By Dennis Su

Photo taken in front of the Shanghai Mansion Hotel by the Sozhou Bridge, near the Bund.

This meeting with the Microsoft team in Shanghai was the result of countless emails during my trip to China with Waisiu Law and ZhenWei. One reason was the tight meeting schedule that my delegation group has arranged for the only full day we had in Shanghai, the other was for Waisiu to book his train ride from Hangzhou into downtown Shanghai where my hotel was.

The main purpose was to discuss face to face with Zhen Wei and his team of Microsoft Shanghai to explore their idea of becoming a part of CTEF to help the rural schools. Wei ( his last name and the one with the circle tee shirt) was instrumental in raising fund to build the famous “husband and wife” school in Sichuan. He is hoping that with the momentum of helping rural school in place from his office in Shanghai, that a CTEF Shanghai can be established to help more school children.

With the elusive wi fi in the hotel, my only communication with both of them in two places was erratic, but eventually, with the help of someone else’s cell phone, I was able to return to the hotel by the Suzhou Bridge just in time to greet them after their late lunch.

The meeting went well because Waisiu already gave them a detailed briefing during lunch to Wei Zhen, Zhao Yinbin and his friend, about CTEF’s history and operation, so they became fully aware of the situations and conditions we have to face. If we like to achieve our goals both sides of the Pacific, it would be better for us to operate independently. For CTEF, we would treat the Shanghai team as one of the Chinese NGO, like Our Free Sky, or Warm 1+1.

The main reason for this type of relation works is the fact that if CTEF has a “chartered” office in China, both the US and Chinese governments will be breathing down our necks and we would be controlled and governed by many regulations as well as international laws. It is unfortunate that we have to work sort of “underground” like many NGOs in order to operate with no interference by the governments.

We suggested to Wei and Zhao to set up a group in Shanghai and to do their own project search, evaluation, and selection as well as fund raising. CTEF would be happy to help them in doing so and may even offer support financially if the project meets the criteria from the US side. As for the name of their group, it would be up to them to decide. If it would help them to gain credit and trust from donors in China, they can mention that we worked on a school before, but should not identify as part of CTEF. They will work on a proposal for us to consider the final working relation.

It is encouraging to see such enthusiasm from the Microsoft Shanghai office and Waisiu would be happy to work closely with them on this.