El Andalous - Purchase of a Kindle Paperwhite

El Andalous Beach

I started reading a lot more once I purchased my first (keyboard) kindle. It took me a while to get used to the grey screen, but I loved having all the books I need on it. Also, I had the 3G version which meant I could check how my shares were doing in between chapters. My idea of heaven! Then amazon, maybe understandably, blocked the use of non-amazon sites with 3G. But I still loved my kindle.

I have a bit of a strange relationship to money – sometimes I seem to throw money away on stupid things and then refuse to spend it when it would be quite sensible to do so. Anyway, having originally splashed out for a kindle, I was determined to get as many free books as possible, thinking this would then “pay” for the kindle. Over time, this has morphed into me downloading the freebies from self-published authors, at least in part so that I can see what my competition is doing. If I particularly like the author, I do make a point of buying one of their other books at a later date.

Anyway, I digress. I now read every day when I’m on the beach and, alas, one day my kindle reached its expiry date. It had been acting weirdly by flipping me back to page 1 of my book at random intervals and I’d lived with that, but now it would only let me see half a screen.

However, now I could finally buy the kindle paperwhite, which I’d been hankering after for ages but couldn’t justify purchasing while my current kindle operated perfectly fine. Hurrah! Now I could buy it, guilt-free! However, I’d forgotten I was in Egypt and that amazon doesn’t deliver to Egypt. Without my kindle, I felt as if I’d lost an arm.

After putting out a query on one of the expat forums, I was pointed to a facebook site that allegedly procured kindles for people in Egypt and I also found a website that acted as a third-party between various US sites (including amazon and ebay) and delivering to Egypt. Unfortunately, after trying four or five times and contacting the latter company, I still couldn’t get the website to accept my credit card. Not sure what went wrong there, but it happens.

I kept on looking at the facebook site and wondering if it was safe to order from. And then – for the first time in my life, I was grateful for that targeted advertising – an advert from souq.com displayed the paperwhite beside my email account. The paperwhite had been out of stock when I looked there before. So, I ordered from souq.com (and the paperwhite soon went out of stock again). I didn’t have any choice about 3G (wifi only), what colour to have (only black), or to have it “without offers” (i.e., adverts), but compared to no availability, and given that it was at least the most recent, improved version of the paperwhite, I was still utterly delighted.

The paperwhite is great – good visibility in the sun and in bed without any lights on, and it’s easy on my eyes. I was dubious about the touch screen, since I liked the keyboard (and I associate touch screens with those loathed smart phones), but actually it is pretty good. It has just enough resistance that I can wipe off the occasional grain of sand or a stray fly without turning 20 pages in the process, but is sensitive enough that I don’t have to thump it to go the next page. Life in Egypt isn’t so limiting after all!

However, I will need to order the dedicated cover when I’m back in the UK. The lack of cover means that my paperwhite is already getting a bit soiled on the back, even though I’m putting it in my bag very carefully so that it doesn’t get sand all over it. There are some black, non-amazon covers available here, but I really would prefer not to have black (it gets lost too easily in my bag) and I want the facility where you don’t have to turn the paperwhite on because the cover does it for you (yes, the height of laziness!). But the purchase of the cover can wait (well, no choice but to wait, if I’m honest).