I was born in Dallas, Texas, and two months after I was born, my family moved to Beijing, China, where we lived for eight years. My dad was a management consultant for McKinsey & Company, which is a business management consulting firm. After living in Beijing for eight years, we moved to Taipei, Taiwan, and lived there for three years, after which we moved to Salt Lake City for one year — so during my sixth grade year, I was in Salt Lake and went to Oakwood Elementary. Following that year, we moved back to Asia for five years.  I completed 7th to 11th grade in Hong Kong. I now consider Hong Kong to be my home. While living in Hong Kong, I met President Astrid S. Tuminez, who was also living there.

I would not trade growing up in Asia for anything. My favorite thing was being surrounded by different cultures, religions, and trains of thought. I think the most valuable experience was realizing there were many people in the world, and most of them were not like me.

As a child, my dream was to live in the same house my whole life to have the same group of friends every step of the way. Living overseas in those ex-pat communities, people moved so frequently. Every two to three years, I had to make a whole new group of friends. The upside was that I could say that I had friends worldwide, but the downside was that I could not achieve the same depth of friendships as if we had lived in one place.

We moved back to Utah for my senior year, and I graduated from Brighton High School, so I am a Bengal. And even though I am the youngest of six children and lived in Asia the longest, I was the only one to graduate from an American high school. At first, I experienced culture shock moving to Utah for high school. For the first time in my life, everyone looked exactly like me and had similar religious beliefs and cultural practices. After a while, I found my place, made friends, and played on the men’s soccer team.

Ever since I was a child, I played soccer. My mom played on BYU’s first soccer team, and she was the one that got me into it. In my earliest memories, I had a ball at my feet. I loved to play other sports, but I always excelled at soccer. The things that I love the most about soccer are that there are no barriers to entry, meaning that you don’t need any equipment beyond a ball, and it brings people together. People worldwide play soccer, and it doesn’t matter if they don’t speak the same language because they can still communicate with the ball.

Playing soccer opened many doors for me, allowed me to meet people, and took me all over the world. While living in China, I played on teams that took me to many neighboring countries such as Korea, Japan, and Singapore. After graduating from high school, I was awarded a scholarship to play soccer for the University of Kentucky. All of my friends left on missions for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I agreed to play for a year and planned on serving a mission when that year was over. But after the first semester, I felt like it was time for me to go on my mission. They did not understand why I was going to serve a mission, and, in their defense, I didn't explain it in the best way. I told them that I would be leaving for an unknown destination for two years. They asked me if I would be able to train and stay in shape. I told them that I would be able to exercise for 30 minutes every day, and hopefully, I would go somewhere where people played soccer, but I wouldn’t be able to do the same level of training.

I ended up being called to the Philippines, which is just about the only country on the planet that does not play soccer. They were not sure that it would work out, so I searched for another school that would allow me to defer my place on their team until after I returned.

That is when UVU came into the picture. I had heard about it from my uncle and his partner, both professors at UVU, and I had seen it while driving by on the freeway, but I had no intention of going there. However, after leaving the University of Kentucky, my mind was open to the idea of attending UVU. Greg Maas, the men's soccer team coach, reached out to me and told me about the brand new program starting in the fall of 2014. He told me that he wanted to make me a big part of the team and that he believed in our ability to make it into a great program.

A few other schools were open to me serving a mission, but UVU seemed like the right fit. I loved the idea of coming in and helping build something new that could have a direct, visible impact on the UVU community.

I transferred to UVU in spring 2014, played that fall in the first men’s soccer Division I game, and left on my mission right after the semester ended. Our performance exceeded my expectations, coming from an established program to a new one. That is a testament to the great coaching staff here at UVU. I am grateful for the chance that Coach Maas allowed me to play on a competitive team, serve a mission, and continue playing on the team when I got home.

From my first moments on the UVU campus, I noticed a strong commitment to diversity and inclusion. In many of my classes, I had the chance to meet students from different countries and ethnicities. I also felt a sincere dedication to the inclusion of LGBTQ+ individuals.

The other fantastic aspect of attending UVU was that although there were nearly 40,000 students when I attended, I always received personalized help from my professors. Many of them became mentors for me as I graduated and continued with my career goals. During my first semester, with one of my professors’ help, I implemented a business plan that I had been working on for several years. When I was 14 years old living in Hong Kong, I brainstormed a fresh take on traditional business-style clothing. My goal was to fuse a standard dress shirt with athletic material. The design was well thought out, but it wasn’t easy to raise enough money on my $15 per month allowance, as factories required a bulk purchase of 10,000 items. My professors at UVU helped me salvage my business plan, and what started as a class project turned into a successful clothing company that has continued to grow into 2021. It was engaged learning at its finest. Our revenue exponentially grew each year, and our growth shows no signs of slowing down.

On my first date at UVU, I was set up by someone on the women’s soccer team — and she is now my wife. We very much bleed green. We still watch all of the games for the men’s and women’s soccer teams online, and my wife is a UVU employee.

Both of us appreciate the personal growth that we experienced at UVU, and we are grateful that UVU brought us together.