I think that's what you and I have in common, Donatella Versace, that careful balance. It makes me proud to be an Italian. In the end, I am proud to do what I do.

I suffered a lot when there was, like, a birthday party and I was not invited. Not because I was ugly or stupid; I was not invited because the parents would say to the kids, "Don't invite him, because he's poor and he comes from the south of Italy, and he can't give you nothing."

For me, fashion is a job. I love it. It's my passion. But the most important thing for me in general is life.

I can give a beautiful present, and that may change the lives of people around me.

Every two to three weeks, I was changing around my room. My room was made out of nothing, basically - a magazine, a little radio, a little bed - and I had the sensibility to put things together and match things in a certain way so that they were very special.

One thing my mom didn't want any of us to do was to cry or to complain about life. Every day and night, even when we didn't have much food, we would pray together. And that for me was a beautiful moment. The fact of being poor didn't really hurt me.

I used to hate to go to school, because when it was Friday afternoon and everybody was finished school, I knew I was going to work Saturday and Sunday.