Have you heard of Li Lu, the "Warren Buffet" of China?
Li Lu has the most impressive story I have ever seen among all the renowned investors I know, despite that, few have heard of him.
Born in 1966, during China's violent cultural revolution, Li Lu had his biological parents sent to a concentration camp when he was 2 years old. He was sent to foster families who rejected him and later to an orphanage. After a time at the orphanage, a family accepted Li Lu, but when he was 10 years old, an earthquake hit his city, killing 242,000 people. Li Lu was the only one in his family who survived.
He read a lot during his youth and realized that the Chinese government was authoritarian and violent. In 1989 he went to Beijing with just 2 underpants in his pocket to fight for change. He was part of the famous protest at Tianamenn Square. The protest ended with the Chinese government machine-gunning the Protestants and Li Lu lost his fiancee, he managed to survive and fled to the United States as he was on his government's black list. He did not know how to speak English.
In the United States, he managed to get into Columbia University, going into debt to pay. At the beginning of college Li Lu heard that there would be a talk by a guy who understood money and there would be a free food buffet. But there was no food and the lecture was by Warren Buffett. Li Lu was amazed by what he heard and went straight to the library to learn more. In 1996 Li Lu was the first Columbia student to earn 3 degrees at the same time.
During college, Li Lu wrote a book about his history and sold the rights. During college he invested that money and when he graduated he was practically financially independent.
In 2006, Charlie Munger, aware of Li Lu's success, invested $ 80 million with Li Lu to buy Chinese companies, given that he would get to know the market and history better. A decade later, Li Lu had turned those 80 million into more than 500 million.
Today, at 55, Li Lu is a manager of Himalaya Capial with $ 13.9 billion under management and in terms of personal assets he has over $ 200 million and is one of the best value investors in the world.
Conclusion
When life seems hard do not give up, keep grinding, keep striving for greatness and you'll achieve it! Hope you get inspired with that guy!