(FORTUNE Magazine) – -- JACOBUS DE SWARDT, 27, a white South African sociologist, on why he has agreed to be chairman of the Cape Town Central branch of the militant, largely black African National Congress: ''I now see myself first as an African and not an Afrikaner.''

-- QUSARN SESSION, 11, on the risk of being killed by random bullets in New York City: ''There's nothing to be afraid of. If you're not in the wrong place at the wrong time, you'll be OK.''

-- DAVID SHAMBAUGH, 37, a University of London Sinologist, on Taiwan's increasing investment in China: ''Taiwan is no longer trying to recover the mainland. It's trying to buy it back.''