美国人在中国发现意想不到的机会

Elyse Robbins came to Beijing in 2001. Although it wasn't in her original plans, she's stayed in the city for almost 14 years now. In that time, she's come to learn about and understand China and its people through Peking Opera.

From a distance, this looks like any typical Peking Opera performer. But under the costume is someone whose path to this Beijing stage is far from typical. American Elyse Robbins came to China almost on a whim after university graduation. Little did she know, it would be the start of now 14-year adventure.

"Definitely coming to China wasn't part of my plan. I was studying Arabic in college. I wanted to study abroad in Egypt and I wanted to become the next secretary of state. I didn't get a chance to go to Egypt so my friend said why don't I go to China. I said sure, I know how to use chopsticks why not. I think it's much like 'yuanfen,' it's serendipity." she said.

Robbins was born in Detroit, Michigan and studied at the University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill, majoring in Drama and Chinese studies. After moving to Beijing, she first worked for the US Embassy, but it didn't take long for her to return to her artistic roots. And her passion found its expression in Peking Opera, which raised some questions among her friends and family.

"Why would I invest my time and money to study something that's not going to give me something obvious? But I think it has given me a lot on a personal level, studying Peking Opera made me appreciate so many things... has given me more insight into not just chinese concepts of beauty but chinese concepts of entertainment, chinese concepts of morality community and all of those things are very important in running the type of company that I want to run." she said.

That company is Geili Giving, a social entreprise that connects users on the instant messaging app WeChat with Chinese charities. Robbins hopes her company will help make the donation process more transparent. But registering it was far less straight-forward -- even for someone who has been in Beijing for more than a decade.

"It's crazy because in China you can't have a name that sounds anything like another company's name. So I wanted to be Geili, so it doesn't matter there's another company that's Geili and it's all the characters can't sound like anything else. So I was sitting there like oh my god it's another Chinese test." she said.

The idea for Geili actually first came to Robbins through Peking Opera, whose stories and themes showed her the giving-nature of Chinese people, despite their loss of faith in charity organizations.

"I find solace in Peking Opera. You look at Peking Opera stories who is a good person by Peking Opera standard? It's the person that gives everything. Gives everything for a moral cause. It's not the person who has the most money they are usually the bad guys...so I think by giving them this opportunity to connect with their community chinese people are going to work hard and make China better." she said.

This company is just the latest addition to Robbins' resume, which also includes numerous appearances on TV dramas and game and reality shows as well as four Chinese films. Her most recent role is in a movie called 'Who is Undercover' where she acts alongside some of China's top actors.

Elyse works hard and has devoted herself to the love of drama. Her dream is to create art, share her experiences and connected people in ways they weren't able to before. I guess it's appropriate then to have Peking Opera, one of China's most traditional and beautiful artforms as a guiding force behind her Chinese dream.