For Zou Yali, founder and director of the Asian American Studies Center at the University of Houston (UH), the pursuit of a successful professional career and happiness are intertwined.

When Zou first came to the US as an exchange student in the late 1980s, she was invited to attend a graduation ceremony at University of California, Davis. Watching the proud graduates, she dreamed of herself climbing the podium one day to receive a PhD and how happy it would make her.

A few years later, her dream came true, but she found the joy short-lived.

"I realized something," Zou told China Daily. "We need to dream big and the dream should include others, not just yourself. If one can make a positive impact on society, one will find true and lasting happiness."

Zou has been doing just that for years now. Since going to UH, she has created and directed the global leadership training program; she has served on various community boards; shared her knowledge by co-authoring numerous books and engaging in public speeches on cross-cultural and transnational understanding and communications, as well as ethnic identity.

Zou went to UC Davis in 1988 with the intention of studying education management and going back to China to work in higher education. However, her experiences with the clash of cultures she encountered led her to change course to cross-cultural studies, a field she finds fascinating.

"I remember the first time I was invited to a professor's house soon after I got to UC Davis," she recalled. "The host had made a variety of dishes and asked me what I would like to have. Out of Chinese custom, I asked for the most insignificant dish - chicken noodle soup. I was served the soup and not offered steak or any of the other delicious entres, as Chinese custom would also dictate. I left the party feeling hurt and half hungry."

It wasn't until later that Zou realized that her hunger and wounded feelings were due to her own mistake of assuming that Chinese customs were followed in the US.

"People here respect your decision and they would not force anything on you," she said. "In China, the host is expected to offer and even force the best food upon a guest, regardless of what the guest says."

When she thought about her own mistake, Zou became interested in understanding people through a cultural lens.

"I realized that culture is very important in understanding each other," she said. "Here in the US, we have such diverse ethnicities and cultures that to co-exist harmoniously, we have to understand each other's culture."

Zou's first book was about the Mexican immigrant culture in rural California. Her training was a multidisciplinary approach involving education, anthropology, culture and sociology. During her post-doctorate research at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Zou focused on ethnography and worked on a case study of Miao ethnicity in China and its implications for American culture.

In 1995, Zou was recruited by UH as an assistant professor and director of Asian programs, a position she still holds today.

"When I came here I found there were African studies, Mexican studies and such," she said, "yet there were no Asian studies."

Zou got right on it and succeeded in convincing UH to establish an Asian and Asian-American studies program the year she joined the school. The program eventually evolved into today's Asian American Studies Center, an interdisciplinary academic institute dedicated to the study of Asia and Asian Americans in the US and abroad.

As the institute's director, Zou initiated exchanges between UH and Chinese universities and began to escort UH officials and faculty members on visits to China. Due to her efforts, UH now has cooperative relations with 37 universities in China.

Zou also established the Global Leadership Training Programs in 1996, a flagship program for the Center. "In the past 18 years, we have trained more than 2,000 Asian public officials, educational leaders and business executives," said Zou.

"We provide insights to leaders from Asian countries, especially from China, on the US cultural model, the US way of thinking, its ideologies," she said. "If China wants to interact with the world on the global stage, it has to learn about others."

When Zou first led a group of American higher educational officials to visit China, she witnessed a cultural misunderstanding similar to her first experience: the Chinese hosts, in their sincerest desire to express welcome, offered the Americans expensive but exotic dishes, such as sea cucumber, which only served to put off the guests.

Zou was ready. She skillfully offered advice to the Chinese hosts on how to make American guests feel welcome. Learning goes both ways, said Zou.

Her center also provides training for executives of US companies doing business in China and Asia. In her view, be it Chinese or American, problem solving requires a global perspective, especially on matters such as climate and the environment.

Zou's research interests range from ethnic identity and cultural context of political actions to effective learning strategies among high-achieving Asian, Anglo and Hispanic students.

Her hard work has been recognized. She got tenure three years after going to UH and was promoted to professor in 2000, two years earlier than the average seven-year track.

"The clashes and subsequent understanding of the differences between the two cultures enriched my life. When I face a problem, I can use two different cultural approaches to find the best solution," she said.

mayzhou@chinadailyusa.com