That’s how I grew up—and we didn’t have any running water, or no water-flush toilet, and as we had no mattresses my mother would stuff dried fern into a linen bag. In winter it was so cold— it was so cold, and no heating in the house or this room where I slept with my brother— so cold that a layer of ice would build on the blanket where I would breathe. You see I would cover myself completely with a blanket and leave a little hole where I would breathe, and there was a thick, sometimes an inch-thick layer of ice in the morning—but it was wonderful to grow up like that. You see it looks like poverty but it was very very good to grow up like that as a child, full of imaginations. We had to invent our own toys, we had to make our own toys, there were no toys, we invented our games, we invented the entire world. I still like to travel on foot—essential things in my life— I would do on foot regardless of the distance to cover. I think we have lost certain things that are very valuable and very close and dear for humankind. We are not built for driving in cars all the time, and our conversation is not made for just doing it over the phone all the time. I think I developed a sense of something essential, how I grew up as a child was a very essential childhood, and because of that it was so beautiful… And of course always hungry, we didn’t have enough to eat… but I do know the value of food, and I have deep respect if there is something on my plate.

Said in commentary for his film "Heart of Glass"