Introduction
I was a little bit hesitant at first to choose the term A Self-Made Man for the title of this book--my autobiography. A self-made man generally refers to an individual who rises to success from humble origins through his efforts. I was hesitant because I was not sure how to define success. Nor was I sure about how much success was required to deem someone a successful person. In my case, I wondered whether my modest accomplishments could be considered a successful life. I am still unsure about that. On reflection, I chose to call my autobiography the story of A Self-Made Man, leaving the above question to the readers to judge after they finish my account.
I think I do meet the other element of being a self-made man: rising from humble origins. I was born in 1933 into a farming family in a small Chinese village beside the Yangtze River. My parents owned a small farm that allowed them to grow just enough to feed our family members. Both of my parents were uneducated. They could not read or write.
I received only six years of village school education in my life. Unlike primary schools in the educational system in the bigger cities, those village institutions taught only Chinese. No other subjects, like math or a foreign language, were part of the curriculum. But even this limited formal education was disrupted by the disastrous Yangtze River floods in 1947. Due to the significant damage from the flooding, my parents could no longer afford to continue funding my schooling. Without their financial support, I finally chose to join the army despite my young age. Although soldiers were poorly paid at the time, they at least had enough to eat.
I was only 16 years old when I came to Taiwan with the military in mid-1949. This was about the time Chiang Kai-shek and his government and military forces retreated to the island following the fall of the mainland to the communists. I remember when I disembarked from a ship in the southern port of Kaohsiung, my only personal belongings were a straw mattress and two sets of worn-out army fatigues.
In Taiwan, I served the next 18 years in grassroots infantry companies, rising from private to captain. I used my free time in the military to study English, which is not my native tongue. I started learning the ABCs at the age of 20.
I studied English the hard way. In the first 10 years or so of my studies, I pressed ahead with my task in army bunkers, barracks, or in the field. I spent weekends and all other available time studying this difficult language. The only learning aid I had was a Chinese-English dictionary.
Yet I had never anticipated that my rudimentary style of learning would be so fruitful that it enabled me to pass a crucial test 13 years later, allowing me to join an English-language newspaper as a reporter. At this point, I was 33 years old.
What I also never imagined was that English would become a language tool for me to practice journalism for the next half-century. I wrote news reports, features, commentaries, and editorials in English. And after I retired from the journalism profession, I also used this acquired language to write my autobiography as well as a book about former President Chen Shui-bian during his eight years in office.
Furthermore, I never expected that I would be able to achieve the status of a professional journalist, given my lack of formal education and journalism training. It was very fortunate for me that I was able to climb up the ladder of journalism. During my decades-long career in this field, I played various key roles from reporter to city editor, editor-in-chief, and editorial writer.
The successes of my effort to study English and my striving to become a professional journalist and writer were made possible, simply put, by hard work, perseverance, and a strong passion for journalism and English writing.
The story of A Self-Made Man, Osman C.H. Tseng, is a chronicle of my life and career. It recounts important events in my life. The story consists of 10 chapters, as set out below.
Chapter 4
Starting a Career in Journalism at 33
Striving to Make up for a Lack of Journalistic Training
I reported to the China Post for work on January 5, 1966, as agreed on. I gained admission to the English-language newspaper after I passed both a written exam and a face-to-face interview. At the time I was still in the military. But I agreed with publisher Nancy Yu-Huang in the interview that I would apply for retirement if I passed a six-month training period and my employment with the newspaper became official.
In the end, I went through the training program, and the China Post formally hired me. I thus applied to my military unit for retirement. My application was granted. So I left the army, ending my nearly two decades of military service. This was truly a life-altering moment: Making a career change in my early 30s, from nearly two decades of military service to journalism, a profession which I was never trained for.
From day one, I constantly faced two big challenges. One was how to gather news worth reporting. The other was how to write English news stories that were readable. As I said earlier, English is not my native tongue, and I began to learn it at the age of 20.
In all, I gathered news and wrote news articles for around a dozen years, accounting for one-fourth of my total journalism career. After leaving the reporting job, I served in several other positions that involved me editing news stories and writing commentaries until my retirement. Performing well in the roles of editing and commentary writing was no less challenging. It demanded profound English knowledge and high-level writing skills.
In other words, the challenges I faced in this latter stage of my journalism career remained strong. I had to continuously work hard and put in long hours to improve my capabilities to ensure that I could measure up to my editing and commentary writing responsibilities.
It can be said that working hard and continuing to learn were the hallmarks of my decades of journalism life.
My trial employment period at the China Post began with the start of a six-month “reserve reporters” training seminar, sponsored by the newspaper. The purpose of the seminar was manifest in its name. Classes were offered twice a week. I was an obligatory attendee. During the six-month period, I came to work for the Post daily, from 6:30 p.m. to midnight, while continuing to work for my military unit in the daytime.
I was assigned to assist in the running of the seminar. Besides me, there were five other attendees. Among them was Alice Sun, who like me was formally accepted and offered a job. Miss Sun, however, was designated as an assistant to the publisher, not working in the editorial department as I was. The remaining four candidates all had participated in the same reporter-recruitment test but failed to pass it. However, they were put on the waiting list. But somehow they were never formally employed.
Attendees to the seminar were taught news-gathering and news-writing skills, as well as journalistic duties and ethics. Lecturers included Taipei bureau chiefs stationed by major international news agencies, such as UPI (United Press International), AP (Associated Press), AFP (Agence France-Press), and Reuters. These veteran journalists and writers were invited to lecture on journalism and share their practical experiences with us.
Among other lecturers was Nancy Yu-Huang, the Post publisher. Nancy Yu-Huang held journalism degrees from Yenching University in Beijing, China, and Columbia University in the City of New York, United States. She taught us the value of the classic “Five W’s and One H” of Journalism. They stand for six questions: What happened? Who was involved? Where did it take place? When did it occur? Why did that happen? And How did it happen? Answers to these questions are considered basic in gathering news or writing news stories. A news story failing to address any of these questions was viewed as incomplete. So the “Five W’s and One H” were held as the basic guidance for journalism practitioners.
Author Osman Tseng is a unique veteran journalist and English writer. He never attended school but educated himself. He learned English in the army where he served for 18 years since he was in his mid-teens. He started his career in English-language journalism at the age of 33 and stuck with the profession until his retirement 45 years later. He always learns on the job, while practicing journalism. Through it all, he has always been reading and writing.
