Quotes About Heritage

Before the Greeks were the Tamils. The Tamils are one of the oldest civilizations that's still surviving.

My grandparents got out of Poland right before the Holocaust and came here, and the only thing that mattered was surviving.

Miami Beach - that's where I grew up, in a middle-class Jewish family led by my maternal grandfather. Me, my great-grandmother - a Holocaust survivor, who was my roommate - my grandparents, my mom and her brother all shared a four-bedroom house.

I am the daughter of Nigerian immigrants. My mother is a survivor of both polio and of the Igbo genocide during her country's civil war in the late 1960s.

My grandparents, like many genocide survivors, took most of their stories to their graves.

To be a black person is to come from a long bloodline of survivors and storytellers, with a resilience that people can't even comprehend.

Phil is a child of Holocaust survivors.

I knew I had that Cajun heritage, that Acadian heritage; I just feel it. And my gut says Irish on the other side. Irish and French, that's what I feel. When you're young, it doesn't matter so much, but as you get older, I would suspect part of the ageing process is to wonder about your ancestors - who were they? What were their lives like?

Order has been sustained in Egypt over at least the last three decades by police conduct which bears more hallmarks of Egypt's Ottoman heritage than an accountable criminal justice system.

My father could swear in Gaelic and English, by the way, ladies and gentlemen.

I learned to speak Italian, somewhat. Definitely enough to get around in Italy. My grandfather always used to swear at my grandmother in Italian.

My sister and I thought my grandmother was not very grandmotherly compared to all of the church ladies that we knew. She was making sure we learned all the Korean swear words, just in case we needed them. Now I see what an awesome lady she was.

I'm a very superstitious person. I come from a long line of superstitious people, so it's not going anywhere. For instance, we have this thing on our movies where if one of the key personnel gets a haircut in the middle of the movie, it's bad luck. I swear by that.

My father is from Bosnia, and my mother is from Croatia, but I was born in Sweden.

When I came to America from Sweden, Mother and I, we went to Chicago where our relatives lived.

Sweden is famous for many things - but not fashion.

There are so many times there could have been a left turn instead of a right turn in all people's lives. I think mine are pretty crystal clear, because of being adopted, being born in Ethiopia, being adopted to Sweden.

We moved to Gambia from Sweden when I was six years old because my dad was from there. It was definitely a culture shock.

Food has always been in my life. Being born in Ethiopia, where there was a lack of food, and then really cooking with my grandmother Helga in Sweden. And my grandmother Helga was a cook's cook.

We have nobility in Sweden, and it comes from the old British aristocracy.

My Swedish grandmother was the daughter of a dairy farmer who lived near Hedemora. My Swedish grandfather worked as a clerk for the Swedish railways in the Stockholm station.

My dad is from Japanese descent, my mom is from Swedish descent and, through marriages and divorces, a pretty multicultural family - a lot of Spanish speakers in the family.

Every time I'm in Canada I feel more Swedish, and every time I'm in Sweden I feel more Canadian. I belong in both places and I love them both equally. It's funny because the Swedes claim me as their Swedish pride and the Canadians call me their Canadian girl. I'll take it all.

The last name is pronounced Jill-en-hall. It's spelled with two l's, two a's. We have a song in my family; G-Y-Double L - EN - HAAL spells Gyllenhaal. It's a Swedish name. It's a family heirloom set to music.