我家小鬼子对中国现代史和华人移民史突然感了兴趣。有些中国特色的问题还真不好回答呢。

Is Deng called Chairman Deng? — 小鬼子 asked

Social study interview on post-Mao Chinese immigration to America

1. Why did you and Mom choose to leave your homeland over 20 years ago?

Well, in the beginning, it was more of a trend we followed rather than an educated choice. Our childhood and teenager time were in Mao’s totalitarian government very much like today’s North Korea. No one was permitted to go out of the country (those who dare including my English professor Miss Wang, once found, were sent to prison). We were brain-washed to believe that our homeland was the best in the world and the rest of the world with the 2/3 population of mankind was a living hell where the poor people were struggling everyday waiting for us to liberate them one day. Mao’s era ended in 1976 when he died and when we graduated from high school.

Shortly after Mao died, a great man named Deng Xiaoping took power. He opened the door of China to the world and started his reform and open-door campaign that fundamentally changed China. Although China was still under the highly controlled government and speech and press were still censored, the reform led China into a market economy and developed China into a strong country at an unprecedented development speed.

We benefited a lot from his reform. After Deng reopened universities which Mao shut down for 10 years (1966-1976) during his Cultural Revolution, we were able to attend colleges through very tough college entrance examinations, only 4% of the candidates were selected. So we were the lucky few to get the high education at that time and the government assigned jobs to everyone of us upon graduation. I was even luckier in getting into the top academy in China for my master’s program in Machine Translation research in 1983. With the master degree in hands, I got the job of assistant researcher in this academy and my career was smooth and the future was bright. There was really no need or pressure to change the status-quo. Life was good.

However, there was a stronger and stronger wave of “going abroad for study” at the time. The Chinese people were shocked at observing the huge gaps between the prosperity of the West and the poverty of the then-China. Almost all young people were pursuing this dream of going abroad after China opened the door.  We had been closed for too long and we wanted to see the outside world. The dream became even more attractive and valuable as the visa was so difficult to get. Unless you are exceptionally good to be able to get full scholarships, your chances of getting the visa to study abroad were very slim. So my schoolmates seemed all working very hard on GRE and TOFEL in order to achieve perfect scores to help with the scholarships they needed. I was fairly late in considering this path but most of my schoolmates with decent English went abroad, most to the US, one after another. This gave me more and more self-inflicted pressure and anxiety. At least, I should go out to see the world, like my schoolmates.
There was one historical event that greatly changed this Chinese immigration wave, that is the Tiananmen Event in 1989. Until that event occurred, the majority of Chinese students and scholars who studied abroad then still had two options before them: some who could land on a job most probably would continue their journey of living abroad until being naturalized in time; others, especially those on J1 visa who were sponsored by the Chinese government, would go back to serve China as required by the laws or regulations of both the US and Chinese governments. But the 1989 event changed everything.  As a response to this event for which the US condemned the Chinese government for violating the basic human rights, the US congress soon passed a special immigration law to allow Chinese students and scholars in the US to obtain green cards. The landscape of this wave of Chinese immigration has been fundamentally affected, with this pool of highly educated and skilled Chinese new immigrants finally settling down in the US for good. 1989 marked the point of no return for many overseas Chinese in the US.

We were a bit later than others in coming out of the country in 1991, first to the UK for one year, then immigrated to Canada where you were born and ended up in moving to the US 16 years ago for career development after I got PhD. Nevertheless, the 1989 event definitely had a considerable impact on our decision to pursue immigration to Canada. We love our homeland where we were born and brought up, with so many connections including family and friends, but we would not want to go back. More importantly, during the long journey in pursuing the American Dream in the new land, we have always been motivated by the desire to pursue a better environment for our child (you) to grow.

So we “chose” to leave our home country (i.e. emigration) not because we were not doing well in China, but because we wanted to see the world as the initial motivation.  The decision for pursuing immigration in North America was triggered by the historical event and your birth.  It does not make sense to bring you back to a society that restricts basic freedom. This is very different from earlier generations of immigrants who left home country mainly due to the poor living situations, or religious or political prosecution.

2. What are pros and cons of immigration to America?

The biggest pro is to see you grow well in this land from childhood to college, enjoying the freedom we were deprived of when young and knowing that opportunities are all opened up for you. We were also very thankful to the US who provided me with an opportunity in using my skills and experiences for career development. In a new land with no connections, purely based on my own talents and abilities, I was able to quickly develop myself into the key role of tech lead and senior management (VP for R&D for my first company and Chief Scientist for my second company), acting as Principal Investigator for 17 government projects totaling 9 million dollars and successfully transferred my technology into real world products distributed globally to the business clients of Fortune 500. All these achievements demonstrate that the US is a mature and fair society for new talents from around the world. We have been working extra hard for sure, but the reward has also been great. We love the new land despite its own social problems.

The cons include the tremendous pains and hardships we came across along the way, from the initial cultural shock and deep depression we experienced as we had to cut off the old ties and started everything from grand zero with no connections and support from family and friends as we had in China. I think this is a common pain for all first generation immigrants who are struggling to adapt to an entirely new environment in a new land. It was a price we had to pay once we are on the road of immigration.

3. Did you ever regret your decision?

No, there has never been regret in the decision although by choosing to come out, we did miss a historical opportunity of China’s economic boom in the last 2 decades. The huge change in China was accompanied with more opportunities with bigger platforms for talents. Friends of mine with similar background and education who did not come out have been doing exceptionally well, playing bigger roles in the society and organizations. So most probably if I had stayed in China, there would have been a bigger role for me to impact the society. But there is no “if” in one’s life and we are happy where we are. We have nothing to complain, especially when we see you grow here, free and healthy, as a second generation immigrant. This land is our third home (second home is Canada), but it is your homeland with all your schoolmates and friends. We appreciate living here as much as you do as a native.

[Related]

Is Deng called Chairman Deng?

Interview on post-Mao Chinese Immigrants in US (Part 2) 2014-12-06

W: by the way, a study on my generation of immigrants is of considerable interest and value
as it is not well studied and it is still developing and evolving with no solid social analysis yet

T: i’m actually quite interested in this

W: the early generation of Chinese immigrants is very different
they are purely kuli
hard labor demanded at the time when this land needs infrastructure construction
after they were used, it became an issue or burden
T: i like your interview a lot
you tell me a lot of hard facts
and make it easy for me to research the push/pull factors
and driving forces
like
“why are young people all choosing to leave the country”
that type of stuff

W: that generation of Chinese did not adapt to new environment
with cultural and language barriers so tough

As for your questions on how well my peers did in the West

in general they have been doing well
many became professors, scientists/researchers and engineers
based on their education and talents as well as their hard working spirit which is fairly typical for all first generation immigrants

For myself, I was lucky to come to the US at a time
of economic boom under Clinton’s administration
in fact it was at a time of overheat of economy
so called dot-com bubble

I came in 1997 and it was not difficult for us to get the Venture Capital of first 10 million dollars in 1999 for the IT sector innovation
although the market crashed in 2000-2001,
I was lucky to keep my team
having survived the crash due to the government funding we got

T: trying to think of time period
you’ve mentioned berlin wall
tian an men
mao’s rule
is this cold war era?

W: Cold War ended in 1989
with the fall of Berlin Wall
Tiananmen event happened before the fall of Beilin Wall in the same year
in a sense, it helped speed up the fall of Berlin Wall

Mao’s Era ended in 1976
way before 1989
in between there were a decade of Deng’s crippled Reform
crippled in the sense that Deng the new leader was only willing to reform the economy to make it a market economy just like the Western capitwalist countries
but he was not ready to reform the political system
so the nation was still under totalitarian government
in the name of socialism although the economic fundamentals were changing hugely
many aspects of life and society especially the economy
have been transformed to be more like the west than the old Red China systems

T: organizing
+ have to make more questions
this is coming together nicely

W: history can be very fun and revealing
as a side note, when I mentioned the cons of immigration
those pains, blood and tears in adapting to an entirely new land with cultural shocks
having to cut the old ties and started everything from ground zero
this reminds me of your difficulty in adapting to a new school
if you feel depressed and the pain in adapting to the new school
I can only tell that the pains in first generation immigrants in adapting to a new culture in a new land
is 10 times what you feel today
it was overwhelmingly pain
I was already 30 years old when I came out of China for UK
supposed to be fairly mature
but I was still feeling the overwhelming pains and emptiness
like a tree pulled out of the old soil
and transplanted to a new land with no familiar sources of support
a tree standing on itself with roots cut or deeply hurt
it was just awful as you can imagine
but again, this is a common pain experienced by all immigrants
when this pain was added by the lack of abilities to earn a living in a new land, it can be devastating
that’s why the suicide rate is fairly high for new immigrants
it is just too much to bear
Fortunately for us
I have never been pushed to the extreme situation that I ran out of living resources
our pains are more from the cultural shock and inability to adapt soon
not from the physical inability of making a living and surviving in the new land
so we managed to overcome the pains with time
time is a cure for everything

T: i see
i was gonna ask
what was the early period of deng’s rule like
anything in particular?
you said that he only bothered to change things economically instead of politically

W: right
Deng is a great man
it opened a new era post-Mao
but he came from Mao’s team historically
so he could only reform that much
he has his own historical limitation
he himself suffered a lot from his wrong decision in 1989
and was criticized and attacked by the entire world
for a time, he lost almost all the friends
after the event
but he was not stupid
soon he realized that he could not go back to Mao’s government style
so he decided to re-energize the economic reform
that made his reform continue for another decade with amazing development speed
gradually the world resumed relationship with him and China
because after all, China was still on the path of reform
and the society became more open
and the economy became the second biggest in the world
only second to the US and surpassed Japan
almost like a miracle, China became a power in the world

T: i meant to ask something like
since deng’s reign would be drastically different from mao’s
therefore the initial change between mao’s and deng’s reign would seem strange to you?
what was that adjustment like?

W: that was a great feel
after Mao died
we were confused a while
but soon after Deng took the power and started the reform and open-door
everyone was happy
we were the beneficiaries
so we were extremely happy in the first few years of his reform
the change was great
every change seemed to provide new opportunities
the society was in a very good shape under the new reform
until 1989
when the reform came across some obstacles and there have been anger
and complaints in the society for the rise of high price due to the free market fluctuations and also due to some government officials corruption
as a response, students in Beijing University
which is like UC Berkely
started the movement for freedom and democracy
which they believed could cure the problem of corruption and other problems caused by
reforming only economy without political system

T: what reform caused tian an men
what were the initial reforms deng made

W: when the economy transitioned from so called planned economy
decided and controlled by government
to the free market economy in the reform
problems may occur
especially the reform is transitional in the beginning
so two systems ran parallel
which left a lot of room for corruption
people in power can use the loopholes of the two running systems
one planned economy and the other free economy
to gain personal interest and wealth which angered the people
at the same time, the price fluctuations were too big
once something was put under the control of market
which is called “invisible hand”
in economics
that price fluctuations, mainly the quick rise of price for basic commodities such as food and necessities
rose to a point that people could not tolerate any more
so people went to the street to protest against the corruption and the price rise
demanding freedom and democracy which were believed to help solve these problems

T: i see
so the new reforms –> price raise/corruption –> protests
then why did you think deng was so great
if it seems he couldn’t control the economy?

W: it was trial and error
nobody could predict all problems in such a drastic reform in such a big country
Deng’s greatness was his courage to take an anti-Mao path
to lead the country to the modern society and made China strong
without Deng, China was just a huge North Korea
we would be suffering from minimal living standards and sometimes from hunger
and would never be strong in the world and could not even see the world

T: i see
but i meant
retrospectively
that is the case
but at that very moment
was it the same feelings?

W: the first 5 years of reform by Deng
made Deng a favorite leader among all people
especially among students
that was the happy time
this was like liberation
we were slaves
under Mao
spiritual slaves for sure
as well as physical slaves to a large extent
for example, farmers are not allowed to move to the cities
all farmers and their children cannot enjoy medicare
and other benefits enjoyed by city residents
very strict classes in Red China under Mao
with Deng’s reform
it was like liberation of slaves
of course there were genuine feelings of gratitude to him

T: i see
why only 5 years/

W: because the honey moon got to end
and side effects and problems would occur
the initial happiness of seeing the liberation and finding the economy benefits will
gradually be weakened by the day-to-day worries of
how we could tolerate the crazy rise of prices
even if the living standards were way better than before in general,
by human nature, they would still be angered by those side effects
there was a strong sense of unfairness due to the corruption they see everyday
people in power can turn power into benefits and money

T: i see
i think i can research an economic graph
of deng’s time
see what happens after roughly 5 years
thank you
if i have any more questions
i’ll ask them
for now
i think this is more than enough
communist china
really looks a lot like north korea
mao ze dong looks a little like kim jong jun
LOL

W: exactly like North Korea, just in a bigger scale
the Mao’s death account in your reference
was talking about the power vacuum after Mao died before Deng took the power
it was about one year
there was a transitional leader named Hua Guofeng
during that time, Hua decided to get rid of the leftist wing
headed by Mao’s wife Jiang Qing, so called the Gang of Four
that was a brave measure
which helped to end Mao’s era
but Hua was a weak leader
so with political skills, Deng replaced Hua and opened the Deng-era
those are details
you do not have to get into
the key is Deng’s reform
opened the door
so emigration became not only possible but fashionable as a trend

T: this is just really interesting to me
didn’t know any of this

T: dot com boom is basically the same as
gold rush
LOL
some differences i’ll find

W: Tiananmen event was the key to make those emigrants who may return to their country
after seeing the world and got the education degrees abroad
decide to become immigrants
both spiritually and materially
spiritually those Chinese were disappointed at the government of their homeland
so they no longer wanted to go back to that land
materially the event triggered the immigration law passed in the congress very quickly
to make the otherwise very lengthy journey of immigration short and tangible
tens of thousands of overseas Chinese got the green cards over night

[Related]

Interview on post-Mao Chinese Immigrants in US (Part 1) 2014-12-06

Is Deng called Chairman Deng? 2014-12-05

设计和实现一个语言是一种非常有趣的事儿，自己做上帝。说起语言王国和上帝的关系，话也长了。自然语言据说是由一群名叫约定俗成的众神团队创制的，缺乏规划，无为而治，词汇和文法的起点均具有很大的随意性，显然不是一神教说的真神所为。然而，语言是何等神器，它是交流的工具，知识的载体和合作的基础。人类一旦掌握了共同语言，齐心造反就容易了，绝不会安于伊甸园里面吃吃果子。真神于是有些怕了，决定搅乱自然语言，使得人类不能顺畅交流，内讧不断。这才有人类世代努力建造通天塔企望大同而不成。直到如今，世界仍不太平，语言依旧混乱，战争和恐怖时有发生。尽管如此，人类还是迎来了电脑革命的新时代。

以前一直不理解计算机这么些年为啥有那么多狂人前仆后继，发明了这么多不同句法和风格的语言，这不是为难人吗。说到底还是，人毕竟不是神，想制定语言王国的条条框框，又要富于表现力，修行不足也。

人类语言繁多是可以理解的，除了前面讲到的神话，也有历史的、地域的和经济的诸原因。可是计算机的硬件和底部机器指令及其背后的逻辑都是基本一致的，完全没有道理人为生出这么多语言来。至少对于高级通用语言，书同文应该是大势所趋。连电脑语言都不统一，何来世界大同？

苹果公司最近设计的mobile平台语言叫啥来着，对，Swift，据说帅呆了。其实，历史上最成功的人造语言不是 BASIC 或 Visual Basic、C 或 C++，不是 Lisp 或 Prolog，也不是 Java 或 Swift 等电脑语言，而是为人类和世界和平而创造的 Esperanto（世界语）。世界语之父柴门霍夫博士才是简约规范与丰富灵活的无与伦比的平衡大师，值得世代景仰。

有意思的是，有时候人会因为创制了一门新语言，就以为该工具针对的问题就已经解决了。人工智能历史上，Lisp 语言以及 为其量身定制的 Lisp 机曾经刮起一阵旋风。女儿最近课上接触它，为那些没完没了的括号头疼不已，我说，难道你没看到设计者的匠心？“I can sense that”，美则美矣，太过极端（大意）。

后来 Prolog 的设计和实现，成为日本五代机大跃进的主要依据。一时间极度乐观主义在日本精英阶层流行，人定胜天，似乎制作能说人话、能自主思考的智能机器指日可待了。泡沫破灭，五代机项目是完败，本来日本雄心勃勃要借助五代机项目赶超美国，做软件产业和IT的带头羊。其结果是与美国的距离更远。

不过反过来说，知道解决问题的 knowhow（窍门），可没有合适的专项语言工具来实现，也往往望洋兴叹。通用语言可以书同文，也的确可以看到书同文的大趋势，但通用语言毕竟难以照应众多领域的特殊需求，因此专项语言的创造会不断深入下去。对于很专业的问题领域，没有针对性的专项语言，解决问题往往事倍功半。比如，很难想象用通用语言可以写出有深度的自然语言的 parser 出来。

最近思考这辈子 involved in 的三次 NLP 专用语言的设计和应用，悟出来语言设计的简洁和表达力之间的某种平衡，会对利用这个语言解决问题并维护系统产生很大的影响，哪怕本质上都是相同的 formalism。设计NLP 专用语言的特殊魅力在于其元语言（meta-language）的特性：为了分析（parse）和处理自然语言，我们需要一种元语言（专用的formalism）去描述自然语言，而用元语言编写的程序，其主体是自然语言的形式化文法，本身也是一种语言，也需要被分析（parse）、编译（compile）和运行（running）。这是何等有趣的语言之塔的螺旋上升。

第一次接触是在国内，导师制定的语言标准，简洁到无语，整个语言不允许有 SPACES，虽然基本功能都有了，还是失之于陋，而且天书一样不具有可读性。然而，在上世纪80年代的软硬件的条件下，在中国相对隔绝的环境里，我的导师刘先生创造出了一整套适合MT和NLP的语言（单有绝顶智慧是不够的，主要还是他有前20年机器翻译的经验做底），亲手实现其 parser（专项语言分析器） 、 interpreter （解释器），和融合了流程控制的 runner （导师称其为语言处理的控制器），并成功应用于实用机器翻译系统的研发中，这是非常了不起的成就。高山仰止，是我对恩师一辈子的感觉。

第二次在水牛城，与瑞典工程师合作，照猫画虎，跟着欧洲施乐实验室的样子，共同创制的。表达力丰富而规范，但没有风格，也不够专项，NLP 本体要求渗透不足。

第三次是来加州以后与印度工程师合作，NLP 本体工作是做足了，语言功能强大，具有扩展性，远远超出了传统的有限状态 formalism 的框框。但该工程师偏好结构清晰，不惧繁琐，叠床架屋，离简约渐行渐远。一个简单的模式规则，也要写一大篇代码，几乎可以与老老年 COBOL 媲美了。

有了阅历之后，如果有机会重新来过，有时间从容设计，我想创制一款既简约又丰富的专项语言来，使用她会减少出错机会，增强可读性，方便 debug，而且看上去要很美很美，过一把做优秀上帝的瘾。