The city's contradictions and frailties drive me to the church. The church, in turn, binds my wounds and soothes my troubled heart, and sends me right back out into the city again.
That picture of me running down the beach - I'll never forget doing that, because I made the hairdresser, who was the only man on the shoot, turn his back.
I never thought black people would say I wasn't black enough. It didn't turn me into a bully - it just put me on the defensive. I had to watch my back. It made me stronger because I learned how to deal with ignorance.
When I announced on my Facebook page that I'm coming to Israel, people started telling me that I shouldn't go there, but I figured that if I'm not going to come here, then I guess I can't go back to the United States anymore and I can never go to Russia again and I should probably never go back to Germany and I should probably never go back to France and I should probably never go back to England....All I see here is a really beautiful city.
So I turn once more to those who sneer at this my city, and I give them back the sneer and say to them: Come and show me another city with lifted head singing so proud to be alive and coarse and strong and cunning.
One overseas diner told me that he was not going to come back to Hong Kong, but after visiting my restaurant he saw that there was more to our city than he originally thought, and he would therefore be back. That made me proud.
You promised to take care of me and not to turn your back on me. How is it possible that you never wrote to me even once and you never came back to see me? Do you think that it is fun for me to spend months, even years, without any news, without any hope!
What made it so special was the city of Houston had never won a sports championship. I think the championship changed people's thinking about their own city. It made them feel like their city had some significance that it hadn't had before.
I have just been to a city in the West, a city full of poets, a city they have made safe for poets. The whole city is so lovely that you do not have to write it up to make it poetry; it is ready-made for you. But, I don't know - the poetry written in that city might not seem like poetry if read outside of the city. It would be like the jokes made when you were drunk; you have to get drunk again to appreciate them.
City's boss and owner came with a very good proposal. They showed me that City has the ambition to be one of the biggest clubs in the world. This made it easy to make the move. Money was never important.
I never really got that chance at Manchester City and developed into a utility player. Playing in all the positions has made me a better player because it's not easy to do that. Understanding the game has made me a more rounded player as well.
You can turn your back on a person, but never turn your back on a drug, especially when its waving a razor sharp hunting knife in your eye.
Straight after the Prescott fight, people were saying, 'He's finished. He's not going to come back.' There were only racial remarks made. But, you know what, it made me stronger. It made me come back even stronger. It made me a better fighter.
It is true that the king has made a truce with the duke of Burgundy for fifteen days and that the duke is to turn over the city of Paris at the end of fifteen days. Yet you should not marvel if I do not enter that city so quickly.
Seeing New York in the movies is what made me want to live in Manhattan one day. I eventually got my wish, and the city has never disappointed me.
Nobody living can ever stop me. As I go walking my freedom highway. Nobody living can make me turn back. This land was made for you and me.