135 Quotes by Louis Yako

My eyes suddenly caught a vandalized sign on a door in a tight corner near Thrasyllou Street, which seemed like an intelligent twist of Charles Bukowski’s famous line “find what you love and let it kill you.” The line on the vandalized sign reversed this to make the meaning even more intense: “find out what kills you and love it!

If it is true that education is the main foundation of any society, it follows that the state of race in today’s America mirrors its education system. Therefore, America’s education needs serious examination and even remaking. It is a system that uses Blacks (and other marginalized people) as mere tokens. You see a meager quota of Black people (as employees or students) here and there to give the false impression of equity.

Considering the way American education is going in the direction of commercialization and corporatization speaks volumes about how education is getting hijacked; it is being turned into a tool of oppression and creating wider gaps between the rich and the poor rather than fulfilling its purpose of setting minds and bodies free.

If it is true that education is the main foundation of any society, it follows that the state of race in today’s America mirrors its education system.

The world is expected to take it for granted than an American expat who studied at any 'reputable' American academic institution is smart, well trained, and competent to do a job anywhere around the globe, but the opposite is never true for newcomers in the U.S.

Many treat friendships and other human connections as if they are things they can store in a closet where they can come back one day and find them unaltered. Alas, human connections do not survive with this mentality.

I want to silently look in the eyes of all those caught up in situations, places, and unfulfilling lives from which they still have no courage to walk away.

[M]any people say things like ‘investing in a love relationship’ as if they are talking about investing in stock market or in financial projects. That is a customer not a human or a citizen language. This type of language is filled with clues about how we have internalized ourselves as customers.

I am here because I want a place from which I can start over.