My Autobiography
Chun-Long (Jerry) Tsung 曾俊隆

This article was already sent to my medical school classmates from National Taiwan University as part of an alumni project.

My father and mother married in Taipei, and my father graduated from an industrial college also in Taipei. I was born in Xulin 樹林, Taiwan, in 1936. I have four brothers and two sisters. Xulin was known for a large beer factory.

My elder brother, younger brother, one sister and I were moved to Dalian大連, China, due to my father’s work assignment. He was offered a better salary for a job as a chemist at the beer factory. Our family enjoyed life in Dalian.

At that time, Taiwan was colonized by Japan and was bombed during World War II by the United States. Japan eventually surrendered in 1945. We escaped back to Taiwan before Communists, with the backing of Russia, had come to China. Since our family was originally from Taiwan, transportation back to Taiwan was arranged by the United States. We were some of the last few to avoid Communist rule. Our trip back to Taipei was complicated. First, we travelled to Tenzhin天津, waited for 10 days, got on a boat to Shanghai, waited another 20 days, and finally arrived back in Taipei and stayed with my maternal grandmother for one week. My father found a job at the bureau of agriculture and the family settled down into a Japanese-style house next to the Teachers’ College of Taiwan in Taipei.

I started my fifth grade at Long An 龍安國小near National Taiwan University, a 20-minute walk every day. When I was young, I enjoyed playing basketball. Then I attended Chien Kuo 建國中學, the best high school in Taipei. I was accepted to the National Taiwan University College of Medicine, a seven-year program.

While my medical school classmates were required to serve one year of military service, I was exempted due to my severe nearsightedness. After graduation, I applied for a residency first in ophthalmology and then in pediatrics. During my residency, I had to serve six months in the military in order to go to the United States.

In 1966 at the age of 30, I immigrated to the United States. I took a rotating internship at the Queens General Hospital in New York City. The following year, I was at King’s County Hospital for a year in pediatrics. I decided to change my specialty to anesthesiology due to my interest in the field, and I started a residency at Bronx General Hospital.

I met my wife, Glory, in New York City, where she was a registered dietician. She was born in Hong Kong but had immigrated to Seattle, Washington, and then the East Coast to complete her training and find a position at a hospital. We were married in 1967, and we had our first daughter, Patricia, in 1968 while living in the Bronx. One of my colleagues had finished his training and was working in Poughkeepsie, New York, which is about two-and-a-half hour drive north of New York City. After my training, I accepted an attending position in anesthesia at St. Francis Hospital in Poughkeepsie in 1970. Our anesthesia group took care of all patients at the hospital with night calls. We lived in Poughkeepsie before moving to the small nearby town of Hyde Park in 1970. We had a second daughter, Joanne, in 1971. When I was hired, we had only 4 anesthesiologists in our group but increased to 10 by the time I retired at age 60.

We lived in Hyde Park for 25 years but moved to Ossining, New York, in Westchester County before coming to San Diego, California, in 2000. My daughter, Patricia, found a job in San Diego as a physician in physical medicine. We enjoy the warm weather and our beautiful backyard in San Diego. I also became very active at the San Diego Taiwan Center. There are a lot of activities at the center such as a choral group, language classes, dancing, and lectures.

Our daughter, Joanne, moved her family from New York City to San Diego in 2013. We have one granddaughter, Luciana, born in 2012. She loves playing soccer and doing anything outdoors.

In my spare time, I enjoyed playing all types of sports as an adult and with my daughters — swimming, ping-pong, golf, tennis, skiing, ice skating, and mahjong on weekends and holidays with friends and relatives. I also travelled extensively throughout Europe, Asia and South America, including many cruises throughout the Caribbean.