Transcription
Meet Hawkwanping, the founder of Banyan Tree, part of a group with 15,000 employees that runs hotels and resorts in 26 countries. But his first business was a failure.
"That was a biggest loss that I was responsible for."
Born in Hong Kong, raised in Bangkok, and went to university in Taiwan, Hawan Ping is now a Singaporean citizen. He went from being a Stanford dropout and detained under Singapore's national security law to dining with league oneU and teaching at top universities.
"So I joined kind of like the establishment."
He shared how the time in Singapore jail changed his life.
"I was for a short moment seeing myself as what it would be like to be a political prisoner."
"What is the hidden reason for the tension between China and America? People who only know Western civilization don't get it. They just think that anybody from China is a threat."
"And what truly defines a Singaporean identity? I promise this story will blow your mind. I'm Max Chernov. Let's go."
"What does it mean to be Singaporean?"
"I don't think it's a shallow things. It comprises, but it's a lot more than chicken, rice, eating durian or singlish or whatever. I think the Singapore identity is really one of values. And in a way, without wanting to define it very clearly, I think Singaporeans when they're overseas and they see each other, they recognize that they're Singaporeans. And therefore, that I think is a Singapore identity already. There is clearly an awareness of how Singaporeans think differently than our neighbors. And I don't want to put a simple handle to it because if you ask somebody what is the British identity, what is an American identity?"
"It's very hard to put it into words. I think it's basically a pride in who you are and a recognition that we are different from other people that gives you your sense of identity already. And in that sense, I think if you feel you are a Singaporean and you think that is part of your identity, then that is your identity already. I don't know how to put it better, but I don't like to respond to it with certain cliched words of yes, sing English is our identity and you know our food is our identity. It's having shared a common experience. Um, for a lot of the males, I would say national service is a strong part of the identity. For Singaporeans as a whole, I would say our system of education, which I fully support the idea that Singaporeans cannot go to international schools."
"Yeah."
"And I support it fully and I and I fully support the idea that there are no private schools allowed in Singapore."
"No private schools. We have the independent schools and so on. So I think the the educational system, the multiculturalism we have in Singapore, these are I think the things that shape our identity as opposed to you're saying what is the identity and put it in you know one simple sentence. I think that's very cliched, but if you were to ask me what shapes our identity, I would say national service, our educational system, our multiculturalism, and at the very end of it, if there's anything at all, I would hope it's our sense of egalitarianism, which means that which is in a way unfortunately eroding, but the values that the the pioneer generation had was that of course there's income inequality, but there's a sense of ealitarian arianism which is incidentally a strong part of the American identity that I can be I can be I can be a billionaire but the billionaires that you see American billionaires as opposed to European or Russian billionaires American billionaires actually very happy eating hamburger and hamburger joint because they have that culture of egalitarianism they truly feel quite comfortable and they're accepted by waiters and so on they feel it's egalitarianism as opposed to equality and I think Singaporeans had that compared to to Thai and Malaysians which have a royalty. So whenever you have a royalty, you have aristocracy, there's no more egalitarianism. But Singapore had a strong culture of egalitarianism that we're all in it together. That was born of our historical experience and I hope that egalitarianism will still be there even though of course there's income inequality. We go to different geographics for interviews and like many people are quite patriotic and Singapore it's also like quite patriotic and Singapore doesn't allow you to have like second passport. So the sense of patriotism is like deeply rooted in society. And then like some people would argue like okay they would say you have to belong to like one like some group like big like bigger group as country and you have to be a patriot but when you grow up in the environment of like having the different nationalities and then you maybe second culture kid so you don't have the sense of patriotism. Do you think it's people should be patriotic is a good thing or it's a bad thing or is how you approach this?"
"I think that's a very good question because I think it's nuanced because I think particularly in today's world choices have become almost binary."
"Yes,"
"you are either patriotic to be an ultraist and to be patriotic means you have to really be aggressive for your own country, your nationality and everything else outside is against you. So it's quite a polarized world today. I see myself very much as a Singaporean. I'm very proud to be a Singaporean. I did my national service here. I'm very uh emotional about the things I don't like about Singapore and this and that and so on. So, I'm a very emotionally invested in Singapore and I would fight for my country. But it also means that because I didn't just grow up in Singapore, attend all schools in Singapore, only have Singapore friends and so on, I think I'm not parochial. You can be patriotic and not parochial."
"Yes,"
"you can be very international in your cultural mindset and still say this is my country, the country I will fight for and die for, but I'm not a close-minded nationalist. So I think it is important to to say to be able to recognize that in today's world and today's young people you can be intensely patriotic and yet not parochial and ultraistic. You can also traverse the world and empathize with the whole world. Otherwise you become very parochial and some Singaporeans including business people are quite parochial and I've criticized it the Singapore mindset because we are very successful country the government itself tells us how successful we have been and we are so you get so many Singaporeans who go to Jakarta or you know go to Indonesia and they say oh this is such a terrible country it's so dirty it's so filthy it's all crimeridden and everywhere we go around the world they go to Paris and they say oh it's dirty and you you compare compare every culture against your own and only see the negative sides of it. So that kind of patriotism I think is misplaced. But I think you can still love your country and know that your country is not the most perfect country in the world and you can still be deeply appreciative of other countries and other cultures and still feel and still be a patriot. So I I think it's it's an important differentiation to make in today's world in particular."
"You mentioned like several times that the world is like very volatile in a volatile state today. What do you think the role of Singapore in this changing environment? What's the place for Singapore in today's world?"
"I think you can take that at various levels. You could take it, let's say you take it at the most immediate granular level and then I would take it at a much higher level. Okay. I mean Singapore is a hub. I have said before in other venues that I think we can either continue to be a very thriving city state of innovation where there are examples already where we are we're doing very well or we could become a mediocre city state as a global city. We could become a second ranking city state and become mediocre if the people in Singapore do not continue to aspire and be ambitious. And that is in a way a threat to Singapore because we are very rich society. We have got amazing reserves. We've got a relatively small population. We don't have poverty, you know, so on so forth. So in a way Singapore will always be prosperous. I don't think we're going to be invaded by another country because we have very strong deterrent capability. I think governance here is comparative to other countries. Public governance is of a very high standard. So it's easy to become complacent in Singapore, but if we don't become complacent, we could become a thriving first rate city with innovation and so on. So I think that's where we could become at a higher level. I think Singapore could aspire for something even more and that would be we could actually be at the intersection point of a great civilizational reset that is happening now and will continue for the next 50 over years. Meaning I think the last 300 years have seen the rise and dominance of Western civilization and all the values that come with it. Not just military power, economic power, but values. I think you're going to see over the next 50 years the rise of a Chinese civilization and East Asian civilization with their own values, particularly on governance. China is not ever going to be democratic in the western sense. It's not going to become liberal. But China is showing different ways by which societies can prosper and deliver goods to its own people. And the values of Chinese civilization are definitely going to be far more important in the next 50 years than before. So you're going to see a civilizational reset where Western civilization is no longer going to be the dominant one. Maybe even within the next 50 to 100 years there'll be an Islamic renaissance which I think the world has been waiting for because Islam was very progressive, very scientifically oriented, very enlightened several hundred years ago and went its own different way today but eventually will have its own renaissance. Where does Singapore sit intellectually in terms of thought leadership? We are very westernized. Of all the aan countries or even Asian countries, we are very very westernized. Our people understand very intuitively western values. At the same time, we're majority Chinese that can empathize with what Chinese people feel about the century of humiliation and the need for Chinese civilization to be not overtaking the world, but at least to be equal with the best in the world. that that ambition of of China as a civilization to regain its place in the world. I think Chinese Singaporeans understand that we also live in a multicultural world where a Muslim population is quite important. A Muslim minority is quite important. An Indian minority here is quite important. So there's a capability for Singapore to not just be a multicultural place where we practice multiculturalism. It could be more than that. It could be a place where if there's going to be a civilizational reset, Singapore can be a thought leadership center where people can come and try to understand that in the new world without one civilization dominating. Singapore can be a place where perhaps there is that intellectual ferment. Now whether it will happen or not, I don't know. For it to happen, there has to be a lot more openness of thought. But maybe that will come."
"Is it not the case at the moment that Singapore is like this this intellectual hub, the gate kind of where the west meets east? To some extent?"
"I'm to some extent. Yes. But I mean, you know, you look at you look at ancient civilizations, you look at Egypt and Alexandria was a center of thought for a long time."
"Yes."
"Right. You have if you go back millenniums, you for that to happen, you have to have a lot of openness to thinking. I would say Singapore is a lot more open to thinking than decades ago. But to really have have a very vibrant debate about Western civilization, eastern civilization, is that going to happen or not? I don't know. You take defense as one issue. The Shangrila dialogues was one attempt to do that. I think the Chinese have I hope the Chinese still come back. But one of the reasons I'm told that they didn't come to the Shangrila dialogue this year is because they felt that the Shangrila dialogue was being organized basically by British think tank and it's it's getting more and more anti-Chinese and not really open. I think you need Singapore needs to be just more than a place where other people come and decamp here and set up conferences and so on. It should be where Singapore itself aspires to be a thought center and not just a hotel as for people to come where it leaves America."
"So what will be the America's place in the world in the next like 50 years you think?"
"I think someone has said to me which I some of my American friends have said America is probably going through its most divisive period since since the US uh civil war and I think that's quite possible because the Vietnam war was actually quite different. The Vietnam war was basically much more contained. it was re get out of Vietnam and that was a debate but now it's about America itself is deeply deeply divided even if you leave aside the issue of America and the world my honest view is that and I'm not I'm I'm not at all anti-America I I think I have a deep appreciation of American values and I have a deep awareness that people write off America too easily and yet there is so much inner strength and resilience within in America itself that I am absolutely sure that America will come out of its own internal divisiveness today and become a very strong country and a very strong society. However, I also at the same breath believe that the whole concept of Pax Americana is gone. Pax Americana meaning what the euphemism they called the postwar rules-based order."
"Yeah. Only people who come from the global south, maybe a Russian, would know that it's an euphemism, rules-based order, playing by American rules. And America sets the rules. America plays by its rules, not anybody else's rules. That was a whole post-war order. And that was in fact a bargain that the rest of the world did during the Cold War. You get American security protection in return for being subservient to America in everything else. Everything else. And now, of course, the Atlantic alliance is fraying because they now suddenly realize that it's gone. And I think you've seen that erosion already. Pax Americana began to erode even after the Vietnam War already when people realize that young American boys ain't going to die for their country in a foreign place. That was how the Ottoman Empire, the Roman Empire, and the British Empire started to decline. When people from the center of the empire weren't willing to die thousands of miles away protecting the empire, you saw what happened with Afghanistan and Americans pulled out of Afghanistan in a very, very pathetic manner. I saw the same thing happened in my youth when America pulled out of Vietnam in 1975. So the Americans willingness to dominate the world by force I think is gone. So with that America itself is going through its own debate. It will become a great nation again. But I think the idea that the international rules-based order based on American premise primacy based on American exceptionalism is gone. I think what we're going to see over the next 100 years is essentially like the movie Back to the Future. Maybe you've seen that movie where basically the future is going to be like what it was 400 years ago when you had competing civilizations. You had a western civilization but that was not dominant around the whole world. You had an eastern civilization, you had Islamic civilizations. So several civilizations and not just powers and I use the word civilization because it brings with it values, practices and so on. that is not just military power or economic power. I think the world will go back to what other political scientists call a multipolar world. But I'm not too keen on the word multipolar simply because it's quite narrow about geopolitics. I think it's a lot more than about geopolitics. It's about values. It's about soft power. It's about many other things. So that's why I call it a civilizational reset when there'll be several civilizations competing, coexisting under the sun. But it will no longer be western civilization alone. And I think the west is having a hard time coming to terms with this because the west and every westerner I know, even the most enlightened westerner, sees China as a threat because it is so alien to everything that they've had. It is simply alien and they cannot believe that you can have a stable society, a prosperous society unless you have elections. But they don't even realize that the idea of democratic elections has been so has become so how should I say it so misused everywhere in the world. The west still thinks every time an African country which is not even ready for elections they have elections it's fine already it's good. But if you have China which doesn't have elections it's bad. And so the whole civilizational outlook of the west has got to change and they're not ready for that. They they definitely not ready and they feel threatened by it because they only know the world view that they came up with over the last 230 years. And the view that they have is our world view, the European and American worldview, the western worldview is the only world view one should have. Anything else other than that is perverse. So, China will dominate this part of the world. You think"
"not this part of the world? This part of the world and that's not necessarily a good thing either. But if you look at Chinese history and one has to look at history, the west was very small part of of Western Europe, small countries like Holland dominated the whole of Indonesia."
"Correct?"
"England dominated the whole world and so on and so forth. Right? There's a history of imperialism and I don't use it as a bad word, okay? There's a history of imperialism in Europe which was very transnational and with way beyond your borders, not just to your border. It's everybody in Europe stuck to their borders, but they basically took the rest of the world because the disparity in technology and economic development allowed it to. China has never had that. China has never once projected itself to have colonies far away. Never had a strong navy for example. So China has always been as the word chong is the central world as a middle kingdom. So it's always dominated the countries around it to be subservient to it like Vietnam and so on. That's the fear that countries will have today that the Chinese mindset is one of you are around me, you are a vassal state. So China had a lot of vassal state but China never had a history of projected imperialism thousands of miles away. So it's crazy for people to think that China would ever go and invade America, invade Europe and so on. It's just not in the Chinese mindset."
"Yeah. But Assean has to be concerned that going back thousands of years and Vietnam in particular, Vietnam was a vassal state. They had it own emperor but the language was Chinese and Vietnam was expected to pay tribute to the Chinese emperor. So that is in the Chinese mindset and that's what Asan countries have to be very careful about to tell China that we are equal to you but of obviously you're the big elephant in the room but sovereign and that's why the South China Sea is such a volatile issue because it's a test of how China can actually be a dominant player but respecting the rights of other sovereign countries in this area."
"Yeah."
"Sorry. Yeah, you were detained in Singapore, right? You were in in jail. What was the reason and how was the experience?"
"I was detained when I was 24."
"Yes."
"When I was a journalist in Singapore and I was writing articles based on my very liberal upbringing uh in the west. So I was criticizing a number of things in Singapore. Singapore government under Lee Konu in those days were very sensitive to a number of things. So I was detained under the inter internal security act which allows which is a British leftover and allows uh detention without trial indefinitely. Every 2 years you just government just needs to renew it."
"Yeah."
"So there was a mechanism the British used for communists and they used it for uh gangsters and so on. So I was detained under that and I went to solitary confinement for two months. Then I had to confess to a number of things on television and I was then let out."
"Was it Changi prison?"
"No."
"No. It's a special uh it still exists today. It's a special prison for internal security detainees."
"Did it change your perspective on"
"Oh yes, for sure. Yeah, for sure. How it changed my perspective in the same way. The two big changes in perspective uh was one when I was kicked out of university and and decided to come back to Singapore. You know, because I realized who I am and what I am not. And when I went to political detention and there were many other people there who were truly truly dedicated to their views and spent years in prison, the Nelson Mandelas of the world. I was 24 and I realized that I did not have those views and I was playing at probably being something that would be quite dangerous. Yeah. Um, and I'm not a revolutionary. I had views and I'm not going to spend the rest of my life in jail holding on to views. Um, and I'm not a revolutionary. So that changed me to decide that I didn't want to get involved in political views and so on. And that started my direction to go more towards business and so on. Yeah, before that I was very radical in my thinking and today I still have a lot of sympathy for political prisoners. Obviously a lot of not only sympathy I think a huge amount of respect for political prisoners wherever they are in the world in in a democratic world or in a repressive world because I was for a short moment seeing myself as what it would be like to be a political prisoner to have the courage to die in jail for your beliefs. like Nelson Mandela was lucky that he got out but there are many Nelson Mandelas of the world who didn't and you had your Russian dissident who went back to Russia after he was poisoned and he died I mean I has a huge respect for that but I'm not that person that that's the realization that I came to I am not that person I've been getting a bit of AI former recently everyone is using AI and new tools pop up every like 5 minutes and I'm like okay what shall I do with all of This of course I already implemented few AI tools and it speed up my work flow tremendously but it's literally just 1% of what's possible and if you don't keep learning it's like refusing to start using email in the '90s. I mean you can but good luck keeping up. If you've been feeling the same let me introduce you to the AI mastermind run by outskill that's happening this weekend. You will learn things like the language of AI aka prompt engineering to get the best outputs using AI 10 most powerful AI tools like make.com aentic hub cloud etc. Using AI in Excel and creating professional presentations effortlessly just enough to actually learn something new without completely melting your brain. It's a weekend after all. Normally, it costs $895, but for my viewers, there are 1,000 seats for free that are available for the next 72 hours, plus cool bonuses worth $5,000. So, whether you're from HR, marketing, sales, ops, or if you're doing your own business or freelancing, you will love it. I want you to join because the upside of mastering AI tools right now is huge. So, if you've been feeling behind or curious, grab the seat before they're gone. For this, click the link in description below."
"You remember your impressions of Singapore as a kid back then?"
"Yeah, actually quite a bit of memories."
"Was it like compared to your life in in Bangkok which was your home back then? What was your like any differences that you saw straight away when you came as a kid to Singapore?"
"First was that everybody spoke English but of course with my less so in those days than now they would be speaking Cantonese. I I would say probably one thing that struck me was how Singapore was actually very was very colonial. Thailand is not. You don't see a lot of old British buildings and all that. It's very Thai. You see some old Thai buildings that were built by by by ties going back to the British days. But unless you went to the British embassy and so on, you don't get a sense of that in Thailand. Whereas one of the things I got here when I visited here and I mentioned that my sister was born in Rangon and we also went to Hong Kong. This there's a lot more similarity between Hong Kong, Rangon and Singapore. The big grand buildings like you see Fitton House, the Istanas. There's a whole similarity between British colonies"
"Mhm."
"and themselves versus Thailand and why I guess Bangkok is such a attractive tourist center is because really there's not a lot of colonial feeling. It's very Thai and they've never been colonized. So I guess that was one sense I I had."
"Yes. Like when people ask like would you ask me would you consider going moving to Kale to Colour? I say not really cuz like it's very similar to Singapore and Thailand like Bangkok I would actually consider because it's completely different."
"Correct."
"So that's the uniqueness of of Bangkok that that you have there because it was not colonized."
"Yeah."
"Yeah. By British compared to many places in the region. So you don't see you don't see the to the extent that what people call the built environment, right? The the built environment, the buildings that you see around you subconsciously influence your sense of a place. There's a lot of similarity between all the colonies and and Thailand is really very um very different."
"Have you met Liquanu in real life in person?"
"Oh, many times. Many times."
"Many times."
"What was the impressions? How you remember him?"
"Well, the after I was led out of jail, I had many occasions where he asked me to go to the Istana for lunch. Okay. And many other people were invited separately. All have the same story about the little he would serve you two steaks. One is tiny and one is big. And you're not sure which one you're supposed to take. But it was not because he was testing you. The first time you go, you're you're being you're not being the first time you go, you think you're being tested, but it's actually because he takes a small one and you're supposed to take a normal one. And so after a while, you go back many times, it's always like that. And then it's, you know, and other people have stories about how he always put on his gloves and he eats his pomelo and so on. But Lie Konu did one thing that was quite amazing and that was when he was already in his 60s, he would have a lot of private one-on-one lunches with people that he thought could potentially contribute to Singapore, not necessarily through the PAP, which they would have a separate mechanism, right? So they would he would meet up with a lot of youngish people in their 40s like myself and other of my friends and just sort of have a general chitchat with them and then put you into positions in business. So I had one-on- ones with him for quite a while even and ongoing."
"Yes."
"Where you talk about the world as a whole and he would now when I look back I mean in my 70s I like talking to people in their 40s to also get a sense of who they are. So that was what he was like in his 60s talking to younger people and then thinking oh this person perhaps thinks quite differently and so on so forth. So after that I was put on the board. I was being chairman of um uh Singapore Power, the first the power company that was uh privatized. I was put on the board of GIC on Singapore Airlines. And so I joined kind of like the establishment and I was sort of taken back as not as a detainee but on the establishment. And I think one sense I had about him was that he I don't think he's driven by anything personal at all. He had a very strong view of what he wanted Singapore to be and nobody would get in his way. But I don't think he had personal grudges as such. You know, I think he's probably one of the most idealistic people one can imagine. Even though you see him so hard-headed,"
"you wouldn't call him idealistic because he's so pragmatic."
"But his idealism for Singapore, I think, was huge. And he was an extraordinary man. I had a very good childhood not knowing who the hell I was. And that's that's added to this whole issue about identity. And I used to think it was a a negative thing when I went to when I went to school in in Thailand or in Taiwan or in America, people had such clear identities and I didn't have any identity at all. Um it used to worry me as a teenager, but now I think it's a it's been an advantage."
"Yeah. Interesting. Like I always thinking about my daughter because she was born my older one she was born in Dublin and growing up since like 2 years old in Singapore international school. So she's probably she will need to start figuring out her identity probably later in life."
"Yeah. But I think you could she would belong to a group of people who who become quite international and comfortable wherever they are. My son-in-law, my my daughter's husband is a Swiss national and Swiss ethnicity, but because his father uh was a hotelier, he never lived much in Switzerland at all. He grew up in Bangkok, in Sri Lanka, all over the world where his father was. And now he's very happy in Singapore. And although he's a Swiss national, he's comfortable in so many different cultures. Yeah. So I think as long as your daughter has a strong identity of herself, which a lot of it will be given by the parents of who you are as a person, I think not having a strong cultural or ethnic or national identity is not necessarily bad. You will find that she will be able to traverse other cultures much more easily. And I've been asked several times why is it that a Singapore company as we are technically has been able to be quite successful globally. We're not a huge company like Singapore multinational but we are in 26 27 countries. We only have about 15,000 associates or employees but they come from about 70 80 nationalities. And yet we're all we all have a very strong common culture. And I think I ascribe that to the fact that I'm not rooted to being Singaporean or Thai or Indonesian. And I think that's a strength. And your daughter, I think, will find that that's her strength in a in a global world. She can truly think of herself as a globalist."
"When you were in Taiwan,"
"yes."
"Was it like you start discovering your ethnical roots?"
"To totally."
"Yeah. Because when I was in you, do you know the expression the sort of derogatory expression for calling a person a banana?"
"Yeah."
"Okay. You're yellow on the outside but you're white inside. Correct. Um and many other such things. Um, when I look back on myself, I think I was actually a banana because I was an Asian very small minority in a very white all-American high school. Yeah. I sort of jumped in totally absorbing that culture to the extent that I got elected president of the student council on a radical platform of student rights and you know this was in the late 60s and the whole baby boomer generation in Europe um they had the Prague spring they had the Paris uh strikes and so on. So and then in the and then the Vietnam war. So I was really thinking I was like an American when I went to Taiwan. Then suddenly I was plunged into a completely different world, totally different world of students my age and I had to live in a room in a with bunk beds with six people in one room. Taiwan was really quite poor to the extent that in this 1960s my classmates would go to the student canteen and it was their birthday. They would go and order a bowl of noodles. Otherwise, they would just eat at the canteen and where you didn't have meat, much meat at all. But I would always every day go and eat at the little noodle shop outside. So, I was really much more privileged. But I really began to understand much more about Chinese culture, Chinese ethnicity, Chinese civilization. And of course, now we have a lot of business in China. My wife is very, very proficient in Chinese culture and language. And although I am not that much so, I totally understand the Chinese civilizational mindset today versus America. And I totally sympathize with the idea that American hegemony and western cultural dominance, which is not all bad, which has been for the last 300 years, much of it was good. the rule of law, the scientific method, but the whole domination of the world since the enlightenment by Western civilization. I totally get it when when people of Chinese ancestry and everybody in China, leaving aside the geopolitics of Xi Jinping and so on, the sentiment that Chinese civilization is ascendant again. I I mean I really do understand that even from just one year in in Taiwan that there's a clearly different mindset and a value system"
"from the west"
"and and that's something I speak about today because I think people who only know western civilization don't get it. They just think that anybody from China is a threat to the prevailing order which is a god orained order. that western civilization is God orained to be there forever and is the reference point by which all other civilizations must measure themselves. And they don't realize that 300 years ago the West was not where it was today. Essentially, I think my exposure to at a young age to something deeply Chinese, having been almost totally westernized, has informed my views about the world today. And then okay from American school to China and then to Stanford and Stanford was like I guess US in the 60s was like cool place cool thing like growing economy after the second world war."
"Well no for you you've got to see it in slightly different light."
"Um when I went to the US it's not like a cool place. It was the US probably at that time was a bit like today meaning it was the most"
"Yes. It was it was the height of the Vietnam War."
"Yes. Yes. And the Vietnam war was hugely divisive like America is today but different issues, right? Completely different issues. But I actually landed in Stanford on the date that there's a famous for all baby boomers from the US, they know something called Kent State. Ken State University is well known now to people who were ever in the Vietnam War movement because that's when that was a day when several students were actually shot and killed by US troops. So for the Americans that's a big thing, right? Just like today for for Trump to send in the National Guard into into LA is a big thing. That was a big thing. And and I landed in Stanford on the day that this happened. So riots all over American universities. This was in 1969 or so I think the height of the Vietnam War and I landed right in the middle of it."
"What was your impressions?"
"I think my that was where I became radicalized and it was a it's a process where I grew up as a banana thinking I was white thinking I was American landing in Taiwan suddenly realizing that in fact there's this whole different culture and I actually am am rooted in that also because of my ethnicity as a Chinese and then going to America and suddenly feeling betrayed by my whole childhood to the extent that I suddenly realized that with this there was this war going on. I became radicalized because of partly because of guilt that I was this teenager living a life of total indifference to the war living a great life in a little bubble in Thailand where all around me the war was going on people were getting killed and so on even my classmates parents were getting killed. One of the most traumatic moments I had as a student was when one of my best friends basically jumped and killed himself in Thailand because his father got killed um in the war. So it was a very very traumatic time and I went to America suddenly feeling guilty that my whole childhood was a bubble and that's when I became radicalized and became more and more against the Vietnam war which was not something that Singapore believed in. Singapore's politics in those days was very much American Nixon politics. Um, very much the idea of the the domino effect that if South Vietnam fell, communism would invade all of Southeast Asia. I took a different view which I think history has actually shown to be right that the war of independence. This the Vietnam war was a war of unification and independence and not the Vietnamese were not a proxy for global communism. But the sentiment in those days in Singapore and elsewhere was that the Vietnam War had to be fought by the Americans and others against Vietnam because the Vietnamese were not nationalists. They were communist. And the other side, people like me said they were nationalists. They wanted to unify Vietnam and that would be all."
"Yeah. And then it led you to some problem."
"It led me to take part in a lot of demonstrations."
"Yeah."
"And then the FBI started tracking. Then I got kicked out for an incident that had nothing to do with Vietnam War at all."
"Kicked out from Stanford. Yeah."
"Yeah. That was because I took part in a in a little student sit in at a professor's class who was a Nobel Prize winner who actually had written books advocating eugenics, advocating that black people should be sterilized. Yeah. And who got very controversial. So I had black students who went to demonstrate. I I didn't even know what was going on. So I just went with them and did this graduate class where they were PhD students, all white and men. And then there was a whole bunch of black students who went in to demonstrate and there was one Chinese guy. So the professor took out his Polaroid camera. He took pictures of everybody. He reported it. And then there was this whole this whole thing where you had to do a lineup and um he couldn't recognize any of the black students but I was the only Asian so he recognized me. Yeah. So then I had to go for trial. It's a university trial. I was found guilty. Ironically the professor came up to me afterwards and said you know Mr. Ho you haven't read my book. And I said no professor I haven't. I just dragged in and I'm told that you you you believe in sterilizing black people which I think is wrong. Then he said, "You should have read chapter 6 or whatever chapter." In chapter whatever it says that Chinese people are the smartest people in the world. So I said, "Oh if I had read that maybe I wouldn't have come to your classroom."
"So"
"so I got I got um"
"I got suspended for one year."
"And then what happened next? It was a big big shift in your life, I guess. Big change, right?"
"It was a big change in my life which actually I've used as an anecdote when I talk to young people about the need to make decisions and be aware of yourself because I was only suspended for a year. I wasn't technically kicked out. Yeah. And immediately I was accepted to Cornell University because I had applied to Cornell earlier and had been accepted and I didn't go simply because my parents went to Cornell. My sister went to Cornell. So I didn't want to go to Cornell but they immediately accepted me and I remember very well the school had already let out. It was very end of the term. So I was one of the students remaining there and I walked around the lake, Lake Aonita where my dormatory was and one part of me wanted very much to continue this life of being a radical student and going on to Cornell and continuing that life. And another part of me said that this is not me. This is fake. This is playing a a role, playing a game. What am I doing here? And I think that was the first dialogue I've ever had with myself. Um, the second one was when I went to jail in Singapore where you actually have to confront yourself and ask yourself who are you really and are you playing a game or are you really being yourself? So that was the first time I decided that I was not going to go on to Cornell. I didn't want to continue living this life of rich middle- class kid playing at at politics and being a radical. So I decided to come back to Singapore which was a big shock to me because I had never lived in Singapore and coming to Singapore meant I had to go international service."
"So that was a big"
"voluntary decision to leave America behind. I guess it could be a bit weird feeling cuz you never lived in the country and then you have to serve for two years."
"Knowing that I was an outsider and people I mean I remember very well where I came back I had long hair they had to shave my head and then I was ridicuant meaning you eat potato meaning you're you're a you're not one of us you know you're a foreigner. It was a derogatory term. And you don't speak S English. You don't?"
"No, I did not speak Hawin either."
"I could speak Mandarin. I could speak Cantonese. But Singapore is mainly a Hawin place. Yes. And I never picked it up because I didn't I didn't if I grew up here, I would have known Hawin because it's spoken at all the hawker centers and so on. But I didn't grow up here. And I spoke with an American accent. I mean, I can do a pretty possible sing English today. But before No. No, no, I didn't know it at all. So, there was this weird kid with an American accent."
"Was like a lot of shift in your life, a lot of changes through your first like 24 years of your life, right?"
"Do you think you like became like very successful entrepreneur later in life because you had this a lot of changes, tough to some extent like tough changes in your life, tough environment need to adapt."
"Well, first of all, I wouldn't say I'm a very successful entrepreneur because I think it's not, how should I put it? If I wanted to find people who have done not as well as me, but whom have been very intelligent, hardworking, I can find many of them. I can find people who have been 10 times more successful than me. So, I wouldn't say I'm a very successful entrepreneur. I think I have come to a stage in life where I'm very happy at where I am with my fair share of failures and my fair share of successes. So what I would say is that I think I am who I am today and whatever I have done today is largely because I did have a background that was very different, very challenging at a young age already in every respect. Not even the traumatic ones of being thrown out of university or being thrown in jail, but even being thrown at the age of 16 into the deep end of a Chinese in the Chinese world where there was not one word of English being spoken. I didn't know a word of Chinese and I just had to survive. So, learning to navigate in a world where you have no expectations of what things should"
be, you just have to deal with it as it comes. And always be optimistic that you will get out of this and the world will be good.
So there were many unhappy moments even in Taiwan because I was just so totally alien. I couldn't even express myself cuz I was really literally dropped in there into a university environment and had to survive.
Yeah.
Then Stanford I had to survive. I had to go into the army and survive and find friends. And then I had to I went as a political detainee for two months. So, and then after that,
I did a business that totally failed. The oil rig failed. And now I'm lucky lucky more than anything else to have a business that seems to be doing well. I never take it for granted because so many things I did I thought I would get out of well and they didn't materialize well. Like our oil drilling business. But I think that my one thing I tell young people today is a very very diverse and varying experience when you're young can only help you. And that's one of the problems I see in Singaporeans today. Not only when people talk about the political leadership having been coming from one thin line of experience but also most young people in Singapore quite narrow in their linear progression. Even the idea of taking a gap year is like really weird. My daughter took a gap year and I just think a very very different experience like your own a Russian who born in Sakalin grew up in Vadosto went here went there now you're in Singapore you probably find yourself a little bit of an outsider you've got Singaporean friends you've got American friends you got British friends and not too many Russians here you understand Western culture very well but you probably also understand a Russian culture too that gives you a perspective on things which is more unique and I think you have certainly a very unique perspective whatever it is I think I have a unique perspective and I think perspective on life is critical to your success yeah that's like I was also trying to think about my daughters cuz the the growing up so it's one is eight one is two the growing up is very in a very comfortable environment so sometimes we go to Southeast Asia countries and like I try to kind of expose her Okay. How people live differently and not so like good life, wealthy life
and like she went to to to Russia with my wife like recently to see like different angles. So I actually I want her to be like comfortable but at the same time I don't want her to take business class all the time. So I don't want her to struggle maybe but not I don't know what's the what's the proper what's the healthy mix of it like okay you need to struggle a bit to see also the perspective how life can be for me for example I worked as a waiter I worked as the housekeeper in a hotel I did this like this very low paid jobs and then I start working as an engineer and then in marketing I can compare now like doing my own business I can compare Yeah. So it feels like it's very important so the kids see different
angles of life, different ways of life, right?
And I think it's a parent's fault if the children grow up very coddled and not able to really understand the Yeah. the reality of how other people live. You mentioned your daughters are young. You say you travel business class. So they travel with you business class
sometimes. When they get older. When my children got older, they all travel economy. My children are and they have I have grandchildren who are even older than yours. They all travel economy. They don't travel business class at all.
Why Why do they need to? They're young enough. Even my children are young enough to be able to travel business economy everywhere. Only when they travel with granddad and grandmom when we go on a family holiday, we say, "Oh, it's a treat. Everybody travel business card." So, it's a treat to them. My daughter took a gap year out. She went to Peru on her own and stayed there working in an orphanage. Um, I hitchhiked from Singapore all the way to the UK in the '70s, which I wouldn't do today because it's not safe.
Yeah.
So, I think it's important for parents to actually create experiences where your children understand what the real world is like, but you just do it so that it's not too unsafe. I mean, you know, you I wouldn't I wouldn't think that when you're let's say especially if they're daughters as opposed to sons, they're more vulnerable to risk and so on to physical risk. But I would have thought you would, if I were you, I would. And if if your daughters could give them a gap year where they work somewhere totally totally alien in a relatively poor place like an orphanage or school, but you you've taken the precautions to make sure that it's safe. But otherwise if you don't expose your children then you cannot blame them later on. If they are unable to comprehend the world or if they do not have a very broad world view it's your fault. It's not their fault. And that's why I encourage parents to not particularly Asian parents don't have such a a attitude of protecting your children all the time. Let them see the world.
I have like quite a few Singaporean friends. Some of them they scared to go to JB to Malaysia because it's unsafe because Singapore is such a such a safe environment and it makes you to fear more outside world world because it's not 100% safe. I mean Singapore is not 100% but 99% safe. For me it's okay. I'm like big dude. I'm okay. I can survive. I street smart. But
Singapore kind of pushes you to be more protective maybe careful against the outside world. I don't know. Well, I mean it's I I think that that is absolutely right. Um
well JB I would also be a little bit careful about because
JB
Yeah, because JB is targeting Singaporeans. So actually if you're if you have a Singaporean car plate then you will be targeted. But I mean Singaporeans should be willing to go to
the rest of Southeast Asia. They can because they're just like another foreigner there. But the other thing is that I think it's changing now among young people but but not among the parents. People want to go on holiday. uh they always want to go to Paris, London, New York. They wouldn't particularly want to go to Southeast Asia. But I think young people on their own now as school kids, they actually quite keen now to see what Southeast Asia is like. And that's I think a good thing.
Yeah.
Because it used to be whenever the kids would take a holiday, they would go only to the west. Hey, I've launched this Telegram channel where I'll be sharing insights from my guests, travel tips around Asia, and also my thoughts about YouTube, marketing, business, and even life. It will be cozy, personal, and free of charge. So, join me. Just scan this QR code on the screen or click the link in description and I'll see you there. We talked about your like challenges when you were like young and then you start your own business and you said like your first business failed. I had never wanted to do business and I had actually been accepted as a research fellow uh at INSEAD and Euro Asia center.
So I had all been prepared to go to leave journalism and go and be a quasi academic but then my father had a stroke one of many strokes and being the eldest son I was never thinking I wanted to go go back to family business at all but I then decided to go back as an obligation. So then I left and I spent 10 years in our home and our own family business. But during part of that I had to close down quite a number of businesses. But also started a new business in oil drilling. Crazy idea.
But we actually built China's largest jackup drilling rig which is quite an achievement.
We financed it ourselves. We built it on budget. We built it China's first rig. They were so proud of it. the oil ministers came down and all that. Then the bottom fell out of the oil market and to cut a long story short, we had to sell it at a massive loss and I flew around all of America just to try to sell it because China did not have oil in the South China Sea. So after that we lost a lot of money. uh all my father's investments in America, he had to liquidate to pay off a lot of things and yeah that was the biggest loss that I was responsible for because I started that business.
How big were the business when you kind of took over your family business?
I don't remember the actual numbers now but it was not I mean it was not a massive conglomerate but it was like a mini conglomerate. He had his business in agriculture and physical commodities and starch and so on in Thailand which my elder son is running now. Then he moved back to Singapore and he started a whole bunch of businesses here which I had to close down one by one.
I closed down the businesses in Singapore completely over 10 years. I closed down the businesses in Malaysia and largely that was one big lesson which led me to Banyan Tree because in those days we had trading companies, we had contract manufacturing, we had all kinds of six or seven different type of businesses which overseas Chinese companies did. And one thing we didn't have, we had no brand. We did not own the market. We were always doing contract manufacturing of calculators, television sets and we even I remember what gave me my epiphany in those days in the 1980s when they talked about the Asian tigers Malaysia, Thailand, Taiwan, Korea. We were all making cheap products for Western brands to sell overseas and you know China basically ate up all that business. But in the 19 early '90s, I set up a new factory in Thailand to make canvas shoes for Adidas, Nike, and so on. Within one year, I shut it down because Indonesia became cheaper.
And then one day, it just suddenly dawned on me that if I keep on going like this, I will die because China was just beginning to do this in the 1990s.
Yeah. And I said, "You can't. You're going to be running just to keep still because if it's based on cheap labor, there's always somebody who's going to be cheaper than you." So I then decided that we had to own the customer. And you only own the customer by having, in my view, one of two things. You own the technology, which you patent, which I'm not able to. I'm not a technical guy. Or you own the brand. By owning a brand and developing the brand, you own the customer.
M
and that I came to realize as I continue shutting down companies but I had no idea what brand I should do. So that was in the next accident when Banyan Tree as a brand was created was when I realized that it was by luck on one end on side to have stumbled on Phuket and so on so forth. That was by luck. But the intent was that finally when I decided to do a business in Phuket, I had said this has to be a strong brand or else we would die. And that was a lesson learned from all the businesses I had to shut down.
What's the main like I don't know one two three things that if for for example you would advise me how to grow my brand. What would be your advice?
Start with the end as a beginning. Meaning that you have to have a vision of where do you want the brand to be as a vision. And if you take a sailing analogy, if you sail and you know your direction, you know that when you sail, as opposed to a motorboat, you have to tack all the time, right? You have to tack according to the wind.
Yeah.
So, you don't always go in a straight line. But if you don't know your your ultimate destination, you'll be tacking back and forth according to the wind with no no destination. So I started with the end as a beginning. Meaning I had no idea how many hotels we were going to have. No idea of what I was going to do. But I had said to myself when I finally decided that Banyan Tree was a way to go, the first thing I had said was we have to be a global brand to survive. Not to brag to people but if I'm not a global brand because travel and tourism is global I will die. So start with the end as the beginning is is one thing I would say about brand building. And the second thing I would say about brand building is never confuse advertising with brand building.
Advertising is a mechanism to the brand building. It's a tool. But the brand is about values. It's about much more than advertising, much more than a logo. It's about the thing that's different you you from everything else. And the third thing I would say is brand building starts with the CEO or the owner.
It's not like okay now you have your brand and now you're just going to hire agencies and say build me a brand. agencies will be the means by which you actually build the brand. But if you are not the one who is actually owning the brand and thinking about brand building every moment of the time then you will not build the brand. So I've always said that Bantry is not just about hotel year it is about brand building a brand. Every day I was trying to build the brand build the brand.
What do you think the the the most important skill for entrepreneur in 2025? I would say agility. Empathy is one thing of course to understand and have understand the world and have and have insights into the world. But I would probably say agility because in 2025 the world is so I don't think the world as a whole has been as volatile as it is today. People use vaua a lot in in Seattle and other business schools. It's all another nice set of words to use. But generally I think it is a highly volatile world today in every respect. Technology with AI, geopolitics and everything else. and the ability to pivot and the ability to be agile so that you know what is your constant goal but you know how to tack and not be stuck in one direction. I think that's probably today in my view the most important thing to have an agile flexible mind so that nothing gets you down and you're stuck. you always know how to maneuver in a very very uncertain and a very volatile world.
What's your view on AI?
My view on AI is at several levels. First of all, the science fiction part of AI I won't even be able to comment on. You know, we as human beings dominated by this massive AI you this whole hunger games and kind of Hollywood version. It might happen one day but I can't I don't know enough about AI to know whether AGI is going to take over the whole world and that's other people can speculate on it. I look at AI as part of a whole as as my view on technology and civilization and therefore the impact of each technology I try to analyze as an amateur. So for example you can say one of the biggest technologies that had the biggest impact on the world which AI I think will have the same level of revolutionary impact would be say electricity right the world before electricity and the world after electricity is so fundamentally different but if you use electricity in the same by the same token when electricity first hit let's say the western world everybody adapted to it in their own specific way even though the world was revolutionized. Every industry had to adapt from the light street lamp people to people producing other things and and so on so forth. So then the impact on AI is at the same impact on AI on on our whole human society is going to be as fundamental enabler of change as electricity enabled civilizations to change. But at the minor level, whatever business you're in, you have to take AI at a very granular level. So even for the hotel industry, there's no such thing as hotel industry AI. It's at revenue management. I have AI affecting it. At the kitchen level, the role of AI in affecting how kitchens are run at, you know, every level AI is being applied. So I think one has to look at AI by from a CEO's point of view has to analyze AI's impact on society as a whole so that you can see what trends you can go into and then at the individual manager level you have to look at AI at your own individual domain whether you are a manager of this function or that function AI is going to affect all of it.
Yeah. So your view is more positive right uh on AI overall that it will bring more added value than
my view on well no my view on technology is that I think technology is always agnostic. Technology is always always a catalyst for change.
Mhm.
Now with change you get good change you get bad change. I mean you take the internet, you take social media even I mean social media is it good or is it bad? I mean social media is the easiest thing to take a look at is social media has completely revolutionized the world of communications and relationships. Is it good or is it bad? There's both good and there's bad.
So that's what technology does.
Yeah. When it comes to relationships with people, what's your main principles? How to get along well with people? how to be trusted by other people.
One of my principles is that I tell my colleagues because they always think that if you want to be nice, you have to be always nice. So I've always said, I will never take advantage of you, but if you try to hurt me, I will hit back double hard. And that's to whatever extent I can do. In the world of geopolitics today with what's happening with the tariffs and so on, I do lose respect for those countries that are so scared for their own well-being that they basically succumbed to a bully. And there and there are countries like Brazil, which is not a rich country at all, that decides that I'm not going to be bullied. You've got powerful economies like the EU that's just decided to play lie over and just give in. I don't have respect for people like that. So I do not believe that you should bully people first but if you try to bully me I will hit you back harder.
That's one of my core beliefs that I've told all my colleagues because they think that to in being in business we should always be nice and my point is yes we should always be nice but don't ever be bullied and I refuse to be bullied. The other value in a rel in a business relationship is to never be overly romantic. Whenever I do any kind of business deal, I always have the exit already clearly stated and already clearly done. Meaning, if I'm going to do a joint venture with you, I never think about just how great we can be. I already have resolved how I'm going to get out of it
if it doesn't work.
Yeah, absolutely.
A clear way of exit.
I would never do a joint venture where, for example, in a joint venture and an exit, I will have the right always to buy you back, buy you up. I will not do any other way. I will not do a venture because otherwise it's not worth it. Why should I put my heart and effort into a joint venture and then at the end of the day I can't exit. So either I'm a majority partner in which case I have the right to buy you out or if I'm minority partner I can force you to buy me out.
And none of this romantic thing of oh we're doing a business deal we'll be there forever. Majority of the time a business a partnership doesn't work out. So if it works out it's great but you better address immediately the the likelihood it will not work out that you get into a messy situation. If you give an advice for young people now, maybe young Singaporeans, but it can be also broadly to young people in their 20s and maybe 30s right now if they want to be if they want to succeed in life, whatever success means, what would be your advice? I don't think it's different for young people today as opposed to young people 50 years ago or my father's generation. Um, people always say young people nowadays have it so much easier than I mean every generation thinks my father's think thought my generation had it easy my I think my children have it easy and that's of course true in terms of material benefits every every generation should be materially better off than the previous one otherwise there's no point to working your ass off to make your you know your children better off than you
so they will be materially better off but I think it gets more and more difficult as a soc society gets richer for the young people to have a sense of purpose. You know, after a war, the people in a society have full of purpose after World War II. It's just to rebuild the society. When I was younger, the Singaporeans of my generation had real purpose. We wanted to make Singapore a first world society. We are now first world. So, what do you do? So the challenge for Singaporeans and young people everywhere who who are born into a wealthier world would be to find some sense of purpose.
And it's harder and harder to find purpose as you live in a richer and richer society. And that's why I think in the western world finding purpose is quite difficult when you when you're quite well off. But I think the finding of purpose and then just doing it is critically important for young people. Otherwise, they will do what I've used as a term before. They will sleepwalk through life. They would just wake up in the morning, sleepwalk to work, sleepwalk to the pub, sleepwalk to a marriage, sleepwalk to having kids, and just live a very humd drum life of material comfort. But at the end of the day, they'll ask themselves, "What did I really do to make myself happy?"
Yeah.
So, I think you need to find a purpose. And it doesn't have to be a fantastic purpose of becoming a billionaire or becoming a prime minister. It can be very ordinary sense of purpose but I think finding purpose that gives your life a sense of meaning is absolutely important for young people because before they know it, they'll become old.
Yeah.
And the saddest thing is to be an old person and realizing you've wasted your life. So don't waste your life.
I don't know it's a cheesy question but like maybe one or two books that can really change your perspective of life. In my younger days, I would say it's K marks capital and now I mean it's not I don't read books that changed my perspective. Well, yes, there have been quite a lot a number of interesting books um by a guy whose name I can't pronounce because he's Turkish American. Um, it's got um his name is Aim Mogloo and James Robertson. Den Daron Aimoglu two Nobel Prize winners who have written a number of books u about I think called why nations fail two economists political economists who have written a number of books about societies and societal change
that has been very interesting to me but those are more for intellectualism. Um, one book that my children gave me two or three years ago that's changed my life in terms of pattern is a book called Why We Sleep.
It's a very interesting book about about sleep patterns and why we sleep and
and um what alcohol does to you when you take it late at night. It makes you sleepy but it makes you also wake up too early without sleep and so on.
So that's changed the way I practice my life. But that's at the at the sort of non-intellectual level but at a very real level.
Yeah. You are 71.
73.
73. Uh how does it feel to be 73?
How should 73 feel like?
I don't know. You look young.
I know. I Well, I tell you one thing. I I mean that's why I tell people not to sleepwalk through life. And that is,
you know, when you're 73 and I I remember my father in the old days when he when he read the Straits Times as a physical paper, not as online like most of us do nowadays, he would first turn to the obituary page
and he would say, "Aha, he's dead. I'm still alive. Aha, he's dead. I'm still alive." So nowadays, I look at the obituary pages and see who has died before me. But leaving that aside, I think when you reach 73 and I'm relatively healthy, although I just did a total shoulder joint replacement. I just replaced a complete shoulder. And you know, you got little bits and inconveniences in life. You do realize you do not have at 73 a 20 year horizon for yourself anymore. I mean, I hope to live until 93, but I kind of doubt I'll be very vigorous at 93, although my heart is. Yeah.
So you realize at 73 that the best part of your life was perhaps behind you. And that's why when I evaluate my own life, I don't think I I may not have done very much, but I did not waste it. Even all my crazy moments of getting in jail, my crazy moments of having done a failed venture, I think I lived my life with passion and with purposes, some of which failed. But I did not sleepwalk through life.
Yeah.
I lived it intensely. And I only give that advice to young people today because before long you also will be 73. And you you will realize that the years between your age today, which is how much?
40. 40.
Exactly. You've got 33 years to go before my age. You will one day think of this meeting and you will be 73 and you'll look back and say what did I do in 33 years
not whether you became a billionaire or not but did I waste my life did I have fun did I enjoy my children did I live every day with purpose joy and excitement and you may well realize that no I sleptw walk through a large part of it and that's all I'm saying for people don't ever sleepwalk through it because that's the biggest regret you will have in life,
not whether you're rich or not. It's really whether I'm now at the trail end of my life, my twilight years. Did I have a really good time?
What's the meaning of life for you?
The meaning of life is to see uh the joy in everyday things and the people you love and to every day enjoy the people you love. Do the things that you love. And again, the meaning of life is that one day it will end. And don't waste a minute of it. [Music]