Happy to make a difference
I was delighted to read your coverage of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp (TSMC) chairman Morris Chang’s (張忠謀) speech at Asia University (“School honors TSMC’s Chang,” June 14, page 3). Chang’s remarks are a clear indication of why Asia University decided to give him an honorary doctorate of engineering.
I was particularly impressed with Chang’s statement that: “The key to life is happiness that comes from a sense of accomplishment and gratification, not from fortune and fame.”
As a former public-relations professional who now teaches the next generation(s) of PR professionals, I am constantly advising my students and advisees to seek out a career in a profession they are passionate about and can feel fulfilled knowing that they have accomplished things on behalf of others that make a positive difference.
Success, as Chang says so well, is not about amassing great wealth. It is about bringing change or making improvements that make our world a better place.
As I say time and again, “True success is when you get up in the morning to go to work and you’re smiling because you know you are going to make a difference.”
It is encouraging to know that truly good men like Chang are “out there” to provide guidance and encouragement to our future generations.
Kirk Hazlett
Milton, Massachusetts
Tour bus drivers
I read with great interest and no small amount of horror that the Ministry of Transportation and Communications is considering reducing the training for tour-bus drivers from three years to two years. Say it is not so!
I have driven both a car and a scooter up and down the East Coast, most specifically the Suhua section. I would rather sandwich myself between two sand and gravel trucks than face even one tour bus. I would even rather play tag with a whole bevy of little blue trucks than face a tour bus.
The route drivers are polite, courteous and easy to drive with, both in the same direction or going the other way. The tour drivers are not. If you are a riding a scooter and a tour bus is behind you, it will push you into the ditch and the devil may care. If you are driving a car in the opposite direction as the tour bus, you can count on going over the cliff, as the tour bus driver takes his half of the road right out of the middle.
I am not sure if this is because the tour companies recruit their drivers from the insane asylum, or if the tour operators are such ogres that the bus drivers fear losing a day’s pay if they are so much as a minute late to the next stop. Further regulation of the tour-bus industry is needed.
However, until the tour companies can be better regulated and held accountable, then for the love of Pete, do not cut their training short.
Shervin Marsh
Luodong, Yilan County
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