Quotes from A Long Way Home

272 pages

Rating: (33.2K votes)


“My mother described her reactions better than I ever could mine: she said she was "surprised with thunder" that her boy had come back, and that the happiness in her heart was "as deep as the sea".”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“I feel strongly that from my being a little lost boy with no family to becoming a man with two, everything was meant to happen just the way it happened. And I am profoundly humbled by that thought.”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“My return seemed to inspire and energize the neighborhood, as though it was evidence that the hard luck of life did not have to rule you. Sometimes miracles do happen.”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“Not having enough to eat paralyzes you and keeps you living hour by hour instead of thinking about what you would like to accomplish in a day, week, month, or year. Hunger and poverty steal your childhood and take away your innocence and sense of security. But”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“We all reach a point as young adults when we wonder what we should be doing with our lives—or, at the very least, which direction to point ourselves in. Beyond the means to get by, we need to think about what’s most important to us. Not surprisingly, I discovered that for me the answer was family.”
― quote from A Long Way Home



“I’d had to learn some of these differences, too. Mum remembers taking me somewhere in the car once when I looked at her and said, “Lady no drive.” She pulled over and said, “If lady no drive, then boy walk!” I quickly learned my lesson.”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“She also said she was proud of me, which is all anyone can wish to hear from his mother. The”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“Mum had decided that there was nothing sacrosanct about families formed only by birth parents. Though brought up Catholic, she and Dad thought the world had enough children born into it already, with many millions of them in dire need. They agreed that there were other ways to create a family beyond having children themselves.”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“I’d learned quickly, as a matter of survival, that I needed to take opportunities as they came—if they came—and to look forward to the future.”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“carrying laborer to teacher and manager. It seems a bittersweet result of the family’s loss that the remaining children had managed to lift themselves out of poverty.”
― quote from A Long Way Home



“Sometimes it felt as if the world had forgotten about us and our problems.”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“One of the most touching things my mother said to me was that if I ever wanted to come back to live in India, she would build me a home and go out and work hard so that I could be happy.”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“Hunger and poverty steal your childhood and take away your innocence and sense of security. But I was one of the lucky ones because I not only survived but learned to thrive. •”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“I was about to embark on a high-tech version of what I'd done in my first week there, twenty years ago, randomly taking trains out to see if they went back home. I took a deep breath, chose a train line, and started scrolling along it.”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“was a juvenile detention centre, called Liluah, housing”
― quote from A Long Way Home



“birdwatching or sailing. Dad often took me out on his small catamaran, which only increased my love of the water, and I finally learned to swim. Just being able to look out at the horizon gave me peace of”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“Adoptees, whether or not they ever knew their birth parents, often describe the constant, gnawing feeling of there being something missing: without a connection, or at least the knowledge of where they are from, they feel incomplete.”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“Just the thought of being able to ask for more food with the expectation of receiving it made me happy and built up my excitement to an almost unbearable pitch. It seemed that we were about to embark on the adventure of our lives. •”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“The idea of having possessions took some getting used to.”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“For the first time, I told Mum that the place I was from was called “Ginestlay,” and when”
― quote from A Long Way Home



“Hunger limits you because you are constantly thinking about getting food, keeping the food if you do get your hands on some, and not knowing when you are going to eat next.”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“imagined what I’d do when I reached this stage. It now seems absurd, but I suppose I thought I’d find a town labelled ‘Ginestlay’ and that would be that; I’d know I’d found home. But nothing else had worked out as I thought it would – this town was well outside my search boundary, and after all my careful planning and methodical efforts I’d found it by accident. It”
― quote from A Long Way Home


“Van toen af aan heb ik gedacht dat we huilen omdat ons lichaam iets probeert te verwerken wat ons hart en verstand te veel is.”
― quote from A Long Way Home


Popular quotes

“The busiest people I have known in my life always have time enough to do everything. Those who do nothing are always tired and pay no attention to the little amount of work they are required to do. They complain constantly that the day is too short. The truth is, they are afraid to fight the good fight.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Pilgrimage


“Are you looking for sympathy? You'll find it in the dictionary between shit and syphilis”
― Thomas Harris, quote from Hannibal Rising


“ Boorab's spear was a window pole. He stood on the second step, barring their way. "Who goes there? State y'business, wot?"
Brother Hoben tapped an impatient paw on the bottom step. "Come out of the way, please. We'ew going to the walltop."
The hare twitched his whiskers officiously. "No Dibbuns allowed up here. You're not Dibbuns, are you?"
Cregga took hold of the window pole he was clasping and lifted both Boorab and the pole, with one paw, down onto the grass. "Do we look like Dibbuns? Don't try my patience, sah!"
"Just doin' one's duty," he muttered up the steps after them, somewhat creastfallen. "I was only asking a civil question, wot. Humph, some creautres!”
― Brian Jacques, quote from Taggerung


“Never in your life have you been helpless—under somebody’s heel. You never lived where your enemies held power over you, power to run your life or wipe it out. You can’t understand. That’s how come you stand there feeding me empty slogans!” Luciente bowed her head. “You crit me justly, Connie. Forgive me. I’ll try to see your situation more clearly and make less loud noises in your ears.”
― Marge Piercy, quote from Woman on the Edge of Time


“In behaviorism, an infant's talents and abilities didn't matter because there was no such thing as a talent or an ability. Watson had banned them from psychology, together with other contents of the mind, such as ideas, beliefs, desires, and feelings. They were subjective and unmeasurable, he said, and unfit for science, which studies only objective and measurable things. To a behaviorist, the only legitimate topic for psychology is overt behavior and how it is controlled by the present and past environment. (There is an old joke in psychology: What does a behaviorist say after making love? "It was good for you; how was it for me?")”
― Steven Pinker, quote from The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature


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