Growing up where I grew up, we looked to athletes. They were our first heroes. They came from the same places we came from. I mean, you can't watch TV and see someone who is successful that you can really relate to. That person isn't real; he doesn't exist. But athletes traveled the world, had these big houses and gave their families a better life.

The experiences that I've had growing up with music, you know, I couldn't trade them for any money in the world. Dancing in the living room to enjoy myself. 'Enjoy Yourself,' Michael Jackson.

When you're growing up, your dad is your superhero. Once you've let yourself fall that in love with someone, once you put him on such a high pedestal and he lets you down, you never want to experience that pain again.

Growing up, politics never trickled down to the areas we come from. But people from Obama's camp, and Obama himself, reached out to me and asked for my help on the campaign. We've sat and had dinner, and we've spoken on the phone. He's a very sharp guy. Very charming. Very cool.

I would have liked to play in New York and be close to my family and friends, but since there is nothing I can do about it, I really don't care where I go.

My parents were not poor, I mean we were a very average middle-class family of academics, but my grandfather happened to have built house literally next to one of Kolkata's largest slum.

My mother's childhood was complex, disjointed, and disturbing. As children, we would gather round and ask her to tell us again and again The Story of Her Childhood. It was Grimmsian, Andersenesque: a classic fairy tale replete with goodies and baddies.

Once you do a show like 'Modern Family,' which has been an amazing thing, and I'm so happy about it, it does make it a little challenging to do other things.