Quotes from Katie Melua

I would advise everyone to have a travel drawer. Mine contains adaptors, ear plugs, blow-up pillows for the plane, travel health books, disposable cameras, a first aid kit and torches.

I think my biggest achievement is still going out on the road and wanting to make music on the road. It doesn't matter to me that I am still travelling around because I just love everything about it, I love the lifestyle, and I love being on stage.

Because of things like 'The X Factor' and 'Autotune', the real art of communicating a song is not treasured any more. But singing other people's songs can be an intensely personal experience. I want the songs to be vessels that people fill with their own imagination, the same way that I fill it with my thoughts and feelings.

The Georgians will treat you like royalty, and the odds are you'll do a lot of eating, drinking and toasting.

I love fruit. One of my earliest memories is climbing trees for figs, and I once got stuck in one when I was six. I could see the biggest, juiciest fig and I climbed up and got it and ate it right there, sitting on a branch. Then I realised I couldn't get down.

When I was younger I dreamt of intrepid travel and whenever I had some time off I wanted to scuba dive. Nowadays I'm a bit more relaxed but I'd still like to do an Amazonian trek.

Everybody in Georgia is musical, but I was slightly obsessed.

I love a classic, white silk shirt with dark trousers or jeans or a dark, knee-length skirt: timeless clothes that are not too fussy always work.

I don't cook very often but when I do I try and make Georgian food. I made a hinkali recently, which is like ravioli but is the size of your palm, with meat in the middle and thicker dough.

When I wasn't touring I'd be really down, then suddenly after a few weeks of crazy travelling - America, a double headline with Ray Davies in Denmark, TV shows here and just partying... Suddenly I had an acute psychotic breakdown.

At 19 I was lucky enough to start making money from my music career, and when I was in my early twenties I trusted financial experts and advisers to guide me with how I invested money.

The first dramatic experience I had of music was when I was five. The electricity had gone out in Georgia, and my mum played the 'Moonlight Sonata' on the piano.

I grew up in Georgia where my parents, little brother Zurab and I shared a flat with my paternal grandparents and two uncles in the capital, Tbilisi. Times were hard and the country was racked by civil war.

I think singing is such an important and incredible art form and it is quite undervalued at times.

I became this dorky 15-year-old, in my bedroom all the time with crossed eyes, staring at my computer. It was all drum loops, R&B and pop - silly songs that I hope to God no one ever hears. But that's what got me in to music.

Well, I couldn't speak English before I went to Belfast. So I learned English with a Northern Irish accent.

I know I've been lucky, but I'm not very materialistic - I don't believe in collecting many unnecessary things and I'm not into girlie shopping.

I may be developing aerophobia as I get older, or maybe I'm just becoming middle aged, because I find flying an increasingly unpleasant way of travelling. I would much rather drive than fly.

When I'm working, I'll often be upgraded to a suite though I don't ask for preferential treatment. I'll be there with a tour manager, my band and various promotions people and the hotel will offer to upgrade one of us; luckily, it's usually me.

I spend eight to nine months working abroad and cram in a holiday when I have the odd week off.

I personally stream or download from iTunes because I love the quick access that I have to music; I don't have to write down a list of songs that I like and then go to the shop.

But I'll never forget my trip to Las Vegas. I'm a huge rollercoaster fan and we did the one at the Stratosphere, which curls around the hotel, and there's one that dips out from the roof then comes back in. That was intense.

I'm not a huge fan of Las Vegas. It's a fun place to go to play a bit of poker but it's so man-made. And being quite environmentally conscious, I couldn't believe the amount of neon lighting in the city.

Buying books is probably my biggest vice when I travel.