Jay-Jay Okocha Quotes

I feel very English in a suit. There's something about being in a suit abroad, particularly in America, that feels empowering.

How comedic are squirrels? We don't have squirrels in Australia. The first time I saw a squirrel was at a meeting at Disney.

Even all the top players going to Europe to play helps soccer in America, as do all the MLS players like Beckham and all that, they're trying to promote it. At the end of the day it's about getting the younger generation interested at an early age so most of them will move on and play.

If you're eight and you live in Los Angeles and everybody has toys and you go to a country that has a Marxist dictatorship and there are no toy stores and nobody speaks English and it's blazing hot every day and they only have fish, which you don't like, then you tend not to appreciate the cultural lessons you're learning.

There's very little bohemia in Australia and it's one of the things I miss most about not living in Europe.

When I was seven months pregnant with my son, my mother and I took a trip to El Salvador, where she's from. Frequent visits with her to see my extended family have taught me how different life can be if you are born into poverty.

I've got to be a husband on my visa. Going to Russia can be scary - you've got to compete in front of lots of people who know I've got a husband.

I've crossed the Mexican border and gone to Tijuana a few times over the years, but I've never felt comfortable there.

I backpacked around the world and went to places like Mexico City and Pakistan, where I'm like, 'Oh. Things aren't quite as good.'

If, by chance, you were to meet me at the Casablanca airport or on a boat sailing from Tangiers, you would think me self-confident, but I am not. Even now, at my age, I am frightened when crossing borders because I am afraid of failing to understand strangers.

If I were bombing with my jokes in English, I would go back to France. Maybe do that mime thing.

I'm very comfortable in the U.S. and Europe, but I feel completely out of place in the rest of the world, mostly because I never spent time outside the U.S. and Europe until I was in my 30s.

We only had white socks in Romania. But when I used to come back from the States, I used to bring back pink and yellow socks with all kind of designs, and hair clips and elastic bands for the ponytail that had colourful designs.

In 2007, I went straight from Tokyo to Iowa to join Hillary Clinton's traveling press. I felt like a foreigner there, too. I remember thinking, 'Americans are huge.'

If I'm in America, I'm safe. I feel very safe. But if I step outside of America, it will be a very dangerous situation.

It's really weird when we're out of the country, whether we're in Brazil or Greece or some crazy place like France or Germany. When you hear your song on the radio or in a store, and you're in a different country, it's really freaky and surreal.

You know it was really hard to do a set, or even to do interviews in English, because in Europe, we always had a translator with us.

I think going to another country and being able to evolve past my thinking and what actually went on in America was a little bit different from what athletes experience here in America.

Chinese consumers don't book hotel rooms that are as expensive as U.S. consumers.

With Lille, we could have gone to the South of France, and people wouldn't have recognised us. But at Chelsea, the players are at another level. Everything has changed - the language, the country - but it is up to me to adapt.

I'd never really travelled before, and when we started going places, like Japan, France, Germany and all over Europe, it's been interesting to see how different cultures work. But to be there playing music makes it so much better.

I think the hardest part, and where we have to stay the most disciplined, as much as you want a player, you can't invent him if he doesn't exist.

Going to Russia is going to be nothing for me. I'm going to treat it like it's the U.S. because, at the end of the day, it's one man, one ring.

People in Nigeria weren't happy that I went to Qatar. They said 'why did you go there of all places?' They missed watching me on television but sometimes you have to think about yourself and your future as well.

When I'm overseas, I suspect I look like Mr. Bean.