Guler Sabanci Quotes

But some people act like they think I live in the jungle someplace.

The mystified idea I had of Israel - the demonization of Israel - it just wasn't true.

You have one big mythology in your favor: Everyone believes that you Europeans are impeccable. But I know you are jerks.

If, as a Spaniard, I am so often offended by the stereotypes that abound regarding my country, how can I accept and repeat the ones that fall even more heavily upon Israel?

Americans know as much about Canada as straight people do about gays. Americans arrive at the border with skis in July, and straight people think that being gay is just a phase. A very long phase.

People look at me, and I dress a little unusually and they think, 'Oh you must be from California.' Of course, people in California think, 'Oh you must be from from Mars,' so, you know, your next-door neighbour is not necessarily the person that you are going to make a connection with.

You cannot understand Russia if you look at her through Western eyes.

Threats are more readily perceived from culturally dissimilar powers than culturally similar ones.

Most inhabitants of these post-Soviet states also resent that people in the West consider their outlook backward and reactionary.

I navigate different cultures daily, and I understand how people can make false assumptions because of their lack of interaction with the cultures I find myself in. But if they don't frequent these spaces much, how can they rush to judgment?

I don't know why people think I'm a Goth - that's a misconception.

The problem is that rap is so often a caricature of its own image. Nobody comes to the table with the seriousness of the effect that it can have; nobody is prepared for that.

I've often gone to start a film only to find the producers surprised to discover that I'm American.

I must begin by saying something about the old Germany. That Germany, too, suffered from superficial judgment, because appearances and reality were not always kept apart in people's minds.

Everything that could produce a clash between the Arab world and the West seemed dangerous to me.

I've only been to these foreign countries: Canada, L.A. and Miami.

Most of them are military commanders, country notables and landowners, and educated people. It is inconceivable that such a group should incline to the theory of Communism. But if Western countries persist in applying unjust pressure, they may well throw themselves into Russia’s arms.

The West will never understand Muslims so long as we ... judge them by the rules we are accustomed to apply to ourselves.

Is Turkey one of the Ayrab countries with which you don't get on very well?

The scorn of our formidable neighbor who does not know us is our America’s greatest danger …. Through ignorance it might even come to lay hands on us. Once it does know us, it will remove it’s hands out of respect.

Whenever the [Ottoman] Turks begin to be troublesome, send embassies to the West at once, offer to accept union, and protract negotiations to great length. The Turks so greatly fear such union that they will become reasonable. And still, the union will not be accomplished because of the enmity of the Latin nations.

The culture and values of many former Soviet republics really do differ from what prevails in the West.

I meet a lot of people when I do stand-up in the Middle East, and I don't know any terrorists, yet on TV and in the movies, 9 out of 10 are depicted as terrorists.

I was surprised by some of my French colleagues who immediately assumed that because I spoke English with an American accent, that, therefore, you must be a supporter of whoever is the current president of the United States. There seems to be this widespread feeling that, 'Oh, American accent - therefore, you like cowboy boots.'

The more I come to know about the outside world's perception of China, the more I feel there are all sorts of misunderstandings, and to a certain extent, people do not get the full picture from the media. A lot of foreigners have few opportunities to visit China, and a lot of Chinese people do not have the chance to go to Europe or to the West.