God made the human body like a machine with built-in obsolescence.

The brain is not an organ we are authorized to use. We are supposed to use only our hands and legs.

And I realized again that real life is different from reel life.

I wonder what it feels like to have no desires left because you have satisfied them all, smothered them with money even before they are born. Is an existence without desire very desirable? And is the poverty of desire better than rank poverty itself?

For me, the day job comes first. That's why I call myself a diplomat who writes, not a writer who masquerades as a diplomat. If the day job demands it, I won't write at all. I write in what I call 'the crevices of my day job', and that comes only on weekends.

I want to show that the underdog can win. I believe were all the same: you, a slum girl, my mother.

The slums are not a place of despair. Its inhabitants are all working towards a better life.