Doulos, 3rd - 13th November

Doulos’s short visit to Mauritius stirred up the local bookshops from their usual slumber. Doulos is the “World’s oldest active ocean-going passenger vessel”, built in 1914, two years after the infamous Titanic. Throughout the years, Doulos has been respectively a cargo ship, a ship transporting immigrants, a cruise ship and it is now the largest “floating library”, sailing from port to port to sell books at bargain prices. It is also home to 320 Christians from 40 different nations who volunteer their services to all the countries they visit. Doulos is managed by a non-profit organisation, the GBA (Good Books for All) and has half a million books in store, which covers a wide range of subjects, mainly religion but also arts, sport, cookery, gardening, science, and the usual encyclopaedia and dictionaries.

This is Doulos’s third visit to Mauritius, after 1995 and 1998. Anticipating a decrease in profits, a few local bookshops banded together and threw a public tantrum to stop Doulos. The attempts to stop Doulos were fruitless. Mauritians, mostly unconcerned about the debate surrounding the event, jumped at this opportunity to buy books that would have cost them 3 times more at their local bookshop. The chance to visit a ship dating back to the Titanic period was a big incentive as well. Thank You Doulos.