00:13:53 · Henrique Dubugras, Jack Zhang
[00:13:53] S0: Yeah. That's so interesting. But is it kinda more the case in Australia? [00:13:56] S1: Oh, you don't get discriminated or anything. It's just that it doesn't... You don't get... Academic result doesn't get rated very high in in high school. [00:14:04] S0: And did you feel that you got discriminated by being Asian in Australia? [00:14:08] S1: A little bit, especially in high school. [00:14:10] S0: Yeah? Yeah. How did that manifest? Like, people just didn't talk to you or, like, what is it? [00:14:14] S1: No. Like, you you get, like, you know, crazy things like you have a girl just just come to you and then kiss you, I think, because she she lost a bat. [00:14:22] S0: Oh, wow. Is that right? So that happened to you? Yeah. Tell us that story. [00:14:27] S1: No. It's just all that, you know, it happened to me a couple times and all of sudden... [00:14:30] S0: A couple times? Yeah. You got like free kisses for bats [00:14:33] S1: a couple times? [00:14:34] S0: Yeah. I mean, they're like, what the hell is going on? That's funny. So you're just like hanging through the hallway and then a girl's like, can I kiss you? And you're [00:14:42] S1: like, you're No. They don't even come to ask you. They just come to kiss you. [00:14:45] S0: Oh, really? Yeah. Wow. Doesn't sound that bad. [00:14:49] S1: Yeah. Some... I mean, the the first time would definitely be shocking. It'd be like, what did I do? [00:14:55] S0: That's funny. Were you good with girls in high school? [00:14:58] S1: Not really.
00:14:58 · Jack Zhang, Henrique Dubugras
[00:14:58] S1: Not really. [00:14:58] S0: No? No. But do you have a girlfriend or a date or no? You're kind of single most of time? [00:15:04] S1: Yeah. Have a I have a I have a girlfriend or a date when I was in high school. I was like 13 or 14 ish and... [00:15:10] S0: In China?
00:15:10 · Henrique Dubugras, Jack Zhang
[00:15:10] S0: In China? [00:15:10] S1: In China. And I was reasonably popular, so I started like my first so called like company or business when I was 13, so called Urban Exploration. It's like a student magazine. So initially, we... You know, I was in a student club in my high school and tried to raise money for student activities. And we would go to the restaurants and the bars around the school and, you know, the internet bars and stuff like that. So they want to raise money, they say, Hey, why don't you just send these flyers around for students? And nobody wants to take, you know, flyers, you know, we don't want to be sitting there all day long just sending out flyers to get money. So we said, Oh, why don't we just do something interesting? Then we built this booklet that we write like comic stories, write student love stories, write how do you play computer games better. Then this booklet that we printed out of the school for free that eventually would become like a magazine that would distribute it to all the high schools in my city. And then we signed up like over 8,000 merchants on that magazine. So that went quite Eight well, thousand and that would merchants? Yeah. How? I just go... Like, we just got a lot of people who wanna read it and then... You know, because our school is kind of pretty good, and then, yeah, a lot of people like it. [00:16:31] S0: And, like, how did you... How did even the idea of starting a business come at, like, 13 for you? Like, did
00:16:31 · Henrique Dubugras, Jack Zhang
[00:16:31] S0: And, like, how did you... How did even the idea of starting a business come at, like, 13 for you? Like, did [00:16:36] S1: you Well, I didn't think it's a business. I was just, like, a thing to do is the project that we started and just went viral and went quite successful. [00:16:44] S0: Did you make any money? [00:16:45] S1: Yeah. We made over a 100,000 US Wow. From that. Mean, this is, like, late nineties in China. [00:16:50] S0: Which, like, was a lot of money in China. [00:16:52] S1: It a lot of money. Yeah. Yeah. Like, huge. But we didn't know what it is, so we we actually But is [00:16:55] S0: that profit or, like, revenue? Or It's profit. And then did [00:16:58] S1: Because we're not paying anybody. Did you distribute between We... But before I left China, I I tried to hand over the the thing to somebody, and no one wanted to take it over because everybody just wanted go to college and get a good academic result. So that just died. The we we donated to the school to build a basketball court. [00:17:19] S0: You donated the money Yeah. [00:17:20] S1: When you [00:17:20] S0: were 14, a $100,000? [00:17:22] S1: Yeah. More than [00:17:23] S0: that. Wow. That's crazy. Why? Did you want the money? [00:17:27] S1: I grew up in... My family is actually quite wealthy, you know, not relatively in a sense to, you know, compared to The US. Right? You know, my family maybe have, like, you know, a couple 100,000 US dollar, but that's considered very rich in China. Or it's in my in my town. Right? [00:17:44] S0: So it's like the time, you know, like in late nineties.
00:17:44 · Henrique Dubugras, Jack Zhang
[00:17:44] S0: So it's like the time, you know, like in late nineties. [00:17:47] S1: Yeah. Yeah. It's not like today. Right? Today is nothing. And I didn't really had spending money, like, when I grew up, so I don't really need money. I had... I don't... I can't really conceptualize money, I think, when I was 13, 14 years old. [00:17:59] S0: Wow. That's so good. [00:18:00] S1: And when I... I remember when I went to to Melbourne, afterwards, I I I lost financial support from my parents when I was 16. I couldn't even afford to buy a $2.50... $2.50 chocolate in seven Eleven. [00:18:13] S0: Why did you stop pushing financial support? [00:18:15] S1: You know, my my dad just lost his his job. I think it was a year before I went to to college in Melbourne, you know, they just lost all the money. [00:18:24] S0: So it was more because they actually couldn't afford it versus Yeah. [00:18:28] S1: Yeah. They they basically couldn't afford it. And my mom resigned from her full time job in a bank, which is a very good decent job, but not making enough money to become entrepreneur. So she started, like, a telecom business just to try to support me. [00:18:41] S0: Oh, wow. [00:18:42] S1: Yeah. So that was that was very tough. [00:18:44] S0: And how was the conversation? Was like, hey, Jack. Like, so we have no more money, so figure it out?
00:18:44 · Henrique Dubugras, Jack Zhang
[00:18:44] S0: And how was the conversation? Was like, hey, Jack. Like, so we have no more money, so figure it out? [00:18:49] S1: No. They actually never told me until the the school holiday after my year 12, and I basically just went back to China. I have, like, a driver from age of four. And all of a sudden, no one picking me up in the airport. And then when I went home, I just saw my dad is smoking, which my dad is not a smoker. And they just told me, like, they can't really support me anymore. [00:19:13] S0: And how did it feel? [00:19:15] S1: It feels a bit hopeless. It's like, how do I survive? I mean, you know, I'm an international student, so I'm paying $24,000 tuition for my college, and I have to pay, you know, living expenses. I pay around like a 50... You know, 40,000 to $50,000 a year Australian dollar. I mean, that's a lot of money. You know, I was like, how do I even figure out to pay for this stuff? [00:19:41] S0: So, like, you felt like, oh, fuck, what do I do? [00:19:44] S1: Yeah. I mean, like, I thought, oh, if I have to leave Australia, come back to China, I've already left China for more than two years at a time, and academically, I'm not able to compete anymore because you know, it's a very intensive competition And I couldn't get into the best college anymore, so what do I do? So the only way is to figure out a way to leave, I guess, myself in Australia and just work. [00:20:07] S0: And how did you do? What did you start doing?