1997 Quotes

I don't trust people who don't love themselves and tell me, 'I love you.' ... There is an African saying which is: Be careful when a naked person offers you a shirt.

I am the sea and nobody owns me

Shoot the bitch and write a book. That's what I did.

You can't have occupation and human rights.

Nobody knows how many North Koreans have died or are dying in the famine—some estimates by foreign-aid groups run as high as three million in the period from 1995 to 1998 alone—but the rotund, jowly face of Kim Il Sung still beams down contentedly from every wall, and the 58-year-old son looks as chubby as ever, even as his slenderized subjects are mustered to applaud him.

There's a marvelous peace in not publishing, there's a stillness. When you publish, the world thinks you owe something. If you don't publish, they don't know what you're doing. You can keep it for yourself.

The sad thing is that so many people, in the belief that the universe is organized to suit and influence them, are willing to sacrifice even the slight cranial capacity with which evolution has equipped us.

Unless a reincarnationist is willing to say there was a 'first generation' of souls created with the first humans, he is exposed to absurdity by the recency of human life on the planet.

reality has too many heads

Don't write in to ask whether I would prefer Gingrich to Clinton. Ask, rather, whether Clinton prefers Gingrich to you. Go triangulate yourself.

I'm the Starbucks poster child.

The special skill of esoteric Buddhism is transmutation by right view and pure perception, using all appropriate means for training. For example, eating food is not itself a Buddhist practice, but if one uses it as a means of training, it becomes a Buddhist training in transforming one's daily life as Buddhist practice.

Ten ma (bsTan Ma [བསྟན་མ་]). Twelve local female spirits of Tibet who have taken the vow from Guru Padmasambhava to protect the Dharma and its followers: the Four Ten mas of the Dud mo [bDud Mo] type: 1) Tshe ring ma (Tshe Ring Ma [ཚེ་རིང་མ་] or Kun Grags Ma [ཀུན་གྲགས་མ་]), 2) Dor je Ya ma kyong (rDo rje gYa Ma sKyong [རྡོ་རྗེ་གཡ་མ་སྐྱོང་]), 3) Kun zang mo (Kun bZang Mo [ཀུན་བཟང་མོ་] and 4) Geg gyi tso (bGegs Kyi gTso [བགེགས་ཀྱི་གཙོ་]; The Four Ten mas of the Nod jin mo (S. Yakṣasi, T. gNod sByin Mo [གནོད་སྦྱིན་མོ་]) type: 1) Chen chig ma (sPyan gChig Ma [སྤྱན་གཅིག་མ་]), 2) Kha ding Lu mo gyal (mKha' lDing Klu Mo rGyal [མཁའ་ལྡིང་ཀླུ་མོ་རྒྱལ་]), 3) Dor je Khyung tsun ma (rDo rje Khyung bTsun Ma [རྡོ་རྗེ་ཁྱུང་བཙུན་མ་]), and 4) Trag mo gyal (Drag Mo rGyal [དྲག་མོ་རྒྱལ་]); The Four Men Mo (sMan Mo [སྨེན་མོ་]): 1) Pod kham kyong (Bod Khams sKyong [བོད་ཁམས་སྐྱོང་]), 2) Men chig ma (sMan gChig Ma [སྨན་གཅིག་མ་]), 3) Yar mo sil (gYar Mo bSil [གཡར་མོ་བསིལ་]), and 4) Dor je Zu le men (rDo rje Zu Le sMan [རྡོ་རྗེ་གཟུགས་ལེགས་སྨན་]).

We are in a state of transition here. In fact, everyone in Hong Kong is obsessed with one single date: 1 July 1997. The whole city is in a state of violent change, moving from one regime we are used to loathing, to another one we are loath to get used to.