For some the "China dream" is not about realizing their own potential, but instead about helping others realize theirs.
Tom Stader, founder of the Library Project, a Xi'an-based non-governmental organization that donates libraries to poor rural schools, first came to China as a marketer for an English-language school in the northeastern city of Dalian, Liaoning province.
Following two years working in Dalian, Stader's life took a dramatic shift after he was charged with finding a charity for the school to participate in as part of its corporate responsibility program.
The 36-year-old American responded by putting a plan into motion to host a book drive that would bring learning materials to a Dalian orphanage, where literature was scarce.
The public's response to the fundraiser was overwhelming, bringing in more than 3,400 yuan ($518) and 600 books over the course of just two days.
Seeing the good he could do for those in need, Stader left the school and began the project which has grown into a massive organization that has donated hundreds of libraries across 21 provinces in China.
"I started this organization with $500 and a couple of friends. Building an organization over years from the ground up has really been a dream come true," Stader said.
He attributes his success to China's warm reception for those with good intentions, as well as the relatively cheap startup costs for businesses.
"The barrier of entry in China is quite small if you look at it in business terms, you don't have to have a lot of money to start something big here," he said.
"We did it slow, we did it grassroots, we showed results, we took risks and those risks played out in a very positive manner."
Stader said if he had remained in the US, the chances that he would have been able to start an NGO would have been quite slim due to the overabundance of organizations already operating there.
"It comes down to the need. There are great organizations already on the ground in the US, I am not sure we'd have been able to provide the impact there that we can here," he said.
It was seeing the need in an untapped market that led Briton Will Yorke, owner of the Vineyard Caf, one of Beijing's up and coming Western restaurants, to venture from life as a club DJ to being a respected business owner in a budding Beijing hutong.
Coming to China in 1997 to study Chinese, Yorke was among the first of the city's expats to bring the electronic art of disc jockeying to the capital, earning him a minor celebrity status in the city's club scene.
After finishing his studies and exploring a variety of jobs, including running a kungfu school, the 35-year-old eventually tapped into his experiences working in restaurants as a youth and found himself in the unlikely position of being a restaurant owner.
"It was a mixture of sheer brilliance and a number of random events that kind of led to this end result," he said.
"It was never my intention to open a restaurant in Beijing, I never thought this is what I'd be doing."
The Vineyard, in Beijing's quickly developing Wudaoying Hutong, was the first Western enterprise to open in the area, catalyzing a boom in boutique businesses along the old alley.
Yorke attributes his success to the fact that China is still a relatively young market for Western concepts.
"It's a matter of saturation, the market isn't as saturated as it is in London. You can still take an idea that might be quite old in the UK and make it quite new here," he said.
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