My family never told me like you have to be one thing. What do you want to be when you grow up? They think it's the most ridiculous question. You can be many, many things.
I actually didn't grow up in a household that loved Chinese food particularly, and it's not really my go-to food or anything... We were more a pizza family, being from the Chicago area and all.
When I was a kid growing up in the States in the late '70s and early '80s, as soon as 'Dallas' came on on a Friday night on CBS at 9 P.M., we stopped everything from that moment on as a family.
I've always loved writing, and my heritage has been interesting, growing up in a bi-cultural family. My mother being Vietnamese and my father being French, it's like an East-West meeting in my house.
Radio was my life growing up. Then, I started in our family band with my uncle, my father, my aunt and my little brother. We would go to The Chicken Box and all the bars and play.
I'll always be the baby in the family. I'm the youngest sister, but growing up with so many boys, it makes you tough. You get teased. There's no tiptoeing around each other. You say it the way it is; you're honest.
I think there is something about... unless you come from a really evolved family that allowed you to talk about your feelings and felt like a safe environment, then you aren't really prepared to do that when you grow up.
If you've never had a mother or a father, you grow up seeking something you're never going to find, ever. You seek it in love and in people and in beauty.
The problem with growing up in a cafe was the cafe never closed, my parents worked every day of the year from morning to night. So it was a big menagerie of kids, business and cooking!
After working for 14 years on Wall Street and growing up in a family with strong roots in small business, I know how important the entrepreneurial spirit is to attaining the American dream.
I remember specifically my mother telling me growing up don't put my business in the street. I was like seven, and I am like, 'What does that mean.'
It took me realizing that a broken heart has never actually killed anyone to find the courage to ask for what I want, in just about every situation. That was part of my own growing up.
You grow up in America and you're told from day one, 'This is the land of opportunity.' That everybody has an equal chance to make it in this country. And then you look at places like Harlem, and you say, 'That is absolutely a lie.'
Losing a parent is a hard thing... I often sit here and think it would be great if mum and dad were alive and had a chance to see their grandkids grow up.
It was a very cool thing to be a smart girl, as opposed to some other, different kind. And I think that made a great deal of difference to me growing up and in my life afterward.
I remember 'Roots' growing up and the cultural impact it had on the country. Watching 'Roots' was not the cool remove of reading about slavery in a book or hearing about it in class. It became something that swept people along.
A huge thing for me growing up was going to see my favorite bands and feeling like, 'Okay, cool, they proved themselves and did things in a special way.' That's the most important thing.
It took me so many years to move out. I'm definitely a bit of a Peter Pan, reluctant to grow up. It all seemed really nice at home-why change it? Part of me would prefer not to have any responsibility whatsoever.
Chris Farley, I was a huge fan of his growing up. I would love to do something kind of slapstick and funny, maybe where I could change my look even a little bit.
Help young people. Help small guys. Because small guys will be big. Young people will have the seeds you bury in their minds, and when they grow up, they will change the world.
I don't remember 'Doctor Who' not being part of my life, and it became a part of growing up, along with The Beatles, National Health spectacles, and fog. And it runs deep. It's in my DNA.
