As a young woman, I could have chosen easy rebellion, coasting through a carefree, uninhibited life. Or I could have opted for the safe, traditional route—landing a stable job, settling down, and quietly living out my days.
Instead, I chose to chase my dream. Because I believe that no matter who you are, everyone has the right to build the life they want.
From an Unruly Delinquent Girl to a Top Student in NTU Finance
It was May 11, 2015. On an early morning in Beijing, right after a sudden downpour, I stood on our company's 21st-floor terrace looking over the concrete jungle of Guomao. Breathing in the rare fresh air and finishing the last drop of Dongding Oolong in my cup, I reflected on my first six months as a "Beijing drifter." In this chaotic, bustling city, how many people commute every day just to go through the motions? And how many, like me, are trying to write a different kind of story?
My name is Shao-Yi Peng. I graduated with a degree in Finance from National Taiwan University (NTU). But more importantly, I come from a long line of tea farmers in Nantou, Taiwan. In 2014, I quit my high-paying, stable job in Taipei, packed my bags, and moved to mainland China alone to launch my own office tea brand.
My story starts in the tea fields. Growing up in a traditional tea-farming family, my sharpest childhood memories are the crunch of peanut shells under my grandfather's boots as he walked the tea ridges, and the rich, grassy scent that flooded the factory when my uncle roasted the leaves.
But I never thought of tea as something polite or constrained. Even as a kid, I knew that wild, untamed tea trees could tower twenty meters high, forming dense, imposing forests. The tea brewed from those leaves is fierce, strong, and unapologetic—to me, that is the true essence of tea.
Growing Like Wild Tea
I was a restless kid. Academically, I excelled, coasting through gifted classes from elementary through high school, but I was never really satisfied. I treated good grades as a chore—the bare minimum required to fulfill my duty as a "good student" and a "good daughter." Once that box was checked, I felt entitled to whatever I wanted.
Knowing my teachers favored me, I pushed boundaries constantly. I dyed my hair a rebellious flaxen blonde—a big deal during Taiwan's strict school dress codes—wore it in a high ponytail, and provoked fights outside the school gates. I swore like a sailor, skipped piano lessons to spend the money at internet cafes, stayed out all night, and dated the biggest troublemaker in school.
"If I like it, why not?" was my motto. The result? A body marked with seven distinct scars from various fights and reckless escapades.
But I was also deeply imaginative. I started writing fiction in the third grade. My protagonists were always slightly veiled versions of myself—facing danger, navigating romance, and surviving against all odds. Real life felt far too predictable; I craved the thrilling, life-or-death stakes of the worlds I invented.
Even while succeeding in the system, I fought against it. I refused to lose or back down. The more people tried to box me in, the harder I pushed back. I didn't want to be the obedient "good girl." I wanted to be the wild force hiding inside every good girl. I wanted to grow untamed, just like the tea I loved.
Family Upheaval and Transformation
In 2008, the global financial crisis hit. Stocks tanked, companies enforced unpaid leave, and my family's finances cratered. I was a freshman in high school.
When I stumbled upon a house mortgage contract stashed in a drawer, and the car picking me up from school downgraded from a smooth Lexus to a tiny Nissan March, I knew things were bad. The reality fully struck when I walked past a half-open bedroom door and heard my mother weeping, telling my father that a friend's company had scammed them out of 5.6 million NTD.
The stress shattered my previously cheerful mother. She developed severe depression and terrifying panic attacks. She couldn't drive for more than ten minutes without feeling like she was suffocating, nor could she walk outside alone without suddenly suffering sudden fainting spells.
Watching families around us collapse under similar pressures, I finally grasped how fragile the world really was. Here I was, picking petty fights and seeking cheap thrills, completely oblivious to the real, devastating chaos of adulthood.
My mom tried to shield me from the worst of it, and I pretended everything was fine, acting as if money was just a little tighter. But something inside me was shifting.
The breaking point arrived at the dinner table. Out of nowhere, my mom put down her chopsticks. Her eyes were red, though she refused to let the tears fall. "Maybe I should just kill myself," she whispered. "At least then you guys could collect the insurance money."
It remains the most helpless I have ever felt. In that instant, the rebellious, reckless girl inside me shattered completely.
I didn't say a word. Instead, I channeled every ounce of my aggression, anger, and stubbornness into my textbooks. I studied with a desperate, obsessive intensity. I lived between my classroom and the study hall, stacking completed practice workbooks beside my desk from the floor to my knees, over and over again.
Every night, the study hall closed at 10 PM. At exactly 9:45 PM, I would go up to the roof, stare silently at the night sky for ten minutes, and head back down to pack my bags as the closing music played over the intercom.
When the 324-day countdown finally hit zero, I walked out of my college entrance exams and knew exactly what I was going to do. I listed only one choice on my application: the Department of Finance at National Taiwan University.
That year, only two students from my entire city made the cut. I was one of them.
The day I moved into my dorm, after my parents drove away, I found a handwritten note from my mom on my bookshelf: "You may live in the city now, but your roots are in the tea gardens. Take care of yourself, eat well, and don't be too frugal." Underneath the note was 8,000 NTD. I only learned later that, given our family's dire financial situation, my college tuition was heavily subsidized by the tea farmers back in my hometown.
No Matter How Wild, We All Sprout Roots
My four years at NTU were a blur of typical overachievement. I joined the student council, ran for student parliament, organized training workshops, starred in a short film, and played golf. I fretted over roommates' early alarms, cried over boyfriends, and went out for late-night meals. On the surface, I had completely normalized.
Our business school constantly invited wealthy, successful alumni back to speak. Watching them in their tailored suits, speaking eloquently about corporate life, I naturally pictured myself in their shoes. I wanted to climb the corporate ladder, make a fortune, and return one day as the esteemed speaker.
I kept myself ruthlessly busy, terrified that if I ever paused, I'd fall behind.
But occasionally, the noise would fade, and I'd feel completely lost. I interned as a magazine editor, wrote newspaper columns, and even co-founded an educational consulting startup with friends. But once the startup began turning a profit, I realized it wasn't the meaningful "education" venture I had dreamed of—it was just a cash grab. I walked away.
Despite taking every elective course I could find on tea, I treated it as just a hobby. When a senior student scoffed, "You didn't go to NTU Finance just to go back home and sell tea, did you?" the little spark I had for my family's craft was instantly smothered.
Trading the High Life for a Startup in Beijing
Naturally, I took a job at a top-tier executive search firm in Taipei's Xinyi District—our equivalent of Wall Street. I wore nice clothes, made phone calls, interviewed candidates, and felt incredibly polished.
Whenever I met new colleagues or clients, I would bring some of my family's premium tea as an icebreaker. To my surprise, I realized that hardly anyone in these high-end offices actually drank good tea—or even knew what good tea tasted like. I started brewing it for my coworkers, and seeing their eyes widen in surprise became the best part of my day.
Word eventually reached my boss. Knowing my background, she pulled me into her office and said, "Our job is helping people find the careers they are meant for. If you can't even be honest about what you want for yourself, how can you possibly help anyone else?"
Her words hit hard. I had a great job, a good salary, and a boss who liked me—everything I thought I wanted. But I felt like I was walking through a fog. Did this incredibly successful woman actually think I belonged in the tea business?
In July 2014, I flew to Beijing for a youth leadership summit. I still didn't have a concrete plan, but the idea of bringing my hometown tea to the massive mainland Chinese market was simmering.
During the summit, I met Pan Xinwang, a student from Nankai University who would later become my co-founder. I hadn't told anyone about my tea idea until one evening when our group was complaining about the terrible tea the hotel provided. I quietly pulled out my own stash. Xiao Pan immediately perked up. "Wait," he said, "Are you trying to start a business?"
That night, our entire group bonded over startup ideas until dawn. Xiao Pan, who already had some tech and startup experience, pushed me to pitch my idea at the forum's final roadshow. "Stop thinking about it alone. Pitch it to the investors and see if the idea has legs."
I threw together an incredibly ugly but deeply earnest PowerPoint. Standing in front of the judges, I was terrified, but the moment I started talking about my family's tea fields, my nerves vanished. I felt an overwhelming sense of certainty.
When my five-minute pitch ended, the room erupted into applause. I knew my life was never going to be the same.
Xiao Pan and I stayed in touch. After a few months of market research and his visit to the tea mountains in Taiwan, we decided to jump in. I booked a one-way ticket to Beijing for October 19.
When I told my family, they were supportive but terrified. "Why Beijing? You don't know anyone there. What if it's dangerous?" I pretended I would think about it, then bought the non-refundable ticket anyway. I am notoriously indecisive about what to eat for lunch, but when it comes to life-altering choices, I don't hesitate. Realizing they couldn't stop me, my family hurriedly packed some premium tea leaves, a few tea sets, and 12,000 NTD in cash, and sent me on my way.
Xiao Pan was equally committed. He turned down several job offers, roped in a few talented friends, and joined me full-time.
Embracing the Grind
Life in Beijing was incredibly harsh, and I absolutely loved it.
We rented a cheap, freezing apartment near Renmin University. My bedroom barely fit a bed and a tiny desk; my wardrobe held exactly five shirts. The heating was basically nonexistent. Xiao Pan's room didn't even have a window. We shared a single bathroom with a dozen other tenants and had strictly rationed hot water. We could hear our neighbors' every conversation through the paper-thin walls. I didn't dare tell my parents how we were living; they would have dragged me home immediately.
But we weren't deterred. I had the tea expertise, and my team had the mainland "internet savvy" that I lacked. For the first two months, we networked like crazy, crashing every startup event, accelerator, and alumni mixer we could find.
To do our market research, I shamelessly asked the founders I'd just met if I could hang out in their offices. I would sit for hours like a creep, taking notes on how often employees visited the pantry, what they drank, and how much time they spent socializing. This on-the-ground recon is what ultimately led us to build an "office tea" brand.
Once incorporated, we spent a grueling month perfecting the product. I worked with my uncle to test 13 different roasting profiles for our Dongding Oolong. We sourced filter bags from Japan, Taiwan, and the mainland until our apartment looked like a warehouse. The printing factory eventually told me to just sit with their technicians all day because my standards for the packaging were too obsessive.
Every setback just hardened my resolve. People told us young people didn't drink tea, that our model was flawed, or even, disgustingly, that as a young woman I should just "sleep with investors" to get ahead. I brushed it all off.
Eventually, people took notice. A prominent investor told me I had a "unique aura" and clearly had a story to tell. An old classmate joked I had the energy of a "Taiwanese mob boss's daughter." Even my old boss visited Beijing, drank our tea, and admitted I looked like I was exactly where I belonged.
In those first 199 days, my skin grew ten times thicker. I learned to haggle aggressively with suppliers, hustle for free PR, and literally beg train conductors to let me on with my massive sample bags. My wallet grew ten times thinner. We maxed out credit cards and lived on instant noodles. Before we secured our first round of funding, no one took a salary. But through the unconditional support of my family, my incredible team, and our first customers, we pushed through.
What Entrepreneurship Actually Means
By the end of our first year, we had launched our v1 product, secured venture backing from TusPark Ventures, and landed massive corporate orders. But looking back, I'm not moved by the wins—I'm moved by the people who stood by me in the trenches.
I realized that nobody succeeds in a vacuum. I only finished college when my family went broke because local tea farmers chipped in. I only made it to Beijing because cross-strait ties allowed me to attend that fateful summit.
Tea is the backdrop of my childhood and my oldest companion. It broke my heart to see my generation replacing it entirely with imported coffee culture. I wanted to use my skills to pass down the sweetness and heritage of my family's craft. That, to me, is the real responsibility of entrepreneurship—not just making money or chasing fame, but creating something that gives back.
Over the New Year, an old middle school friend reached out. Now a married mother of a toddler, she asked me, "You had a great degree and a safe career. Why did you choose such a terrifyingly unstable path?"
I told her my belief: Security doesn't come from your parents, nor does it come from a husband. True security comes from pursuing your own ideals and knowing you can build your own life.
Education gives women the power of choice. But if we use those choices only to trap ourselves in safe, predictable boxes, then our education was wasted. We'll reach middle age sighing, "Well, an ordinary life isn't so bad."
I still don't know for certain if Summit Tea will become a massive empire. When I go back to Taiwan, people sometimes warn me, "Don't get swept up in the mainland startup craze. You're just a tiny ripple in a massive ocean."
I don't care. As long as I am guided by my own convictions, I know I'll never lose my way.
At the end of your life, "success" isn't the best metric. Living fiercely, fully, and without regrets—that is the only success that matters.
