A Chinese-American’s Dream
A Chinese-American’s Dream
Edmond Li Edmond Li
A Chinese-American’s Dream
Edmond Li
Dedication
I want to dedicate this book to my grandpa George.
Left: George and his wife’s shopping location iii
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George and his wife’s shopping location
Acknowledgements
This book would not have been possible without my grandpa. I would like to thank my family for supporting me throughout this project. I also want to thank my Freestyle teachers who provided me with valuable advice and ideas along the way.
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Preface Introduction Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Work Cited vi
Content
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Preface When I fi rst learned about the Junior Documentary project, I did not know what topic to choose, but I knew I needed access to personal interviews and a research topic I was interested in. I asked my English teacher, Mr. Greco, for help, and he suggested a stories about my grandparents, since they might have a rich history. I chose my grandpa as a profi le subject because I wanted to know him better. He has been living with me and helping me in many aspects for a long time now, but I still did not know as much as I wanted to know about him. The main diffi culties of this project included its size, many deadlines, and four required interviews. This project put my time-management and all of the skills I had learned so far at Freestyle to the test. I was able to learn what to avoid and what I should do with a big project during a school year. I hope with this book one can know the story of my grandpa.
Left: George and his wife’s shopping location ix
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Photo of George and his wife
Intoduction In a summer morning of 1950s, in a quiet library at Tsinghua University in Beijing, China, there was only one single English-Chinese Dictionary on the bookshelf available to the readers. Breathing heavily, a young student rushed into the library in order to be the first one there to secure this coveted reference book. He was not going home for vacation as many others were, so he made use of the summer break to read an English book, “An Automatic Factory that Produces Auto Pistons,” and later another book, “The Postage Stamps of the People’s Republic of China.” He wrote down new words and their Chinese translation, and he would ask the questions to someone else. There were many volumes of “RussianChinese Dictionary,” because the students were required to study Russian as their only
second language, so they could learn more from the Russian big brothers, according to the slogan “Lean to one side!” Through the self-taught English study, his English proficiency had improved, although his technical Russian was also not bad. He later had translated a few technical articles of his field from Russian into Chinese for a reputable magazine. Today, in America, the young student is an 81-year-old man named George. He lives in Mountain View, California, with his loving family, and he has achieved the American Dream. There are many immigrants coming from China to America today, and George’s story of courage and hard work shows that the immigrant’s experience can be a positive one.
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George’s Backyard
Chapter 1: Childhood From 1937 to today, the Chinese people have seen three diff erent governments - the Japanese invaders with the puppet government, the Kuomintang (KMT), and the Communists. George was born a few days before the Japanese occupied Shanghai, while his dad, a surgeon, was in a rescue team for the injured Anti-Japanese soldiers. Because of the labor, his parents could not but stay in Shanghai when it was occupied. When George was a 3rd grader, a Japanese teacher was sent to his school to teach Japanese to high grade students. After the Japanese surrendered and the WWII ended, the KMT resumed power and the second language in the schools switched from Japanese to English, as the KMT has a good relationship with the Western countries. At home, George was greatly infl uenced by his father, who spoke George’s Backyard
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English fl uently among his coworkers, writing only English in patients’ charts. George studied in school in Shanghai up to the 5th grade, where he had his fi rst English class. During his 6th grade of elementary school, George’s father had fallen ill, so the whole family moved to his hometown in Fujian, where he soon passed away. George lived in Fujian from his middle school years to his high school years. In 1949, the People’s Republic was founded. Following the policy of the government, many schools switched to Russian as the second language. The school he attended was originally a Christian missionary-run school with a strong background in English, while Russian teachers had become quite scarce. Therefore, Left: George’s wife and son - Lousia and Henry
George was fortunate enough to have English as a second language through to the end of high school education, while most of his classmates at Tsinghua University started their Russian at the beginning of high school, or even at the beginning of middle school. As a result, many of them do not know English. The reason is that the Communist chased after the KMT from the North to the South China in the Liberation War, or the Civil War, and Fujian is in the South East China. So the Northern schools switched to Russian earlier than the Southern schools. In summary, the politics and regimes really aff ected the foreign language selection in schools. 15
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George’s Backyard
Chapter 2: An Opportunity Following Mao’s death in 1976 and the downfall of the “Gang of Four,” the chaotic Culture Revolution in China came to an end. The new leader became Deng Xiaoping, the architect of the new brand of thinking that combined socialist ideology with free enterprise, whose slogan is “socialism with Chinese characteristics.” Deng opened China to foreign investment and the global market, policies that are credited with developing China into one of the fastest-growing economies in the world for several generations and raising the standard of living of hundreds of millions. At this time, it was found that China needed lots of professionals that knew the latest science and technology, so the government planned to send a lot of qualified people to have a short term study in the advanced Western countries, such as the U.S., Great Britain, Germany, with the U.S. being the main destination. The scientists and engineers each had a time slot of two years
maximum with no degree sought, while the currently enrolled graduate students could go as a regular student and stay until a degree was achieved. To this end, it was soon found that language shortage was a huge problem. With Russian as the only allowed second language taught in middle schools and colleges, many scientists and engineers in China at that time knew very little English, or no English at all. In 1977, a nationwide English exam for screening qualified personnel to study abroad was held. The young student who was teaching himself English during the summer break at Tsinghua University’s library, now a 40 year-old lecturer at a university, easily scored 93 out of 100 points, which was the second highest among all the other applicants throughout the country, as a head of Foreign Language Teachers at his university later told him. It was also heard that 40 points was the minimum requirement for passing this exam; therefore, George was more
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than qualifi ed as far as English was concerned. As a matter of fact, in the early years of the People’s Republic, the government also selected some college students together with existing scientists and engineers to study in the Soviet Union. A very strict scree ning was attached to the selection so that the children of high ranking offi cials were easily qualifi ed; meanwhile, many candidates with relations living in the capitalist countries, or Hong Kong and Taiwan, were denied. Therefore, George fi rst was not so optimistic until his department head notifi ed him that he was chosen to be sent abroad for a two-year study. There were four of the teachers and one graduate student from his university chosen to
study abroad. They came to Shanghai Foreign Language Institute for several months to improve their spoken English. Upon their arrival, the Institute set up an English test to re-group them according to their English profi ciency. One of the teachers overlooking the English dictation test whispered to her colleague, “This guy got all correct!” George ended up going to the advanced class. At the same time, they started to mail letters to foreign universities to seek an opportunity to be a visiting scholar or adjunct professor or graduate student at their college. He was overjoyed when he learned he had been accepted as a visiting scholar for two years at U.C. Berkeley.
“Grandpa work very hard in his early age and he want to one of the best university in China. After that, he continue to do well, he eventually become a professor in our hometown in Fujian. In all of his career, he worked hard and he won his respect from his colleague and his student.” - Henry
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Photo on the right: Photo of George and his wife
Chapter 3: America
Transition is diffi cult for everybody, whether it is changing a habit, leaving home for the fi rst time or moving to another country. As there were not any direct fl ights to go to the U.S. at that time, George left Beijing on August 15, 1980, and fl ew westward to California, changing planes in Paris and Washington D.C., until landing at SFO. He met with a lot of diffi culties as well and he noticed some diff erences between China and America. He was also able to meet a lot of diff erent people on the way. George chose to go to U.C. Berkeley to study under Professor K. in the Dept. of Mechanical Engineering; he admired Prof. K.’s published papers and wanted to learn the advanced research on the computer simulation of metal forming processes, for which the professor is one of the pioneers, leading to 22
Photo on previous page: The place where Geroge go shopping.
his being elected as member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering. Although George had started to work on the same topic in China, the programming language he used was Algol, and the media to store the program was paper tapes with small holes punched on it. You can imagine once there are mistakes in punching, you have to cut off part of the paper tape and connect the remaining parts together with glue. In the U.S. at that time, people used FORTRAN programming language and each sentence of the program was punched on a single IBM card with many holes. The sentence of source code was printed on the top line of the card for convenient recognition. In case there were mistakes in a sentence, all you had to do is to toss off that bad card and insert a new one
instead. No glue is needed. The card deck is read into the computer via the I/O counter in seconds. All of these were new to George, and he was learning every day. Not long after George got there, Dr. K. brought a carton of some 2,000 cards to George’s desk, saying, “This is the program of some problem one of the previous guys has worked. Now you work out your own program to solve your problem.” This was the first step for George to proceed. George had made good progress but not without difficulties. For instance, at the beginning, the program he ran did not converge. George asked one of Prof. K’s graduate students in the same booth with him for help. This graduate student joined Prof. K’s group earlier than George and is quite bright and experienced. He could’ve answered the question with a few words, but he asked George to the TA room to give him the answer. As George was not a graduate student and was older than his peers, he felt embarrassed, so he decided to find the answer on his own. English was still difficult, especially listening comprehension, even with his good foundation in it. One of the reasons was that in China at that time there were very few native American English speakers to help improve his listening and speaking. He was able to overcome
this obstacle through hard work. While he was overcoming this obstacle, he was able to meet many people around San Francisco and Berkeley, such as local Chinese who did not go back to China for a long time or had never been to China. They were interested in the situation in their homeland. George and a teacher from Fudan University were able to tell them what happened in China, such as the cultural revolution. Once a Taiwanese student’s dad, who originally was from Fujian, came to visit his son at Berkeley. When he learned that George was from Fujian, he eagerly wanted to know what had happened in Fujian, and he invited George to come for a talk. George’s progress in research made Prof. K. happy. He took George to present a paper at a conference in Washington, D.C. After George returned to China, another paper was presented in Great Britain at the first NUMIFORM, which is an important international conference in their field and it will be the 13th meeting this year. With George’s help, Tsinghua University, George’s alma mata, invited Prof. K. to visit and give lectures, with George being his interpreter.
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Conclusion After being a visiting scholar for two years at Berkeley, George returned to China, and he continued to teach and do research at his old university in Fujian for another ten years. Then he was promoted to full professor. After that, he found his research direction was not quite in line with what the university wanted. Soon after, his wife’s mom broke her leg in Xiamen, so he requested to transfer to Xiamen. However, the work in Xiamen did not suit his specialty. George’s only son Henry was a Ph.D. student in the U.S. at that time. After his mother-in-law passed away, George and his wife, Louisa, went to America to pay Henry a visit. At the end of this short stay, George had a chance to visit his former professor at Berkeley. Prof.
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K. told him that one of his Ph.D. students had started a company in Columbus, Ohio, and needed George’s expertise. This offer presented George with a dilemma. If he would go ahead with the job opening and get hired, his American Dream would not only come true, but also the three of them could get together in the U.S. However, he would lose his job in Xiamen with the pension plan, which the Chinese people referred to as an “iron bowl” because the job was so very permanent. George decided to take a chance by joining the startup at the age of 54. He got a plane ticket and flew to Columbus for an interview. He was accepted. He canceled his returning flight to China, and flew to Columbus with his wife. During
A family photo of George, Henry, and Louisa
his twenty years with the company, he developed and further improved the software products of the company with his coworkers. He participated in small projects and earned the opportunity to visit customers throughout the world. He also attended professional conferences and presented papers. He felt the job was so interesting and rewarding. The employer applied green cards for him in the category of “outstanding professors and researchers� together with his wife. Then they became U.S. citizens, which made it convenient for George to visit companies with defense contracts. He enjoyed working with his colleagues and retired in 2010. Even though he is very proud of his career success, what completes his American Dream is his family. Today, George and Louisa live with my dad, Henry, my brother, Eliot, and me in the Bay Area. 25
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Works Cited Editors, History.com. “Cultural Revolution.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, 9 Nov. 2009, www.history.com/topics/china/cultural-revolution. Editors, Wikipedia.com, “Deng Xiaoping,” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deng_Xiaoping Li, George. Personal interview. 19 March 2019. ---.Personal interview. 4/29/2019 Li, Henry. Personal interview. 3/28/2019 Heffler, Robin. “Survivor of Cultural Revolution Chronicles Immigrants’ Lives.” UCLA, UCLA, 24 Mar. 2014, newsroom.ucla.edu/stories/survivor-of-cultural-revolution-221409. Huang, Louisa. Personal interview. 3/28/2019 Osnos, Evan, and Evan Osnos. “The Cost of the Cultural Revolution, Fifty Years Later.” The New Yorker, The New Yorker, 19 June 2017, www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/the-cost-of-the-cultural-revolution-fifty-years -later. Revolution”, “Cultural. “Cultural Revolution.” Encyclopedia of Russian History, Encyclopedia.com, 2019,www.encyclopedia.com/history/asia-and-africa/chinese-and-taiwanese-history cultural-revolution. “Seeing Red: The Propaganda Art of China’s Cultural Revolution.” BBC Arts, BBC, www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/44hl41NY7Mb4Jx4tPJpzwty/seeing-red-the- propaganda-art-of-china-s-cultural-revolution.
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About the Author Edmond is a junior at Mountain View High and Freestyle Academy. He enjoys activities like swimming, drawing, and video gaming. He plans to continue pursue creative work at Freestyle and in the future with a positive mindset.
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A Chinese-American’s Dream Edmond Li