Hopeful We Can Change

Yale-educated Wei-Tai Kwock surrendered his hard-won company and career to fight for our climate, working with Vice President Al Gore for the non-profit Climate Reality Project.  This wasn’t an obvious path. His grandfathers and father were into business and science. They had all fled China when the Communists took over in 1949, his parents coming to the U.S., his paternal grandparents going to the Philliipines . HIs grandparents never set foot in China again. (See Part 1 .)Wei-Tai's father did return, though, as soon as the country started ties with the U.S. (1979), and he took Wei-Tai with him. China was not as Wei-Tai's father remembered. Still, he was proud of the country's accomplishments, and eager to introduce other Americans to it. (See Part 2.) Wei-Tai also became enchanted with the idea of leading tour groups. (See Part 3.)Upon graduation, he decided to further his studies in China, attending Fudan University. He was one of many foreign students in what felt like a U.N. of sorts. After living and working in China for a bit, he got transferred to New York, and he quickly decided that city was not for him. He moved to California just in time for the 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake. ( See Part 4.) Wei-Tai worked for a nuclear energy company for a year. Then he was approached by friends who asked him to create multi-cultural advertisements. Although hesitant (as in, "No way!"), he soon not only joined Dae Advertising, but was in charge of it.  (See Post 5.).) He gave up his lucrative ad agency, and instead worked for Suntech Solar Power. (See Post 6.)When that went bankrupt, he worked for another solar company. Then, he decided to focus on the Climate Reality Project. Wei-Tai is concerned about China and America, two of the biggest polluters. He has faith China can make a difference, if it so decides.  (See Post 7.)
As for America’s challenges? Wei-Tai pointed out that our biggest climate challenge is the burning of fossil fuels. “Compared to all of the other countries, we’re one of the biggest per capita emitters, and I think we need to take responsibility for that, doing our part to lead to a solution. Unfortunately, Trump has said, ‘Let’s get out of the Paris Agreement.’” Wei-Tai takes heart that “not a single other country—of the 195—took that as an opportunity to say, ‘Well, if America gets out, then we’re out too.’

“America needs to take a leadership role.  And if this administration is not going to do it, then we need to find another leader. And fast.  The time is ticking. The United Nations most recent report said we have less than twelve years to address the climate crisis to avoid the worst consequences. I think the U.S. needs to lead. We are a superpower. We are the richest country in the world. We are all these things. We need to show some leadership here. “

For his part, Wei-Tai traded in his gas-powered car for electric, put solar panels on his house, and is taking steps towards becoming a vegetarian  (Raising cattle uses enormous amounts of resources like land, crops, water, and energy while producing a colossal amount of methane, a potent greenhouse gas.) This summer, he and his wife renovated their home to remove all fossil fuel appliances, including their gas furnace, gas water heater, gas cooktop and gas fireplace.

He also regularly contacts his elected representatives to keep them focused on climate issues.  Most importantly, though, he devotes his volunteer time to educating the public, the key change makers. Thirteen years ago when he saw An Inconvenient Truth, he was depressed. He was sure that his own children and grandchildren would witness only further destruction. Today, he is more hopeful.  Hopeful that we can learn what it is we are doing wrong and find ways to change.  “Solutions are all around us,” he remarked. “Youth are raising their voices and an increasing number of citizens are waking up with the desire to take action now.” All it takes is our willingness to make change. One person at a time.

With gratitude to Wei-Tai, this concludes this interview.

On November 20–21, the world is coming together to talk about the climate crisis with 24 Hours of Reality: Truth in Action.

Join the conversation. Attend a Truth in Action presentation from a Climate Reality Leader and learn what the crisis means for you – and how we can solve it.

If China decides to combat Climate Change, it will get done

Yale-educated Wei-Tai Kwock surrendered his hard-won company and career to fight for our climate, working with Vice President Al Gore for the non-profit Climate Reality Project.  This wasn’t an obvious path. His grandfathers and father were into business and science. They had all fled China when the Communists took over in 1949, his parents coming to the U.S., his paternal grandparents going to the Philliipines . HIs grandparents never set foot in China again. (See Part 1 .)Wei-Tai's father did return, though, as soon as the country started ties with the U.S. (1979), and he took Wei-Tai with him. China was not as Wei-Tai's father remembered. Still, he was proud of the country's accomplishments, and eager to introduce other Americans to it. (See Part 2.) Wei-Tai also became enchanted with the idea of leading tour groups. (See Part 3.)Upon graduation, he decided to further his studies in China, attending Fudan University. He was one of many foreign students in what felt like a U.N. of sorts. After living and working in China for a bit, he got transferred to New York, and he quickly decided that city was not for him. He moved to California just in time for the 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake. ( See Part 4.) Wei-Tai worked for a nuclear energy company for a year. Then he was approached by friends who asked him to create multi-cultural advertisements. Although hesitant (as in, "No way!"), he soon not only joined Dae Advertising, but was in charge of it.  (See Post 5.).) He gave up his lucrative ad agency, and instead worked for Suntech Solar Power. (See Post 6.) 

But even that was not enough. Over the past year,Wei-Tai has focused the bulk of his time on Al Gore’s non-profit Climate Reality Project. This project, funded initially by Al Gore with proceeds from the movie and subsequent book, aims to empower volunteers to go educate people around the world about climate issues, and turn this awareness into action. Today the group consists of more than 20,000 trained volunteers, including scientists, cultural leaders, activists, and concerned citizens, committed to building a sustainable future together.

Al Gore awards the Climate Reality Project's highest honor, the Green Ring Award, to Wei-Tai, 2018

“I really feel that we’ve entered a window of time where the public is much more aware of the climate crisis, where stakes are extremely high and people recognize it, and want to take action. They don’t just want to be educated, they really want to know, ‘What can I do?’ I want to galvanize that interest and set it in motion.  Here in the Bay Area I want to try to bring as much change as quickly as possible. “

Wei-Tai works towards encouraging policymakers to take action: to understand that solar and wind are viable technologies, and that zero emission electric cars are 70% cheaper to drive than gas cars. Despite this reality, “Only 1% of cars are electric vehicles.  Less than 5% of American homes are being powered by solar.  We’ve got to hurry up and get more people on board.”  

Wei-Tai believes the world can change, and that China and America (who have the heaviest carbon footprints) must take the lead.

When he visited China for the first time, the focus was on modernization.  “They did an amazing job to modernize their country, and rocket ahead. Certainly, compared to other less-developed countries, they’ve done the best job of it in the last 20 or 30 years. They’ve lifted hundreds of millions of people out of poverty, and they’ve created much more—well, I don’t want to say ‘freedom.’ But, people can pick their jobs. They can leave their jobs.  In the past you were assigned your job, and if you were a janitor in a certain danwei, (unit), you were in that danwei forever.  So things have gotten so much better for people. There’s so much more individual freedom and choice and marketplace selection.

“What that brings with it is uncertainty, because you don’t have that iron rice bowl underneath you anymore…(In addition,) in some ways Chinese have become very individualistic. Everyone is looking out for themselves. It’s like they’re going through adolescence. 

“There’s been a tremendous amount of economic growth at the expense of heavy pollution of their air, their water, their land. The food safety is questionable—can you really eat a tomato or an apple or anything? What is in that?  How was itgrown?  It’s just frightening the environmental damage this country has suffered in this growth spurt.”

Wei-Tai was pleased to see that recently China has begun focusing on environmental issues. And when China decides to do something, it gets done. “They are closing down the dirtiest polluters, because people don’t want to walk around with masks around their faces, coughing all the time. Now that they’ve gotten their other freedoms, they value quality of life, and the quality of the food, water, and air. So, people are speaking up and forcing change.

“For a poor country in 40 years to do what China has done for their people -- they have growing stature in the world, they’re a peaceful country, they’re not an aggressor, they’re not out there causing trouble--I think they’re a positive model. The world should welcome them, and engage with China, and work with China.  China will continue to pass through adolescence and continue on into adulthood and maturity . They are, and will even be more of, a global leader. 
(To be continued. Next: Hopeful We Can Change.)

Galvanized by a Movie

Yale-educated Wei-Tai Kwock surrendered his hard-won company and career to fight for our climate, working with Vice President Al Gore for the non-profit Climate Reality Project.  This wasn’t an obvious path. His grandfathers and father were into business and science. They had all fled China when the Communists took over in 1949, his parents coming to the U.S., his paternal grandparents going to the Philliipines . HIs grandparents never set foot in China again. (See Part 1 .)Wei-Tai's father did return, though, as soon as the country started ties with the U.S. (1979), and he took Wei-Tai with him. China was not as Wei-Tai's father remembered. Still, he was proud of the country's accomplishments, and eager to introduce other Americans to it. (See Part 2.) Wei-Tai also became enchanted with the idea of leading tour groups. (See Part 3.)Upon graduation, he decided to further his studies in China, attending Fudan University. He was one of many foreign students in what felt like a U.N. of sorts. After living and working in China for a bit, he got transferred to New York, and he quickly decided that city was not for him. He moved to California just in time for the 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake. ( See Part 4.) Wei-Tai worked for a nuclear energy company for a year. Then he was approached by friends who asked him to create multi-cultural advertisements. Although hesitant (as in, "No way!"), he soon not only joined Dae Advertising, but was in charge of it.  (See Post 5.)
In 2006, Wei-Tai was happily involved in Dae Advertising, when his wife, Violet, suggested they go see a movie called An Inconvenient Truth.The Oscar-and Nobel-Peace-Prize winning documentary, narrated by Al Gore, detailed the science behind Climate Change. Wei-Tai was so moved by what he learned that he did research to see if any of the government leaders were acting on this important issue. But they weren’t. George Bush did nothing. Obama did nothing during his first term.
“This made me really angry. If a regular person like me could understand the threat of climate change, why didn’t our experts and elected officials take action? I felt a sudden burden on my shoulders.  I knew I would have to be part of the solution.  But how?“
Figuring out how to be part of the solution was a daunting task—and days passed. At the end of each day he reflected, “’What did you do to become part of the solution?’ And every day it was the same answer: ‘I did nothing.’”  One day, he realized if he wasn’t acting to solve the problem, he WAS the problem.
“That’s what got me to quit my job at Dae and look for something else, And, the something else was solar energy. If I could help market solar panels, the more we sold, the less we’d need to rely on fossil fuels.  That would be my contribution. “

Wei-Tai Headed up global marketing for Wuxi-based Suntech Power, which became the world's #1 solar company.

Wei-Tai ended up joining Suntech, which at that time was the world’s second largest supplier of solar panels in the world.  The company, based out of China, was looking to grow their SF office. Being bilingual was an asset. The year was 2009, and not many Americans could say their employer was a company based in Mainland China.  “How unique an opportunity it was to work for one of the first world-class Chinese companies that was listed on the NY Stock Exchange.”

The founder of Suntech, Shi Zhengrong, was born and raised in China. In the late eighties, he went to Australia to get his Ph.D. He ended up staying there for another decade plus, and he worked for a local solar company. That’s when he got the idea that China could make this happen in a big way, and he returned to Wuxi to start Suntech Power. “He ran this Chinese company in more of a western fashion--twenty thousand employees—most of whom were Chinese. Among the top management, many were international business persons: German, Australian, American. Many Chinese companies in China are top-down. You listen to the boss.  Whatever the boss says, you do it. Suntech was more of a hybrid, which made it a very enjoyable place to work.”

Wei-Tai worked at Suntech from 2009 til it went bankrupt in 2013. “What happened was that it was so successful that many banks wanted to lend money to help us build more factories faster and faster at a time when the product was flying off the wall. Suntech couldn’t build factories fast enough.  They had borrowed billions of dollars. At one window of time—in 2012—the market slowed down and some banks were owed 450 million dollars that year in repayment. Instead of extending the loan, the banks wanted their money back. But, the company had only about 200 million dollars in cash and no way to pay it back. “

Lacking cash, Suntech offered the Western banks some cash and some stock. But, the banks insisted on a dollar-for-dollar return. 
‘The Chinese government is not going to let the world’s biggest solar company go bankrupt,’ the banks said.  

‘You don’t understand,’ Suntech replied. ‘The Chinese government doesn’t do that.  Not like the American government coming in to bail out Chrysler or AIG.’

The Western banks refused to compromise and, as a result, Suntech went into bankruptcy protection, and most of its 20,000 employees were laid off, including Wei-Tai. He continued to work in the solar business, though.

Wei-Tai and his boss Dr. Zhengrong Shi, CEO and Founder of Suntech, meet Al Gore in Miami, 2015

Wei-Tai  reflected that since he started working in solar, the price of solar panels has dropped 80%. So whereas solar used to be more expensive than coal, today it rivals the price of coal in many places in the world, and it continues to drop in cost. “Wind and solar power are now economically viable solutions to the climate crisis,” he said.

(To be continued. Next: If China decides to combat Climate Change, it will get done.)

From Nuclear to Advertising Power

Yale-educated Wei-Tai Kwock surrendered his hard-won company and career to fight for our climate, working with Vice President Al Gore for the non-profit Climate Reality Project.  This wasn’t an obvious path. His grandfathers and father were into business and science. They had all fled China when the Communists took over in 1949, his parents coming to the U.S., his paternal grandparents going to the Philliipines . HIs grandparents never set foot in China again. (See Part 1 .)Wei-Tai's father did return, though, as soon as the country started ties with the U.S. (1979), and he took Wei-Tai with him. China was not as Wei-Tai's father remembered. Still, he was proud of the country's accomplishments, and eager to introduce other Americans to it. (See Part 2.) Wei-Tai also became enchanted with the idea of leading tour groups. (See Part 3.)Upon graduation, he decided to further his studies in China, attending Fudan University. He was one of many foreign students in what felt like a U.N. of sorts. After living and working in China for a bit, he got transferred to New York, and he quickly decided that city was not for him. He moved to California just in time for the 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake. ( See Part 4.)

 Despite the shaky start, Wei-Tai and Violet stayed in California, and he stayed for a year with the Nuclear-Energy consulting firm which was made up of three former GE nuclear engineers. As insiders, they believed nuclear wasn’t safe, left GE, became whistle blowers, andadvocated against industry growth.”It gave me great insight into the construction of nuclear plants, how difficult it is to regulate, and how expensive it is.  What the level of confidence needs to be in construction. “

One day, some friends of Wei-Tai asked if he had any interest to join a new Asian advertising agency they were starting—Dae Advertising.  “Absolutely not,” he said. “I had no interest in advertising.”

His friends convinced him to just come and sit in on a meeting. So he did. One thing led to another, and he soon found himself working there.

“When you watch KTSF—Channel 26—you’ll see Asian-language programming. And if you see Wells Fargo ads in Chinese, Lucky Store Ads, Southwest Airline ads, those were all produced by my ad agency, Dae Advertising.”

A Dae Advertising Campaign

There was a whole burst of multi-cultural advertising in Hispanic, African American and Asian markets throughout the 1990s, 2000s. In the mid 90s, when the world wide web came along, Dae Advertising branched out further, creating websites. They realized that Fortune 500 companies need multi-cultural websites, including Disney. They helped develop Disneyworld.com.  and Disneyland.com in Japanese, Spanish, Portuguese, German, Italian, etc. Apple Computer asked Dae to build their first Chinese website featuring a product called the Chinese Dictation Kit, which allowed you to speak Chinese into the computer, and what you said appeared in Chinese characters on the screen.  “It worked pretty well, but it was a first-generation type of thing and so it was not perfect, as some of the voice recognition is now. But that was a complete break-through product developed mainly by Kai-Fu Lee. He ended up leaving Apple to run Google China and Microsoft China, and was the source of much litigation between those two companies fighting over him. And, now he’s a very famed venture capitalist in China.”

In 2006, Wei-Tai was happily involved in Dae Advertising, when his wife, Violet, suggested they go see a movie called An Inconvenient Truth. 
(To be continued. Next: Galvanized by a movie.)

A Shaky Beginning to Career

Yale-educated Wei-Tai Kwock surrendered his hard-won company and career to fight for our climate, working with Vice President Al Gore for the non-profit Climate Reality Project.  This wasn’t an obvious path. His grandfathers and father were into business and science. They had all fled China when the Communists took over in 1949, his parents coming to the U.S., his paternal grandparents going to the Philliipines . HIs grandparents never set foot in China again. (See Part 1 .)Wei-Tai's father did return, though, as soon as the country started ties with the U.S. (1979), and he took Wei-Tai with him. China was not as Wei-Tai's father remembered. Still, he was proud of the country's accomplishments, and eager to introduce other Americans to it. (See Part 2.) Wei-Tai also became enchanted with the idea of leading tour groups. (See Part 3.)

Wei-Tai picked up so much of the language during the summers of his undergraduate studies, when he graduated, he decided to keep up his language progress. So, rather than applying to work on Wall Street, which was a popular choice in the 80'S,, he moved to Shanghai and enrolled in Fudan, one of China’s top five universities.

Shanghai's Fudan University ID, 1985

 He remembered the cost of education was so, so inexpensive: about $600/semester for school, about $4/day for room and board. More than that, he found himself in the midst of a UN of sorts. His fellow classmates came from all over the world: including North Korea, Russia, Czechoslovakia, Eastern Germany.  “These were countries that Americans usually never interacted with. Fortunately, China was the place where all these people could congregate. China had relations with all these countries.  As students, we sat in the same class, ate together, played baseball, volleyball and ping-pong together. And you wondered, ‘Why are these countries enemies?’ And, you realize it’s sort of contrived to be enemies. When you get to know them, they’re just the same as normal people.”

After he graduated from Fudan, he got a job as a translator and legal assistant at Paul Weiss, an American law firm with an office in Shanghai.  It was then he happened to meet his wife, Violet. Born in Hong Kong, and educated in the U.S. (Duke, Thunderbird), she had a job at IBM in Beijing.  After Shanghai, Wei-Tai was transferred to Paul Weiss in New York for two years, where he eventually concluded that he had little interest in a legal career, even less in living in New York. He had visited California several times, and had always enjoyed the place. So, hanging on only to the hope that he’d find a job in high tech, he jumped to the land of sunny blue skies. Within a week his dream had materialized, and he found himself working for a nuclear-energy consulting firm.  Monday, October 19^th, 1989 was his first day on the job. At five o’clock, he put his pencils away….and the Loma Prieta Earthquake began.

(To be continued. Next: From Nuclear to Advertising Power.)

Initial Chinese Impressions of Americans

Yale-educated Wei-Tai Kwock surrendered his hard-won company and career to fight for our climate, working with Vice President Al Gore for the non-profit Climate Reality Project.  This wasn’t an obvious path. His grandfathers and father were into business and science. They had all fled China when the Communists took over in 1949, his parents coming to the U.S., his paternal grandparents going to the Philliipines . HIs grandparents never set foot in China again. (See Part 1 .)Wei-Tai's father did return, though, as soon as the country started ties with the U.S. (1979), and he took Wei-Tai with him. China was not as Wei-Tai's father remembered. Still, he was proud of the country's accomplishments, and eager to introduce other Americans to it. (See Part 2.)

Wei-Tai also became enchanted with the idea of leading tour groups.  His goal was not only to see the country, but to learn the language.

“I did not grow up speaking Chinese except for yi, er, san, nihaoma (one, two, three, hello.) During my high school years, a friend of my father’s said, ‘Hey, you know, China is going to be a very important country during your lifetime. As a Chinese-American you better be able to speak Chinese. People are going to expect you to speak it. ‘"

Since Wei-Tai  was interested in international relations and saw the vast potential of this one-billion-person country (at that time,) he dove into a Mandarin class at Yale. He discovered that Mandarin “is an extremely difficult language to learn in the United States.  But when I traveled in China, in three weeks my fluency level picked up so much, ‘cause you’re in the environment. You see characters all over the place—from just that daily, hourly reminder of all the characters  I almost made as much progress in three weeks as I did a semester in America."

So, for the next two summers, he took Americans on tours throughout China.

As China had been closed off to the world for 30 years, many Chinese had never seen a westerner. “When we walked down the street, legions of people would be riding bikes, and just staring at us. Even walking up and just following us just to see what we were going to do.  Or to try to say hello.” Wei-Tai was 19 in 1983, but many of his clients were retired. He remembers several Chinese asking, "Are all Americans old and fat?"

Also they’d never seen blonds. “Often Chinese people would come up and ask to touch their hair.  Just cause it was so unusual."

One lady was even approached by some women, asking if they could touch her breasts, as they’d never seen any so large. Said this woman, “We must look like Martians to these people." Wei-Tai emembered China as a sometimes difficult place to live and travel, but definitely innocent and charming.  He said that the hotels varied by city and were pretty smelly by Western standards” in remote areas. (Think squat toilets.) Also, at the time, the planes in circulation were Russian jets and  propeller planes. “One time, when a portly Americana passenger tried to put his seat belt on, the whole thing came off. The stewardess told him it was OK not to wear one."

(To be continued. Next: A Shaky Beginning to Career.)

Father Dives Back into China, taking Wei-Tai Along

Yale-educated Wei-Tai Kwock surrendered his hard-won company and career to fight for our climate, working with Vice President Al Gore for the non-profit Climate Reality Project.  This wasn’t an obvious path. His grandfathers and father were into business and science. They had all fled China when the Communists took over in 1949, his parents coming to the U.S., his paternal grandparents going to the Philliipines . HIs grandparents never set foot in China again. (See Part 1 .)

Wei-Tai led some of the earliest groups of American tourists on 18-day tours through China.

Wei-Tai’s father  was a different story. He loved to travel.  “When China opened up to the west with Deng Xiao Ping in the early 80s, my dad was keen to go, but you could only get a group visa to China. There were no individual tourist visas. Group tours had started a year or two previously. 1979 was the warming-up period of relations.  So, he joined a group. At the time, Lindblad Tours, InterPacific, and Pacific Delight were the three major American tour companies that were authorized to bring tour groups to China. My dad and I went on the InterPacific tour, which was a company owned by one of his friends, Patrick Yau, of New York City.”

They even managed to visit the Kwok Home in Shanghai where Wei-Tai’s father grew up. and where a distant cousin still lived. His father had great memories of this awesome house that he lived in, because when he was growing up, Shanghai was the Paris of the East.  Even in war, the house was well-appointed.

Wei-Tai remembered walking into that old glorious house. “This three-story house that had chickens walking around indoors, and the paint is peeling off the walls. No maintenance. And, they burned coal to heat it, so there’s these coal-stained walls.  Dirty light bulbs hung from the ceiling. My father’s heart sank.  

Under Communist rule, you don’t own your home, and thus you don’t put any work into it.  You don’t try to improve it. It’s not yours.  And any home that’s gone through 40 years of no maintenance is going to look quite dilapidated.“

While Wei-Tai’s father was disappointed by the look of his glorious old home, he felt pride in the country. “When he saw China as a whole—a country that actually had transportation, had food, clothing, and was not a war-torn country in chaos but an organized place, he greatly admired the progress.  He felt proud that China had come through the Cultural Revolution and was opening up. And that the people behind the iron curtain were actually good people.”

Wei-Tai’s father wanted to know more about the country and the people he had left behind. So, for the next 20-30 years after he retired, he helped Americans tour the country. “Even at the age of 93, he’s still interested in China and travel “
Wei-Tai also became enchanted with the idea of leading tour groups, and for two summers in college led some of the earliest groups of American tourists on adventures through this heretofore closed country.

(To be continued. Next: Initial Impression of Americans)