I studied at one of the best journalism schools in China. And I failed her at first, taking up private English tutoring as a job after graduation, for five years. You might say that the journalism in China is not worth the effort, as most of the media outlets are controlled and censored by the state and hardcore professional journalism grows on barren soils, if at all. That was what I thought in the beginning, which kind of convinced me that I should try to prove my life’s worth somewhere else. And I did. While I spent half of my waking hours teaching a bunch of school kids how to pass English exams, I used the rest of my time studying psychology, reading, watching movies, writing stories, polishing first-draft screenplays with young movie directors, taking pictures. Nothing big, but they gradually made me realize that I would want a career that involves storytelling through lenses, be it fiction or nonfiction, movies or documentaries. It was a gradual process, and when I finally became convinced that I wanted to pursue it in April 2015, I quit my job as an English tutor, when I was 29, when I felt that the pressure to get married, to shoulder responsibility for the family, and to have a stable and successful career was quickly mounting. It made me wonder how others have made the career switch, and how they coped with all the issues and consequences. There came the documentary film that I’m working on right now, about those who have made major life changes or career switch at a comparatively old age, working title The Restarters. I have restarted my life, and I have gone back to the track that I had chosen in college. This is what I’ve been working on these days, and hopefully I can share with you some of the stories I’ve gathered so far. And if you also have something that you’d like to tell, whether about this theme or not, I’m all ears.

Interests

Movies, documentary films, reading, photography

• writing
• photography
• documentaries
• cooking
• movies
• reading
• track and field
• communications
• teaching
• journalism
• psychology

Music, Movies, and Books

to name a few:

Love in the time of cholera by Marquez

Lost in Translation by Sofia Coppola

Happy Together by Wong Kar Wai

The End of the Tour by James Ponsoldt

The Last Samurai by Edward Zwick

Rush by Ron Howard

Spirited Away by Hayao Miyazaki

American Beauty by Sam Mendes

Teach, Learn, Share

Things about China, stories that I've heard during the documentary filming, Chinese cooking which I am good, movies that I love

Countries I’ve Visited

Thailand, United States

Countries I’ve Lived In

China