Las Vegas, the most expensive toilet in the world that still can’t flush.

Cuban eyes often look close to tears. Tears never seem far away because both their pain and their joy are always so close to the surface.

Both for Havana's beauty and decay, it's very hard to restrain yourself from staring everywhere you look.

The cave sits tucked deep within the mass of rocks that sprout like moles from the forest floor.

... vampires are like gourmet chocolate - oh, so tempting, but overindulgence is a killer.

We were then in a dangerous, helpless situation, exposed daily to perils and death amongst savages and wild beasts, not a white man in the country but ourselves.

Arabs may have the oil, but we have the matches.

I wrote four novels, but then I realized that the world didn't need me to be a novelist, but the world could use me as a nonfiction writer.

I was not ready for abstraction. I clung to earth and her dear shapes, her density, her herbage, her juice. I wanted her volume, and I wanted to hear her throb.

The tragedy of it is that nobody sees the look of desperation on my face. Thousands and thousands of us, and we're passing one another without a look of recognition.

I do feel like I'm not entirely an insider.

...stupidity is one of the two things we see most clearly in retrospect. The other is missed chances.

It was easier to sell a painting that was not for sale.