لأنه علي الرغم مما يقوله البعض، فإن العشق ليس مجرد شعورحلو مقدّر له أن يأتي ويذهب بسرعة - Elif Şafak

I like to borrow a metaphor from the great poet and mystic Rumi who talks about living like a drawing compass. One leg of the compass is static. It is fixed and rooted in a certain spot. Meanwhile, the other leg draws a huge wide circle around the first one, constantly moving. Just like that, one part of my writing is based in Istanbul. It has strong local roots. Yet at the same time the other part travels the whole wide world, feeling connected to several cities, cultures, and peoples.

whenever you got angry with someone, you should replace the face of that person in your mind with the face of someone you love ...perhaps you could find something to like in him.

So I guess it is in my genes, this melancholy I can never quite shake off. Carved with an invisible knife into my arborescent skin.