US actor and politician Arnold Schwarzenegger has spoken about his childhood growing up in Thal, Austria.
In his upcoming book, Be Useful: Seven Tools for Life, Schwarzenegger details his early years, writing: "I grew up in a small village in Austria at the beginning of the Cold War.
"My mother was very loving. My father was strict, and he could be physically abusive, but I loved him very much. It was complicated.
"My father had a hot-and-cold-shower kind of a treatment.
"When he was drunk, he was not forthcoming with his emotions. He was angry. And when he was not - two, three days later, he would maybe feel guilty and buy us ice cream and take us out, hugging, kissing and all that stuff."
Speaking to US magazine People, the Terminator star said he makes a point of saying loving things to his children.
"I would say that I’m really well-bonded with my kids."
Schwarzenegger said that his father had a motto that he instilled in him: "Be useful was the very phrase that motivated me."
"I have always fond memories of my dad, and I always will have fond memories of my dad. And I don't blame him for anything, simply because he did not know any better.
"I felt that my father loved me because I could tell by the way he held me. I learned how to feel those things rather than to hear those things."
Be Useful: Seven Tools for Life by Arnold Schwarzenegger is out on 10 October
