Your mother wasn’t upset. “Scars stay with you so you don’t forget, ” she said. She seemed almost satisfied.

There is no denying it, our past stinks and seeps into our present. Occasionally I get such a potent whiff of history that my mind spins and my stomach lurches.

I struggle to discover what these silent sons of mine want, but words have always failed me. They are sullen even as they tell me they are okay. I know they are lying but there is nothing I can do.

The first sound a child hears is very important. It determines character. A Muslim child always hears the Azan first. Words in praise of God. Words to live by.

Difficulties were fires. If you kept them in check, you could learn from them. You simply had to know how to fan them the right way.

They want me to contain the raging fires within me. They need me to appreciate glowing embers, to understand that even weak flames need to be managed with a lot of careful planning.

But what is the point of buying vegetables in plastic bags? Everything from the supermarket smells of plastic. Everything from the market smells like it’s supposed to.

Hope is a gift. Use it wisely.

We must experience certain things in life, even in our childhood, so we can later look back and value the journey.

The most precious gift that marriage gave me was the constant impact of something very close and intimate, yet all the time unmistakably other, resistant - in a word, real.

My idealism has not abated, but I have witnessed it withering away nationwide, to the point where at least among the young, to have ideals is akin to being blinkered and oldfashioned.

Will the United States pull the rug on New Zealand? The answer is no. They might polish the lino a bit harder and hope that I execute a rather unseemly glide across it.

His foodWas glory, which was poison to his mindAnd peril to his body.

Yes, hope is a strange thing. Peace at last. But at what price?

Generally paintings are about technique, but I don't see myself as a painter. I am more of a storyteller and an image - maker.

I'm such a sucker for love and I believe in it and I always want it to win.

People, even genetically damaged people, make choices. That’s what matters.’