Luxury is the enemy of observation, a costly indulgence that induces such a good feeling that you notice nothing. Luxury spoils and infantilizes you and prevents you from knowing the world.

Hawaii is not a state of mind, but a state of grace.

There are probably more annoying things than being hectored about African development by a wealthy Irish rock star in a cowboy hat, but I can't think of one at the moment.

The Australian Book of Etiquette is a very slim volume.

I cannot make my days longer so I strive to make them better.

You go away for a long time and return a different person - you never come all the way back.

You can't save the rhinos and you can't preserve a culture. I'm very pessimistic. Once it's gone, it's over.

All travel is circular. I had been jerked through Asia, making a parabola on one of the planet's hemispheres. After all, the grand tour is just the inspired man's way of heading home.

Travel is an attitude, a state of mind. It is not residence, it is motion.

Railways are irresistible bazaars, snaking along perfectly level no matter what the landscape, improving your mood with speed, and never upsetting your drink.

Tibet has a very proud people but it's culturally gone and overrun ever since the Chinese took over. It's like saving the rhino. When a species is endangered, it's gone.

Never make a sales pitch as the way you introduce yourself. What you CAN say is how you help people and businesses.

I’m not an easy lay, I won’t do a one-night stand, and my father is a mob boss with a short temper and a collection of guns. Still want to take me out?” - Ana Avdonin

What comes from the heart goes to the heart.

Resolve to be thyself and know that he who finds himself loses his misery.

More people write poetry than read it.

But I've married a deeply sensible person who is extremely good at talking me down from my various ledges, and who takes care of me in a billion ways.

We are like people with short-term leases on summer cottages; we can never seem to make our provisions come out even with our stay.

But children, hark! Your mother would rather, When you arrived, have been your father.

I like the dark; it is safer here, where no one can see me. The shadows caress me; friends hugging me.