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People can only become winners after having experienced loss. True success can only be obtained after one comes to know failure. Hardships in life are what mold a person to become headstrong and independent. Many times, people face situations that can assure their belief in the futility of life. Life can be ruthless, having no mercy when it comes to the difficulties that a person experiences. Many lose hope and resign themselves to fate. However, at the same time, there are those herculean personalities that rise against these challenges and face them head-on to the bitter end. A great example of these personalities is the American businessman, entrepreneur, and human rights activist Kuzzat Altay.
Racism and Oppression have spread their roots globally, being openly seen in the most developed places. Even China, an increasingly progressive country, is filled with race-induced Oppression. Kuzzat hailed from Urumqi in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. As a child, he had no real sight of the differences set by the world in regards to ethnicity. He spent his early days happily in China, which are depicted by his own words “My days in Beijing were pleasant, and I felt like a fully enfranchised Chinese citizen.” His family background was one of stable financial status. Their family-owned several businesses such as restaurants and import and export ventures. His family belonged to an Uyghur ethnical background and practiced liberalism and secularism. He completed his high-school education at a prominent school in Xinjiang. Each day was more fulfilling than the last, but unfortunately, it was short-lived.
As time went on, Kuzzat started to see the bitter truth of his surroundings. He never dreamed that he would be oppressed by his own government. He came to understand the government propaganda of them trying to erase the Uyghur culture completely. He saw the expansion of concentration camps in his hometown and the people close to him being targeted by them. His world came to an abrupt stop on the day he found out his father was being taken by the concentration camps.
The loss of his father brought a very heavy burden on his shoulders. Losing one’s guide and role model in life is a hard fall to recover from. Disgusted by the situation of his country, he fled from China at the age of 21 in 2005 to Turkey. He reunited with his girlfriend in Turkey shortly after, and they both got married sometime later. After spending three years in Turkey, he got instructions from his aunt to move to the US to be closer to some family. Therefore, in 2008 he moved to Fairfax, Virginia, with refugee status. Even with the recent changes in life, the horrors of his home country were fresh in his mind, and he now had a burning determination to bring some change to the situation in China.
After coming to the US, he was exposed to the environment there and came to know that race-induced Oppression was a global concept. He decided that he would voice out the reality of the global condition and bring a change to them. Being an intelligent individual from the beginning, he knew to accomplish his goal. He would need to become more stable and accomplished. He worked hard in the US, utilizing his expertise in IT to obtain employment in the booming technology sector. Over his career, he has worked with many top-tier IT consulting firms such as CGI and Accenture. He also played a vital role in major projects such as HealthCare.gov. Determined to gain more recognition in society, he took part and graduated from the Harvard Business School’s General Management Program (GMP).
Throughout his successful career, he found many aspiring people that inquired about Kuzzat’s secret to success. They wanted to know how he being of a minority ethnic background and a refugee to add, became this successful in the IT field. Kuzzat had found a way to empower minorities by teaching them how to succeed in the field of IT. His thoughts later turned to the launch of Cydeo in 2015. The goal behind Kuzzat’s new venture was to empower people of all backgrounds to reach new professional heights. His school aimed to groom its students with the help of industry-experienced teachers. He wanted to educate and empower people of disadvantageous backgrounds.
He took every opportunity to voice his concerns about the situation in China and all around the world. He became part of many humanitarian societies which shared his thoughts. Kuzzat’s determination to better the world is emphasized by the fact that he was pursued by Chinese sectors for expressing his thoughts. Even after Kuzzat’s father was freed in 2020, he was not allowed to meet his son. Even after that heart-breaking occurrence, Kuzzat did not falter and carried on to work for the upheaval of humanity.
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