AMERICAN DREAM

Chào các anh các chị .
Em đã nghe nói về nhiều trường hợp những người nhập cư đến Hoa Kì (cả người Việt Nam ) vượt qua khó khăn ban đầu và thành đạt . Vậy nếu ai biết hãy kể một số trường hợp để em có dịp mở rộng tầm mắt .Tất nhiên , bên cạnh đó , những ai có khó khăn hay thất bại của riêng mình ,nếu có thể, hãy kể ra để được chia sẻ vợi bớt và giúp người đi sau biết được để tránh

Có chuyện này khá hay , nhưng bác chịu khó đọc tiếng Anh :
THE BIRD BILLIONAIRE
Stranded in the U.S. after being cast off by a Taiwanese manufacturer, a keyboard salesman named James Chu struck a daring pact with a rival company and started ViewSonic, the world''''s leading independent monitor brand.
by H Y Nahm
PAGE 1 OF 8

The millions of Asians who have come here during the past century have produced thousands of millionaires -- mostly Chinese Americans -- who have joined the ranks of America''''s wealthiest citizens. None has built a bigger, more successful company in less time with less capital than a shy immigrant from Taiwan who sometimes has trouble being understood in English.
In 1986 James Chu moved to the U.S. as the underpaid sales manager of a barely solvent Taiwanese keyboard manufacturer. By October 1987 Chu''''s salesmanship turned his employer into a huge success. In the process Chu became such a threat to his boss that he was forced to resign.
It''''s eight years later. ViewSonic Corporation, the company Chu started with little more than salesmanship, has become America''''s top independent monitor brand. Its 1996 sales are projected at $400-500 million, three times that of Chu''''s one-time employer. Little wonder, then, that ******lds no grudge.
"I was angry the first few years," Chu says. "As time goes on I am more and more grateful. If he didn''''t treat me that way, I couldn''''t be successful."
His entrepreneurial feat makes Chu the most successful Asian American under the age of 40. What''''s more, his success in building the ViewSonic brand into the most trusted in the monitor business makes him the man with the best prospects for future growth. Before 2000, Chu reckons, ViewSonic will slip past NEC in total U.S. sales.
From Los Angeles go east on the Pomona Freeway and get off at the last exit before 57, and you find yourself in an area of boxy, single-level structures bearing the logos of companies like GE, Aiwa and Ingram. The 100,000-square-foot ViewSonic building looks too small for its $309 million in 95 revenues. It is. In April the company will explode into a newly-built 300,000-square-foot structure just down the street.
A black 500SEL is the make, model and color favored by Asian CEOs in every industrial park in the state. This one''''s no exception. The gleaming black Benz in ViewSonic''''s lot crouches with its chrome grill pointing toward the darkened glass of the building''''s business end. Across the glass is the office of the man who has driven the company to the top of the computer monitor industry.
James Chu''''s eyes and round face were made for laughter, though until the past five years they saw little reason for mirth. His movements are brisk, efficient. You shake his hand and sense, in equal measure, his quiet strength and an almost painful shyness. If you didn''''t already know that he had gotten started in the industry through his salesmanship, you could think he had inherited his position or maybe created it with technical or financial wizardry.
At the outset getting James Chu to start talking is like pulling teeth. It doesn''''t help that English is a language he had no reason to practice until the age of 28. He struggles for some words, leaves out others. Even when he does succeed in finding just the right words, they''''re obscured by his clipped, impatient Mandarin accent. "I feel" always sounds like "I fear". For the hapless transcriber, this shapes up to be the interview from hell.
Then it happens, unexpectedly. About five minutes into the interview Chu suddenly transforms himself into a relaxed, engaging conversationalist. The English doesn''''t get much better, but now it flows. There are even some happy turns of phrases. This is a man, you sense, with as unlikely a success story as an interviewer could want. The conversation starts after lunch and continues nonstop until we stagger out to powder our noses and find the sea of 100 cubicles nearly emptied of the white-collar staff. Among those remaining is executive secretary Amy Wang, the woman who screens demands on Chu''''s time from three continents.
The future tycoon was born October 23, 1957 to an unpromising family in the small town of Pintong in southern Taiwan. Father Chu Chin-Tsu was an enlisted man in the Nationalist Air Force. Mother Dong Ta Twe was a housewife with a second-grade education.
"We were not a rich family, definitely not," says Chu. "My mother cannot read a magazine article."
Chu was the fifth of six children, with three older brothers and a younger sister. His family had moved from mainland China in 1949 with the Kuomingdang to settle in what became an air force enclave.
................
Now he''s gone I don''t know why
And till this day some times I cry
He didn''t even say goodbye
He didn''t take the time to lie
Bang bang he shot me down
Bang bang I hit the ground
Bang bang that awful sound
Bang bang my baby shot me down
Được hungmmx sửa chữa / chuyển vào 14:35 ngày 08/12/2003

The parents taught the kids, ''''When you grow up you want to be an officer of the air force.'''' So I never thought about going to the University.
"I was pretty quiet," Chu says of his grade school days. "Actually not too much to do. I was good at wrestling. I always stayed home and I was shy--anyway, not too special." He was an indifferent student, with few friends. "In junior high school I was probably 35th out of 50 students." From an early age Chu rejected the life he was expected to live.
"The whole set pattern was boring--going to the military, going to officer school. My life was pretty ordinary, I thought. I was very ordinary." The school work was difficult for him and he was given little encouragement to apply himself. By high school Chu had decided he would die of boredom. In the 11th grade he left for Taipei.
"I told them before I went," Chu recalls, "but everybody didn''''t agree. I said ''''I must go to Taipei. I need a separation from this enviroment. This enviroment will kill me. There is no future here.''''"
"I''''m not outstanding the way some people are," Chu says of his dilemma. "I didn''''t know what I could do. I thought that in the worse case, I could change somewhere else, but [if I] stayed there, I [would] get into trouble. I was thinking, ''''My brain is in pain.'''' So I moved to Taipei, changed my enviroment. If people asked me what my goals were, I didn''''t have one."
He packed some bags and took the train with a classmate suffering from a similar need to escape.
The school Chu had attended in Pintong was a government funded school which, in Taiwan, was considered more prestigious than private schools. Despite his lackluster performance, Chu was accepted by a private school recommended by his Pintong classmate''''s sister.
Chu too had a sister in Taipei, his married oldest sister Chu Ti Ng, then 24, the second of the Chu children. She helped Chu, then 16, with living expenses. Chu lived with his Pintong classmate in a rented house with the help of the money his sister could spare. He managed to finish high school.
The only way Chu could avoided compulsory military service was to get himself into a top university. "I failed [the exam]. I felt pretty upset about not getting into the university." Facing the prospect of being drafted, in December 1977, at the age of 20, Chu joined the army paratroopers and found himself stationed in his hometown of Pintung. Army life offered little diversion. He had no girlfriend. The dozen jumps he was required to make lost their excitement after the first one. Once or twice a month he visited his family.
"In a family with six kids," he muses of his parents'''' attitude toward him, "it''''s quite difficult to get special attention."
He began and ended his two-year stint as a private. Deciding to make another try at getting into a university, he returned to Taipei to devote himself to studying. Three or four months of studying was all he could take before deciding to look for a job. He scoured the newspapers. The only jobs available to people with his credentials were in door-to-door sales. Three or four months after leaving the army Chu was hired by Duplo Enterprises to sell mimeograph machines, the messy precursors to today''''s copiers.
"They needed people to do door-to-door sales," Chu says. "Going door to door, door to door, you get a lot of rejections.
"This sales manager was very outgoing," Chu recalls. "He was a very good salesperson. So he taught us how to [do sales that way]. But his idea of a salesperson didn''''t fit my character. I''''m shy, I''''m not good at talking to strangers. When I talk in public, I''''m very, very nervous. None of those [qualities he expected] fit me. But that was the only job I could find. I can always change myself. I bought a book called The Salesperson. I learned a lot. If you are a car salesperson, you probably need 60 calls before you sell one car. If you sell business machines, you need 45. My future looked like [I had] no chance, [unless] I changed myself
When I went into the office, the first thing I would say is,"Hi", to anybody, "Hi, how are you?". I boasted [about] myself even if I didn''t want to talk. It was like I put on a mask. When I started work, [I wore] a happy face], always smiling, mouth big almost to the ears, always asking questions. It didn''t matter if I was scared, I always talked anyway. The people in Taiwan are very shy. They teach the children to never answer. It''s very different than here [where] everyboby wants to show off.
"I wanted to be an outgoing person. Any question the teacher asked, I was the first person to raise his hand. So after he called me, I had to stand up and think about what I needed to say. That forced me to become the most talkative person.
"That [company sales class] lasted one week. My classmates were suprised. They look at me as a very different person, a super salesperson. I got encouraged. They sent five people to meet customers. The manager saw some people are nervous and paired two people together. I was the first to volunteer, ''I don''t need anybody.'' If I went with another person, nothing [would be] done because we would share responsiblity. The second reason, in case I lost face, I didn''t want another person to see me. It would be very embarrassing."
He overcame his terror of knocking on doors, by forcing himself to knock first without thinking about the consequences. Once he had knocked, he found, he could respond to the situation. "Many times people kick me out."
Chu forced himself to call on as many prospects as he could based on the expectation that he needed 45 visits to make a sale. During that first month he screwed up his courage enough times to sell three machines. No other salesperson sold even one.
"It was the first time I found out I could be a good salesperson," Chu recalls proudly. He remained shy in his personal life, but found that putting on a tie and going into the office made him a super salesman. "The conflict in my mind was very big because I was a different type of person now." A month and a half later, he quit.
"The pressure grew so big," he recalls. "People were already expecting me to be a super salesperson. In one and half months, I sold a total of four machines. If I was that good, how about the second month, the third month? The expectation level was higher and higher, and for me it was quite difficult. I was so nervous."
................
Now he''s gone I don''t know why
And till this day some times I cry
He didn''t even say goodbye
He didn''t take the time to lie
Bang bang he shot me down
Bang bang I hit the ground
Bang bang that awful sound
Bang bang my baby shot me down
Được hungmmx sửa chữa / chuyển vào 14:31 ngày 08/12/2003

During his month and a half at Duplo, Chu began studying for the university exam, supporting himself from his sales income. Each evening he would begin at five and study until seven or eight the next morning. As a result, he did well on the exam and was admitted into Tong Hai University, a top private college that was considered a second-tier school. His first year he majored in physics which he picked more from social presssue than any interest in the subject. He was more interested in the social sciences, considered suitable only for women.
During his first year Chu scored 17 out of 100 on a math exam. At the end of the year he sought permission to transfer into the sociology department. Based on Chu''s dismal grades, the department head refused. His true passion lay in the fields of psychology and and sociology, Chu convinced him. Chu would have preferred to try the business management department but knew his chances would be nil as it was a muchmore popular area than sociology. Chu took a few business courses.
He supported himself by working evenings selling Chinese-English dictionaries at adult night schools. During the five minute breaks, he went into a classroom with a box of dictionaries and stood in front of the class. Chu discovered that, thanks to the human herding instinct, it was easier to hold the attention of an entire classroom.
"One powerful person can control a whole society easily," Chu says, "do anything he wants. I passed out the books, my face not smiling. I watched everybody. They''re surprised how someone can do something so strange. So everybody is quiet. Everybody pays attention. Everybody is watching. If somebody is still talking, I just stare and say nothing. Everybody else would suggest that person not talk any more. The first time in front of lots of people, it was very difficult. Later after more practice, you know when people will be laughing, when people will be asking questions."
What made the feat all the more remarkable, in Chu''s mind, is that he had a stuttering problem that worsened when he was tired or nervous. The problem had become particularly acute during his first year of college. Chu noticed that he didn''t stutter if he were reading aloud. By practicing with a book, he trained himself to speak for five minutes without stuttering.
Having secured their attention, Chu passed out dictionaries and a signup sheet and gave a brief, solemnly-delivered sales pitch. He finished by collecting the signup sheet and the money. At about $20 U.S. apiece, each dictionary earned him a handsome commission of $6 or $7. A full class might net him 35 sales, generating $200 in commissions--a huge sum in the Taiwan of the early 1970s. Chu made two presentations an evening.
Later, he scaled up his sales operation by hiring helpers to pass out the books and the signup sheets so that they could actually sell in two or more classrooms simultaneously. This lucrative operation lasted two months until another enterprising hawker began selling the same dictionaries outside the school for $6 apiece. Chu never set foot in that school again.
For a few months Chu sold houses, then encyclopedias. He then started a business selling English-language study tapes at a university in the southern Taiwanese port of Kaohsiung. By selling through university organizations, Chu attracted the attention of government agents who suspected him of being a political agitator. The school authorities asked Chu to stop selling his tapes. Fortunately, Chu was also selling the tapes by mail order and was enjoying some success at it. He enjoyed a brief period of success selling computers, outselling a pair of experienced full-time salespeople. "I worked for 2 nights, I can sell one complete computer," he recalls.
In his third year of college, Chu faced the decision he had been putting off. "I am not a good student, why not leave now?" By that time he was having trouble keeping up with the demands of his business and sales work. His attention was also diverted by Lily Huang Lee, a night school student working as the bookkeeper for Chu''s tape sales company.
At the end of 1983 Chu left Lily to finish college in Kaohsiung and moved up to Taipei. In his first few months Chu went through several sales jobs. The following April he interviewed with a small Taipei company called Behavior Tech & Computer, BTC. Several days later he still had not gotten a response. Chu went to the company and waited two hours for the owner who was known as Steel Su. Su finally returned at 7 that evening.
"I said, ''I need to talk to you.''" Chu recalls with a wry smile. "He said ''Okay''. I said ''It doesn''t matter if you give me an answer, I will follow you. No need to give me an answer. I''m starting work tomorrow.'' He said, ''Okay''." That was the start of Chu''s career in the computer industry.
At that time BTC was 3 1/2 years old. "The company was initially very poor," Chu recalls. "They have a lot of debts and the company attitude was negative. It was in a very, very difficult situation.
"It was the only computer job I could find. The company was so small, so very shakey. I wanted it to grow strong so I could learn all sides of the business. This company gave me a lot of experience, a good picture of what can happen. I never want my business in that situation.
"The company was engineering driven. They always wanted to develop products. In reseach and developing products, it wanted to be second to none. They had a dream, continually dreaming. Their sales so small, their resources very limited against big companies but thinking they could find something and instantly become rich."
BTC had already been through one reorganization. Chu was its 12th employee, and its first salesperson. Its only revenues came from designing products for OEM manufacturers and had no product to sell. Chu was paid a small salary without commission.
"The company was so small, I shared the general manager''s office," he recalls. "We had one desk. My side faced the window. I had nothing to do. One day, two days, three days. I thought, ''Nobody is teaching me.'' I talked to the general manager and said, ''What should I do?'' He said, ''Later, I''ll talk to you''. So I started looking in the books, in the magazines and found information by myself. Pretty soon, my conclusion was we needed to sell a product."
................
Now he's gone I don't know why
And till this day some times I cry
He didn't even say goodbye
He didn't take the time to lie
Bang bang he shot me down
Bang bang I hit the ground
Bang bang that awful sound
Bang bang my baby shot me down

Phần còn lại anh xem tại link này nhé: http://goldsea.com/RTR/Chujames/chujames4.html
................
Now he's gone I don't know why
And till this day some times I cry
He didn't even say goodbye
He didn't take the time to lie
Bang bang he shot me down
Bang bang I hit the ground
Bang bang that awful sound
Bang bang my baby shot me down