chance to be a banker and a publisher . I am writing a book on my 40 years ’ experience in America in English , Chinese and translate to Spanish .
AL : That ’ s wonderful ! I ’ m sure many people will be looking forward to reading it . WL : The main thing for me was to be a businessman because I was so poor . When you ’ re poor , you can ’ t do anything , right ? I was telling my daughter how important it was for her to have a doctor ’ s degree and now [ she ] is working at the St . Luke ’ s hospital as an MD . I ’ m very proud .
When she got married , I told her a very common sentence I say money is not everything but without the money , you can ’ t do nothing , right ? Remember money is very important so sometimes this is a driving factor .
AL : Are your parents still here living ? WL : My mother , she lives in Washington DC . She is 97 years old I just visited her yesterday .
AL : That ’ s fabulous ! WL : My father passed way in Taiwan , long time ago . I have a big family , six brothers , and sister .
AL : I was curious about that , are they in the business with you ? WL : Yes , most of them joined me in the media business . One in Chicago , one in Washington DC ., you know , our family business .
AL : Tell me about the International Management District . WL : Okay about 12 years ago , Alief was a rundown district . If you look at Alief school district , it was suffering . After 1980 , things went down Bellaire on Bellaire Blvd ., 20 years ago it desperately needed to be improved .
So I worked with the state Representative Hubert Vo . Both of us went door to door to make a petition . So according to State law , you have to have a half of businesses to be on the board to establish a management district . So we did it . Finally , we passed a bill in the State of Texas , so we created this International Management District . So if you look today on Bellaire Blvd . we created hundreds of the businesses , the schools are getting better , we have foreign banks and local banks on Bellaire Blvd . This is a miracle for the city of Houston .
My experience includes me publishing 10 different newspapers . I traveled all over the United States , from Seattle to Boston , you name it , everywhere . I met hundreds of people . My business influence so many , many readers , my television stations media business but the reason we wanted to start the international trade center is because we want to give back to our community .
So I think this is very important . The reason we establish the International Management District ; we want to create opportunity not just improve security but create businesses . So I should say 70 % of the companies created in this day in the international district is from somewhere . Currently , we have 2,500 businesses in this area , with a population of 130,000 in the international district .
We are proud of our record . Doing this international thing , we need to help those that have a mission to promote in the community to be a good businessman , education , culture . This is a good thing .
AL : For a new business coming in , how would they get to participate ? WL : We try to attract not just investors or who can afford it . For instance , the people in Orange County , CA , if they sold their house for $ 800,000 but come to Houston they can buy a nice decent house for $ 200,000 then they could create their own business . Also , one of the important parts is that we have a lot of community banks helping these people to start a business , restaurant , it could be anything . We are very proud of our record . Look at Bellaire .
AL : If you had one bit of advice or recommendation or a piece of personal wisdom for someone in business or someone starting a business what would that be ? WL : Yes , I have five single words that I want to give to the young entrepreneur . Think of it like this a hat you wear H . A . A . T . S . it ’ s five words . The first H representing HEALTH . You ’ ve got to have good
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