Paulo Coelho Quotes

In London, people don't make eye contact; it's almost too provocative.

Never looking anyone in the eye when you're traveling on public transport, in case it's interpreted as a sign that you're trying to get off with them.

I avoid my neighbors - luckily, my building has two exits.

You don't look at each other on the subway.

What I like about New York City is nobody cares. If they do, they don't ever approach. They just give you a 'What's up?' and that's it.

I think I'm a very solitary person. To actually not be anonymous is a bit claustrophobic for me.

I'm a little hibernating animal. Anonymity is one of my favorite things. I mean, that's why I moved to New York when I was like 18, because there, there are just so many people that there's no one and you're just lost. You're completely invisible and I find that very liberating.

When your life changes and you become a more public person, in some ways you need to be a more closed person, you know?

I'm not okay when I have to be around everyone all the time.

The time when most of you should withdraw into yourself is when you are forced to be in a crowd.

When you're on the subway in New York, people literally could be 11-inches away from you, and you can't just stare at them.

I try to preserve whatever balance society has between public and personal life. I never try to eat on the subway. I never try to listen to loud music on the subway.

I don't like to go out to parties or clubbing, and I kind of like my anonymity.

The story of my life is about back entrances, side doors, secret elevators and other ways of getting in and out of places so that people won't bother me.

I don't feel safe around a lot of people.

I feel alone and safe in public.

Every place I go, Im recognied, and its pretty hard to just sit by yourself.

I have a somewhat reclusive quality myself, and actually what's great about New York is that it pushes you to be social because the streets are full of people.

When I first moved to London, I used to pretend to be on the phone. I used to talk about stuff that was going on out loud. To my phone! I don't do that anymore!

I can't imagine finding success and then moving to a building in Manhattan with 300 strangers, like a bunch of little ants going home at night.

I just want to be quiet wherever I go, not seeing people, not facing more pressure, because every time now I go home, I will have so many people waiting for me.

does a society exist where it's become acceptable to wear 'helmets' enclosing one's entire head when in public to preempt social interaction

Hardly a man will you find who could live with his door open.

Reformers have long observed city people loitering on busy corners, hanging around in candy stores and bars and drinking soda popon stoops, and have passed a judgment, the gist of which is: "This is deplorable! If these people had decent homes and a more private or bosky outdoor place, they wouldn't be on the street!" That judgment represents a profound misunderstanding of cities. It makes no more sense than to drop in at a testimonial banquet in a hotel and conclude that if these people had wives who could cook, they would give their parties at home.

I felt as if I was the only person awake in a city of sleepwalkers. That's an illusion, of course. When you walk through a crowd of strangers it's next door to impossible not to imagine that they're all waxworks, but probably they're thinking just the same about you.