Quotes

You can get away with a lot of shit if it looks like it's all you know how to do.

Whenever I get dumped [by a girlfriend]), I nail the door shut so that no one can come inside, get a towel and clip it around my neck so it's like a Superman cape, take off my shoes so I can slide across the room, and . . . get a fake mic, like a celery stick or a pen, and I play any record that features the vocalist Ronnie James Dio. And you can just pretend you're Dio, because on every album he does, he has minimum one, usually three, *EVIL WOMAN LOOK OUT!*- songs.

The ones who don't do anything are always the ones who try to pull you down.

When you start to doubt yourself the real world will eat you alive.

I don't want to pass through life like a smooth plane ride.

If you hate your parents, the man, or the establishment, don't show them up by getting wasted and wrapping your car around a tree. If you really want to rebel against your parents: outearn them, outlive them, and know more than they do.

Want a good body? Work at it. Want to be a success? Work at it. Want to be truly exceptional? Be a touch insane . . . You need a little bit of insanity to do great things.

Nothing brings people together more than a mutual hatred.

Good question about the anger. It is perhaps something else; an awareness, a catalyst. All I know is, when everything seems to be going well, it feels like a scam!

I got no problem with Britney Spears or *NSYNC, really, just because that kind of stuff has always been around and they're not calling it anything more than just some fun. That's why I didn't mind Spice Girls, they're just fun. But Bono thinks he's changing the world with his music.

[2010, on landing his presenter job with National Geographic] What I'm hoping for is that National Geographic keeps me oh so busy. This is a job that I've wanted since I was about 8. You know, I grew up near the National Geographic building [in Washington, DC], I've had the magazine all my life. It's National Geographic that first let me see the Sphinx and the Pyramids, and I always said, "I'm going to see those," because I was inspired by them. And since then, I've been to the Pyramids a few times. And so to be able to be a presenter, a host on the National Geographic Channel, I can't tell you what a big deal it is for me. Especially coming from music, where . . . you know, I could go out and sing those old songs and look like a damned fool, as so many of my peers sometimes do. They fall in love with their past, and they go up there, gray-haired, and play. And . . . I don't want to. I'm not putting down the people that do. I just want to do something else. And if you asked me what I'd rather do instead of going out and playing the same old songs, well, I'd like to work at a place like National Geographic. And it happened. Well, at least for now. You never know. But as it is now, I'm kind of in that "no way" phase of everything, 'cause I really want to be there. They're an amazing group of people, and documentary stuff is really what I'd like to . . . I'd be happy just doing that for the rest of my life.

[1995] I don't have anything else but work. I have no hobbies, no wife, no children, no drug habit to maintain. Nothing is in my way. I'm very simple. I'm used to living in a backpack for months out of the year.

[1995, on meeting Steven Seagal] The guy was beyond belief. I think I would rather drink latex paint than be in a movie with him. However, he does know his shit about aikido: I would not want to mess with him. He stalled, asking me what I was doing in his office, why I wanted to meet with him. And that was really strange because I didn't even want to be there. He called me. I only went because my agent asked me to go. Then Seagal wanted to know how much experience I had with guns. When I told him I had none, he looked at me as if I had better move out of town, That's when I walked out of there and saw all these people in his front office, nervously clutching scripts. Apparently, he was casting On Deadly Ground (1994). That clown is a guy who definitely lives in his fucking scene. And there is danger there.

[1995] The last time I got into a fight was two years ago in Germany. I knocked a guy's tooth out, broke his nose, put eight stitches in his eye and got arrested by the German cops. I just meant to back him up, but I busted him up.

(2011) You'll never convince me that bombing Iran is a good idea. I had too much of a good time in Iran. Just unforced hospitality unleashed upon me everywhere I went. Literally, just walking around by myself. The only thing that sucked was the freezing weather. Otherwise, no one would let me spend money. Every dinner...Dinner parties every night in different homes, interesting discussions and debates until 2 in the morning, some of the best food I've ever had, the best ice cream I've ever had. And walking the streets by day and getting into interesting conversations.

(2011) I beg young people to travel. If you don't have a passport, get one. Take a summer, get a backpack and go to Delhi, go to Saigon, go to Bangkok, go to Kenya. Have your mind blown. Eat interesting food. Dig some interesting people. Have an adventure. Be careful. Come back and you're going to see your country differently, you're going to see your president differently, no matter who it is. Music, culture, food, water. Your showers will become shorter. You're going to get a sense of what globalization looks like. It's not what Tom Friedman writes about; I'm sorry. You're going to see that global climate change is very real. And that for some people, their day consists of walking 12 miles for four buckets of water. And so there are lessons that you can't get out of a book that are waiting for you at the other end of that flight. A lot of people-Americans and Europeans-come back and go, Ohhhhh. And the light bulb goes on.

(2011, on his travel style) I just travel the world with my backpack and my cameras and a bunch of Clif bars. I hit the streets every day with no real plan besides walking and seeing what happens or taking a taxi across town and finding my way back. Or I look out the top of the hotel and see an area and say, okay, I'm going there today-that slum, that village. I go through souks and bazaars and stores. People come up and ask, "My friend, what are you doing here?" My icebreaker is, "I'm here to meet you." Which is true, and also sometimes cracks them up. They say, "Me?" I say, "Oh yeah, man, I'm Henry, what's happening?" I've had that conversation in Islamabad, Beirut, Tehran, and I'm still here. I think when you show genuine curiosity, and when you're confident enough to walk alone with a smile on your face, people think, he really wants to be here. And you ask a question, and all of a sudden you're getting invited in for tea and food. If you're polite and show due respect, I think people get it. It's almost canine and instinctive, and when you're being disingenuous, they get that, too. But when you're being genuinely kind, it's so disarming.

(2011, on what got him into in-depth world travel) In rock 'n' roll and the other touring I do, I get to see a fair chunk of the world. Europe, a lot. Which is nice. But it's not the world. It's just Europe. Australia, New Zealand. Sometimes Japan. And the odd date in Singapore. We went to Moscow. We went to Warsaw. Pretty cool. But it's not going to get you to Egypt or Djibuti, or the Middle East. So at one point in the '90s, I was talking to a journalist who said, "You do a lot of travel." I said, "Yeah, but I've never been to Africa." And it stuck with me. Why not? I'm curious. I'd like to see the Sphinx. I'd like to meet a Masai tribesman. What's my excuse? So I decided, I'm going to go to Kenya, Madagascar and South Africa. It was 1997, I believe. And it was mind-blowing to see such a different part of the world. Kenya was the first place I landed. The first thing you see when you come out of the cloud cover is this herd of zebra moving out of your way. You land in a small plane and you disturb the zebra. So they all run. My mind was completely blown. It was basically weeks of that. Like, look out for the elephant! Don't let the monkeys get into your tent! Okay, duly noted. It was great to have my mind expanded like that. Then I said I'd better go to Africa every year, and I've pulled it off almost every year. One thing led to another and I was going to the Middle East, Southeast Asia. A buddy of mine, a diplomat, said, "We're living in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and we can get you a diplomatic visa. Want to come visit?" Uh, yeah! It's hard to get into that country. I got a visa for Iran; that took couple of years. Finally got a visa for North Korea. I went there about a year ago.

(1998) I just get things done instead of talking about getting them done. I don't go out and party. I don't smoke, drink or do drugs and I'm not married, that leaves a lot of time for my work.

(2008, on travel) I'd gladly do 200 shows a year. I fare better on the road than at home. I train better. I eat better. I think better. [I suffer] less depression. After five or six days home I itch to get back into the world." He pats his laptop and his travel bag: "This is my office and home - I've been living like this since 1981.

(2004, on his level of fame) I don't need security to go to the grocery store. People recognize me all the time at the grocery store or at the hardware store. Do I get talked to a lot? Yes. Do I get recognized? Within one traffic light. The car next to me. Within a minute of walking to any hotel, airport, restaurant, store...within a minute. I see my name being lip-synced by someone pointing at me. It comes with. But do I have to run from paparazzi? No. They want the young, handsome guy with the hot chick. Not the short graying man who walks alone. I'm so not interesting to these people. I can't tell you how little they give a fuck, which is fine. It allows me to do what I need to do.

(2004) I have a low threshold for boredom. I'd rather do stuff than talk about doing stuff. The idea is to work vigorously. All my heroes work vigorously: Miles Davis, Duke Ellington. I'd rather do that than take three months off to find myself on some beach.

(1998) I don't want a wife and I don't want kids. I'm 36 and if I met a woman of my own age and married her, I'd also be marrying her former life, her past. It might be OK for some people - I don't want to judge it or anything - but it's not for me. It would destroy my creativity.

(2008, on marriage) I am better off on my own. I don't hate people but prefer my own company. People are complicated, relationships tend to normalize things and to me, obscure aspects of life that I want to experience. The last thing I want is to come off the road to a woman. Nothing against women, I just don't want to answer questions, check in, explain myself, etc. Also, I don't want to have that safety net of unconditional love or whatever. I would rather load my pack, dress for cold weather and hit the trail while it's still dark out.