Jamyang Wangchuk

The Inspiration Behind

Jamyang is an actor, filmmaker and an advocate for the environment. He grew up in the remote district of Pema Gatshel in Bhutan with no electricity and telephone. During holidays, he’d often trek with his father, walking through forests for weeks. This tradition with his father, gradually nurtured his love for the natural world. In 1996, he was visiting family friends in Hong Kong when a casting agent spotted him. At 14, he went from living in remote Bhutan to sharing screen space with Brad Pitt, playing the young Dalai Lama in ‘Seven Years in Tibet’. This was his introduction to filmmaking.

Jamyang was fascinated when he first walked literally inside the Rhone glacier in Switzerland in 2014. In 2019, he was further captivated to read about a funeral held for a glacier in Iceland. Inspired, and deeply concerned by this, he immediately enrolled for a climate-leadership training in the US.

Jamyang was in New York in March 2020 where he saw a world in total chaos that left a deep impact on him. A week after WHO declared Covid-19 as a pandemic, he was infected with the virus. At one point, he contemplated the real possibility of dying from the virus, which was followed by difficult questions he had for himself: What is my purpose in life? If I get through this, how can I create a positive impact with what I do? Eventually these questions drove him and gave birth to the campaign.