It’s daunting to find the language so foreign, so distant, but also so thrilling. One is absolved of responsibility when the language is incomprehensible.

Whatever a guidebook says, wether or not you leave somewhere with a sense of the place is entirely a matter of smell and instinct.

Indecision is a virus that can run through an army and destroy its will to win or even to survive.

A Chinese poet many centuries ago noticed that to re-create something in words is like being alive twice.

Memory is, of course, a trickster.

The longer you are in a place, the more you get under its layers.

The Italians have their priorities right: They're driven, they do their work, but they really enjoy the day-to-day and they don't put off the enjoyment of the everyday for some future goal.