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Ancillary 1. Learning English through TV. 

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English was a subject that was offered since 3rd grade, but most schools do not have the resources, so they stop teaching it after 3rd grade. So it was at my school.

But, I was lucky to find a British TV program called Follow Me! (See Wikipedia Article: Follow Me!). It was exactly the time that I got my first TV set, color TV, like 14 inch, pretty big for the time. This was my first exposure to english that really got me hooked because they teach with a good sense of humor, setting a scene, and forming a story.

In high school, english class was officially introduced. Up to that point, I was learning british english, so I sounded very different than now. In college at Peking University, I had a teacher from the United States, so we changed our accents accordingly. There is also a lot of American international students at Peking University. They served as the teacher for oral english practice with us.

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Ancillary 2. Yi's Advanced Parole "Piece of Paper" with private information redacted at the top.

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Advanced Parole: a government approved piece of paper

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Advanced Parole: a government approved piece of paper

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When I was a student here, I was on F1 visa. Basically, I was responsible for my own cost to study. Even though the school pays for me, I have to make sure the school wants to pay for me. So I didn't dare leave the country at that time.

I found my first job, and the green card was already approved. So, we were allowed to go back to China, with a piece of paper called Advanced Parole. And, that was an interesting name. So, I talked to my boss, an Oxford Ph.D. from New Zealand with a great sense of humor: "Oh you're going back to China to go see your parents, great. Make sure you can come back!"

"Yeah, I have Advanced Parole" I replied enthusiastically.

"You have what??"

"Advanced Parole."

He immediately ran next door to his buddy, a distinguished engineer, his best engineer. "Guess what! Yi is getting Advanced Parole; he's going to get paroled."

"Uh, he got what, what did he do?"

That was basically the very first after graduation. I went back to China with just that piece of paper with the picture of me that I submitted. Will anyone recognize this piece of paper? My heart pounding, immigration said, "Oh I see, follow me." What did I do wrong? "I just need to get the stamp." I guess it is not very popular document, but he recognized it. So, after five and a half years, we went to China and came back successfully.

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So, language should not have been a problem?

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So, language should not have been a problem?

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Just off the boat (I suppose the airplane), I met my graduate school professor, and he was surprised, saying my english was pretty good. While they usually reserve grader work for students from China, he said I should teach the undergraduate class. He led me to the department head, and they tested me out and said "yeah, you're good; you're really good."

I had my confidence. Literally the second day of being in the US, fresh off the boat, I met undergraduate students for physics class. I set the ground rules: "If you're lab report is late for more than three days, I will never receive it." After I said that, I saw some funny faces, but they were respectful enough to not laugh. Only, after class, I thought maybe I should say accept. So there are some quirks.

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Image 5. Yi (right) graduating from NJIT.

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I started on an Applied Physics Masters and switched to Electrical Engineering Ph.D. later. I was working integrated circuits, making them faster and at lower power. I received an undergraduate education before coming to the US. The US is on the leading edge of this technology, so I came here for the better access to technology.

Of course, I cannot afford to study in the US. The way it all pays out is that because of my credentials, I teach undergraduate students in the college. I did pretty good both ways, earning a Ph.D. and an outstanding instructor award. I was pretty amazed.

So I went to an award ceremony, and they gave $2000 award or so. The professor in front of me talked saying: he worked so hard, he goes home so late, his wife should know he didn't do anything bad.

Inspired, I said "I want to thank my wife too." They thought I was a copycat. I continued, "She has a full-time job, but still records the grades for my students." They continued clapping, thinking it was done. "Although, I didn't pay her." There was a pause. "With this award, I can issue the first paycheck."

So now I could even throw a joke in English just after a few years after first coming and being new to everything.

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For foreign students, choices for jobs are limited. Bigger companies, at least at that time, did not want to bother with immigration processing, so foreign students usually work for smaller companies to demonstrate worthiness for bigger companies to hire you and go through the hassle and expense of immigration.

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Obviously, there are many ways to become a naturalized citizen in the US. Most people get employment-based. For me, I applied for a national interest waiver process. It was created to capture nuclear scientists from Russia so that they don't go to other countries after the USSR collapsed. With my Bell Labs experience and publications, I was able to justify to immigration that the expertise that I have was valuable to the country.

Immigration is a tricky issue. As a new immigrant, sometimes you feel like some people don't want us to be here. It was an unpleasant experience when we went to the immigration office. The guard was sitting there, not looking at anyone who walked towards him. So, I walked past him, his eyes still looking at the sky.

"What do you think I'm here for?" the guard says.

I was like: how do I know? You're standing there, looking at the sky.

"So, you think you just bypass me"

"No..." I respond with a shake of the head.

It is a long process, but everything is expedited for the national interest group. So basically, it was agreed I could get my green card right after I got my Ph.D. and got to stay at Bell Labs and go to Lucent Technology. So, I am lucky in my immigration.

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Besides coursework, graduate students normally spend most of the time doing research. Electrical engineering had cutting-edge technology happening in corporations. My advisor actually came from Bell Labs to NJIT to teach as a professor. He wanted to send me to work with his former colleagues to work on some technologies, but the tricky part, besides security background checks, is that international students can't work outside of the college.

But, they worked out a deal to do my Ph.D. thesis there at Bell Labs. The school covered the expenses. My new advisor got the contract and realized that this was interesting: "you are an unpaid consultant; so, we will receive consultancy from you although we all have PhDs. And we are going to provide free consultancy to you!"

In general, there are a lot of opportunities that foreign students have a hard time getting access, but there are ways around it too.

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listen to Yi tell this story->

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I'll know what you are talking about... if you translate it to Chinese

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I'll know what you are talking about... if you translate it to Chinese

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The other challenge was that technical terms were all taught in chinese, unlike students from India that learn technical terms in english. So, I knew I knew the subject, but I could not put my finger on the word. I guess it's challenging especially for the first year, but I grew better and better.

I still somewhat face the same issue of identifying certain facts to this day. The other day we were talking about Edgar Allen Poe, but I didn't recognize the name. When we translated the name to chinese, I recognized and remembered who he was, and interestingly, I learned him in China as Allen Poe, no Edgar.

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listen to Yi tell this story of telling his boss about advanced parole->

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Image 7. Yi revisiting his high school in China.

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Peking University BS, EE

New Jersey Institute of Technology Ph.D., EE

Distinguished Engineer at Broadcom Ltd.

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Image 2. Yi and the author Brandon Cai at a Parkland Football Game.

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Image 8. Yi (middle right) with family including author (far right)

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Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood. All is riddle, and the key to a riddle is another riddle.

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Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood. All is riddle, and the key to a riddle is another riddle.

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~Ralph Waldo Emerson