful. But if the books give great joy and meaning to the new owners, I would then, consider the objective of the blog, to have been achieved.
Counting on your support.
Thanks and warmest regards
Sharifah
SECOND CHARM
In front of my Singapore shop is Canadian Pizza. From time to time, the manager will signal me to take the empty drinks cartons he's throwing away, before the karang guni guys who hunted these pieces come. Dont be surprise to see me carrying used boxes across the street. He knows I use a lot of them for packing our furniture and collectibles to Kuala Lumpur. He often sees me haggling with Ong, a weekend taxi driver and a karang guni man on weekdays, from whom I buy used cartons for packing.(Ong is not just a karang guni man. He is also my friend)
I have never used new cartons for packing. Apart from the fact that they are expensive, I believe in conservation. I consider SECOND CHARM as a conservation business. When I first started the business and coming out with my first simple flyer, the motto then was "recycle, reuse, restore, resell makes the world a better place." We are a bit more sophisticated now since we are dealing more and more with vintage furniture, calling SECOND CHARM - An ode to the past. I might just use Marcel Proust "remembrance of things past" for a change.
Nevertheless, I still believe that whether we call it antique, vintage, used, preowned, preloved - the essence is still conservation. I think SECOND CHARM is doing a great job of circulating things around, of maintaining, restoring and breathing new lease of life into old stuffs and of finding new owners for them, who will give them new meanings and new loves. Recently, a celebrity customer, Nadya Hutagalung (former MTV VJ, model, actress, jewelry designer , entrepreneur and conservationist) bought a few pieces of furniture from us in its original condition. One of them was a vintage chair in a very bad state and I was quite reluctant to sell it to her, offering to restore it for her first. She insisted on the original condition and what she said deeply touched me, " Let me see, whether I can give it a little love"- a true and passionate conservationist as she is. I become a fan of her facebook - Green Kampong because of that.
Coming back to the the empty used cartons across the street; while picking them up, I saw a few big boxes nearby. Most of them are sealed except for a few on top. Inside the open boxes are books. I still love books inspite of the power of the internet. I flipped quickly through them and my heart literally fluttered. Inside the open boxes, were books by Foucault, Daniel Boorstin, Derrida, Sartre, William Blake, a history of Chinese symbolism, a hard cover book on history of costumes, a big colourful book on Masterpieces of Western arts, Dostoevsky's Brother Karamazov, a stack of interior designer magazines, Harvard Business review journals and mangas etc.
Fancy finding Foucault, Boorstin, Derrida, Sartre and Dostoevsky dumped outside Canadian Pizza on a small lane in Singapore. They were my reading list back then. I remember reading Boorstin 'The Image" from cover to cover and struggling through Foucault, Sartre and Derrida. Either I'm slow or Frenchmen are difficult to understand. Back then, among my friends, mutterings of Foucault, Sartre and Derrida, gives one the sidekick of being a would be intellectual. Give me Lu Hsun and Fanon instead! As to Dostoevsky, simply love him and other late 19the century Russian thinkers and writers. I still treasure them as part of my collection. On the second level of my shop in Singapore and in my office in KL, are some books which some of my customers have been trying to lay their hands on but are not up for sales. They are there because we run out of space at home.
Curious, I asked the manager about the books. He mentioned that they belong to a guy who just close shop upstairs, and the books were supposed to be sold to the library. (I dont think library buys secondhand books). And that someone was supposed to take them away, he said. Acting on instinct as sometime we business people have to, or call it risk taking, I made a quick offer to the manager to be relayed to the owner, that I'm interested to buy the whole boxes even without opening the rest.(I already have an idea of his book taste) I was prancing up and down my shop, waiting in excitement. He came back a few minutes later with a slightly higher quote than mine. He must have included his commission. Fair enough. Everybody needs to make a living. As a close business friend of mine would says; "cari makan, beb". I paid him immediately. In this business, cash is really king, especially when dealing with the runners and dealers, who expect immediate payment.
Afraid that the owner might change his mind, I hurried my helpers to ferry the books across. 12 boxes of them. I spent the whole afternoon going through them. Great surprises like this sometimes gives you the feeling of discovering buried treasures. Those close to my interests will definitely be for keeps and the rest will be put up at my new blog at www.secondcharmbooks.wordpress.com. It may not grow to be as big as Amazon.com. I still believe that small is beautiful. But if the books give great joy and meaning to the new owners, I would then, consider the objective of the blog, to have been achieved.
Counting on your support.
Thanks and warmest regards
Sharifah
SECOND CHARM
You have read this articleMIDCENTURY MODERN FURNITURE /
VINTAGE - RETRO AND ART DECO FURNITURE /
VINTAGE FURNITURE IN SINGAPORE AND KUALA LUMPUR. SECOND CHARM VINTAGE COLLECTIONS /
VINTAGE FURNITURE IN MALAYSIA
with the title FINDING FOUCAULT. You can bookmark this page URL https://tanyarukaart.blogspot.com/2010/03/finding-foucault.html. Thanks!
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Dj Ganden - Kamis, 25 Maret 2010
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