He grew up in a bilingual household and published his first story in a Chinese student literary magazine.
Two years later, Yong left his job at DBS and enrolled in Texas A&M University to read for a Masters in Business Administration.
[2] Yong is a part-time tutor at Nanyang Technological University, and is a regular contributor to newspapers like The Straits Times and My Paper.
In 1994, Yong submitted a manuscript of forty to fifty poems to the Singapore Literature Prize and was shortlisted.
[6] He also managed the Mentor Access Project through Mediaexodus Limited Liability Partnership, which provided aspiring writers exposure to the Singaporean literary scene, and gave them access to guidance from older writers.