True love doesn't happen right away; it's an ever-growing process. It develops after you've gone through many ups and downs, when you've suffered together, cried together, laughed together.
The biggest lesson from Africa was that life's joys come mostly from relationships and friendships, not from material things. I saw time and again how much fun Africans had with their families and friends and on the sports fields; they laughed all the time.
I laughed when Steven Spielberg said that cloning extinct animals was inevitable. But I'm not laughing anymore, at least about mammoths. This is going to happen. It's just a matter of working out the details.
Every lesson I learned as a kid was at the dinner table. Being Greek, Sicilian and Ruthenian - we are an emotional bunch. It is where we laughed, cried and yelled - but most importantly, where we bonded and connected.
Sure, I've felt racism. I think everybody has prejudice. When I was growing up, the dark Mexican kids weren't allowed in the public swimming pool in Dallas. My light-skinned friend got in, and he laughed at us. It didn't seem like a big deal, because we didn't know any different. So I never ran into anything that actually scarred me.
At first, I only laughed at myself. Then I noticed that life itself is amusing. I've been in a generally good mood ever since.
The most wasted day of all is that on which we have not laughed.
My brother and I laughed a lot as kids. We came up in the middle of the Depression, and neither one of us knew we were poor. We had nothing, but we didn't know it.
'The Hangover' was, like, solid. I laughed a bit, you know. Seven out of 10, maybe. But I made it 32 minutes into 'Hangover 2' before I walked out.
But I don't distinguish between being laughed with, and laughed at. I'll take either.