Religion is not something I like to talk about publicly. One reason is the politics, but also I think spirituality is deeply personal.

If the dominant political expression that we're seeing right now is of nostalgia and we know that nostalgia won't really work out, what happens is, we become depressed as individuals and societies - when we're depressed, we're much more vulnerable to be taken advantage of by demagogues and xenophobes.

The mobile phone is very dangerous. If you're walking and looking at your phone, you're not walking - you're surfing the internet.

I think there's a natural link between the fact that our self is a story that we make up and that we're drawn to stories. It resonates, in a way.

If your sense of self is destabilised, to imagine being another becomes pretty easy.

I have a funny relationship to language. When I came to California when I was three I spoke Urdu fluently and I didn't speak a word of English. Within a few months I lost all my Urdu and spoke only English and then I learned Urdu all over again when I was nine. Urdu is my first language but it's not as good as my English and it's sort of become my third language. English is my best language but was the second language I learned.

It is not surprising that most Pakistanis do not support America's bombardment of Afghanistan. The Afghans are neighbours on the brink of starvation and devastated by war. America has shown itself to be untrustworthy, a superpower that uses its values as a scabbard for its sword.