Patrick Vieira Quotes

Since becoming aware of the need to be inclusive, I've tried to make my stories broader and more representative of our world.

Company cultures are like country cultures. Never try to change one. Try, instead, to work with what you've got.

I'm glad I was faced with different cultures when I was growing up because I wasn't fazed by it. It has been a huge benefit to me; I feel comfortable wherever I go.

When you travel, remember that a foreign country is not designed to make you comfortable. It is designed to make its own people comfortable.

The United States is very good at understanding itself, and very bad at understanding others.

Believing in each culture's right to be understood by the other party without any form of falseness or distortion is paramount.

Learn to understand the culture of those that you wish to influence.

Working with Europeans is very difficult. They require endless respect.

It's hard to be judgmental once you've been around the world... it's pretty hard to be anything but understanding, and I think it's good for everybody to get out and see someplace other than where you grew up.

No matter how certain I am about some culture or some group of people, my opinions are only as accurate as the amount of time I've spent with them.

Directing while overcoming differences of language and culture is a stimulating challenge.

The Foreign Office works hard to remind people of local laws and customs as often they can be very different to British law.

I can empathise with different cultural expressions and am open to things that seem strange at first sight.

I think when you move to a country like the U.S., you need to understand the culture, to understand how people see the game, and adapt yourself.

The difficulty that negotiators have is often based on the cultural difference that various countries have.

In Spain, they're never direct, and that frustrates me.

I do think that when you're specifically working in a country like South Africa, you have to be able to be aware of the cultural truth of what people are raised in and believe in and how they function within their society.

I think an awful lot of the diplomatic problems that exist in the world come from people assuming that their society is the one with a purchase on truth.

I've actually spent about half of my life overseas in the third world. I grew up in Tanzania, East Africa, and later lived in South-West Asia. In general, everywhere I go, I am treated with great respect and hospitality, but I need to be sensitive to cultural, tribal and ethical customs of the local people. In this modern era of technology, I think we forget that the most important thing when traveling is to listen and learn, and establish relationship, and not be hidden behind technology like Goretex, emails, satellite phones, and insulated from the people around you.

I have my brain switched on and I might be thinking something else but we've come to an arrangement. That sort of play is maybe easier with someone who also thinks that way. But that is not necessarily a national thing, but maybe a little bit of a cultural thing.

The rule for traveling abroad is to take our common sense with us, and leave our prejudices behind.

Reform is a work of time; a national taste, however wrong it may be, cannot be totally changed at once.

I asked myself, 'How are you going to change all these people, they have different values, different customs, different language, different interpretations?' So that’s the time I joined the Ku Klux Klan in Miami. The reason I joined is to see if I could change them. So I dissolved that organization in a month-and-a-half, alone. [Applause] Then I joined the White Citizen Council. The WCC hates foreigners – all foreigners. So I joined that organization; I dissolved it in one month.

In my state, on the basis of the separate but equal doctrine, we have made enormous strides over the years in the education of both races. Personally, I think it would have been sounder judgment to allow that progress to continue through the process of natural evolution. However, there is no point crying about spilt milk.

The first step toward tolerance is respect and the first step toward respect is knowledge.