As a scuba diver, Tan has relished the wonders of the ocean. Now, she’s investing in its conservation
Kathlyn Tan could finally see clearly in 2016—and not just metaphorically. Plagued with debilitating myopia, she had lens implants that gave her clear vision for the first time since she was a child. “It’s like having a new set of eyes. It was life‑changing,” she tells me over a morning coffee. Excited by her ability to see without contact lenses, she ratcheted up her scuba diving activities to train as a dive master. “Suddenly, I could demonstrate all these things [to students] with my mask flooded and my eyes open.”
We are ensconced in a cafe in her neighbourhood, where I’m following up on her email responses to my preliminary questions. As an introvert, she feels more comfortable writing out her thoughts, she says. Her considered replies fill five printed pages, written in bursts over a week. In person, she is the embodiment of the “!” and “:)” that peep out from her sober responses. We speak about her days at boarding school, her passion for scuba diving and freediving, her influences and joys; and a story begins to emerge.
Read also: Female Free Divers Take Marine Conservation To New Depths
Kathlyn Tan the marine conservation champion came into being the year after her eye operation, when her love of the sea, the plenitude of life she has seen in it, and its increasing degradation crystallised into a cause and set the direction of her life. She was then 29 years old, and not without resources and connections. She introduced an environmental portfolio into her family’s investment vehicle, which was renamed Rumah Group in 2019. Meaning “home” in Malay, it was inspired by family to contribute to a better world through sustainable investments. And like a staghorn coral sprouting limbs, Tan branched out into impact investments, philanthropy, and on‑the‑ground initiatives.
THE MAKING OF AN ENVIRONMENTALIST
I tell Tan that I caught Sense and Sustainability, a CNA documentary featuring her conservation work, and was moved by her tears upon seeing a dead fish in a laboratory. “I like animals a lot,” she admits, remembering the incident. “My approach is, if I can’t kill an animal, it would be best not to eat it either.”
She notes that her turn to vegetarianism started in boarding school in Sydney, where every night, “slabs upon slabs” of steak were placed on the table for dinner. The practice opened her eyes to overconsumption. Her beliefs were reinforced after she watched Earthlings, a documentary narrated by actor Joaquin Phoenix that exposes the animal cruelty in factory farming. Then came Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer, from which she learned about by‑catch. “When we eat fish, so many other species that weren’t targeted during the fishing process die as well,” she says. That made her give up seafood in addition to meat.
But her exposure to the problems of the wider world began even before boarding school, when as a girl, her father Stanley Tan introduced her to humanitarian work. A real estate honcho and prominent philanthropist who works with Red Cross to bring medical relief to disaster zones, the elder Tan would take his daughter on personal trips to provide aid to communities in need. She remembers visiting a leper colony in the Philippines, noting that her father likes to speak to people directly and work with the communities themselves. Naturally, he was supportive of her vision for Rumah Group. Today, she and her father, along with her husband, are directors of the group, which spans real estate, impact investment, and philanthropy (through its Rumah Foundation arm).
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