Searching for a Job in the Yellow Pages

Retired UCSF Pharmacology Professor Nancy Ma and Internist Peter Lee both fled from China for different reasons. However, recently they created the foundation WuWei Harmony which does projects with China. 
Nancy was born in Shanghai during the 1940s. Her father worked as Asian General Manager for Colgate-Palmolive, a wonderful position...until the Communists took over in 1949.  He fled first to Hong Kong, a British territory back then. The rest of the family , however, could not get exit visas. (See post one.) After seven years of waiting, they finally managed to get to Hong Kong. (See post two.) 
Husband Peter fled from China for different reasons. His parents were part of the Nationalist Army that fought against the Japanese from 1937-45 and then the Communists from 1945-49. (See post three.) While Peter was safe from Communism, he realized upon college graduation that there weren't many job opportunities. Fortunately, he got a scholarship at the University of Texas. (See post four.) Meanwhile, Nancy struggled in Hong Kong. Her mother enrolled her in a Cantonese/English high school, two languages Nancy did not understand. Nancy only lasted three days. (See post five.)But she did well in college, and managed to get a scholarship to Southwestern University in Georgetown Texas. (see post six.) 

When Nancy graduated with a chemistry major, she decided she had to get a job.
“I didn’t know how to look for a job," she said. "I remember I sent out some 200+ applications from the yellow page book...

Didn’t even get one response.” 

Fortunately, Nancy had good rapport with a professor who taught bio-chemistry at the University of Texas in Austin, and she asked him for a summer job. After working there for a semester, he gave her a full position.  She ended up going to graduate school there. “Without me knowing it, I finished my Ph.D. in Chemistry.’ 

That’s also where she met her husband, Peter Lee. Eventually, she ended up as a research associate and then a full professor of Pharmacology at UCSF. 

(To be continued.  Next: China Asks Nancy to Come Back.)