Abids Sunday Book Market

On Sunday mornings the pavements between Chermas and the GPO disappear under books. Hundreds of sellers spread them straight onto the ground (paperbacks, out-of-print classics, stacks of old National Geographics, sometimes a Persian volume that has drifted in from the Old City), and prices start around Rs 10. The ritual is more than forty years old and runs on patient rummaging: come before noon, because the good finds leave early, and haggle gently rather than hard. Sundays only. Any other day, Abids is an ordinary shopping street.

Forty years of pavement bookselling, and the best finds are gone by noon