The number 127 was a signpost in the career of the former investment banker turned NGO founder Chung To. He’s now the head of the Chi Heng Foundation, the NGO he established in Hong Kong in 1998 with a mere 100 Hong Kong dollars. His decision was driven more by instinct than logic: He had an impulse to help people whose lives were turned upside down by the raging AIDS epidemic. This instinct grew stronger and stronger until, in 2001, he left the world of finance and invested everything he had – money, time, and care – into running Chi Heng. The following year, Chi Heng would rescue its first group of AIDS orphans, 127 in all.