Crystal Tai was born in Taiwan and immigrated to California with her family as a teenager. She holds a Master's degree in Education Policy, Organization and Leadership Studies with a minor in Journalism from Stanford University. She has been a news reporter for the Silicon Valley Community Newspapers and Patch.com. She has also translated former Google China president Kai-Fu Lee's and former Taipei mayor San-Lien Wu's biographies from Chinese into English. Currently, she works as an interpreter.