“I wasn’t scared. I was excited.” My grandmother smiled, sinking further into her reclining seat. She took another sip of her chai before going on.
To be honest, this was the happiest I had ever seen her. It was the day after Christmas and I was sitting on the floor next to her seat, listening to her tell her story. My dad, her youngest son was on the couch with my mom, eagerly reminiscing about when they moved to New York. My grandma’s story is honestly one of the best I have heard, and her talking for an hour about her accomplishments and her pride as an immigrant completely transformed her being. It was as if something lit up inside her and passed its energy to all of us.
“Why didn’t you ever tell me before?” I asked her, placing my hand over hers. She smiled softly and laughed.
“You never asked.”
I guess that was true. I knew she immigrated from Pakistan to Manhattan. I knew after a few years there she moved to Champaign, Illinois and then retired in Kalamazoo, Michigan. But I didn’t know that much else. And in ignoring the true stories of her immigration and how she used her passions to support her entire family, I realized that for all of these years, I barely knew someone so close and dear to me.
My grandmother’s name is Parvin Arjumand Shah, and she immigrated from Pakistan to Manhattan in 1973.
“My husband had 8 acres of land and that was not enough for the family to run on, we did not make enough money.” she explained. The family had three cows that they would milk and then sell the milk around the neighborhood. She also used to sew clothes, which was one of her main passions. While my grandma wasn’t poor, she still had a servant to do household chores which is culturally common in Pakistan, she felt the family wasn’t making enough to support the four children comfortably.
She saw something in her long time friend Razak Sheikh. He had moved to America and opened a successful business in Manhattan selling clothes. Whenever he would visit she asked him to sponsor her family so they too could move to the US and start something for themselves.
When she told Razak she wanted to sell her clothes in New York and run a store like him he was supportive but hesitant.
“He said you will have a tough time. Things are different in America. How will you manage it?” My grandma said she just shrugged and replied simply.
“I’ll manage.”
Managing it was kind of an understatement if you ask me. After asking her friend on numerous occasions for a sponsorship, he finally agreed. By selling her house in Pakistan and using the $10,000 her dad gave her, my grandmother was able to take her whole family to New York and rent an apartment on 111th St, just a few blocks away from her friend Razak’s store, where she started working on the second day of her life in America.
In addition to starting work on her second day in America, my grandmother pushed herself to sell her clothing samples. Not knowing much about anything, she hopped on a train to Greenwich village and walked around the boutiques, showing off the clothes she made.
“When I reached Greenwich Village it was a different world.” Her eyes lit up as she reminisced. Only one person ordered shirts from her that day, but she kept going back every day.
“I was very ambitious. I kept going and I finally got orders from other stores. I was very happy to be successful there.”
My grandma worked in her friend’s store for 5-6 months until she bought it off him. She couldn’t afford to buy it all at once, so she would pay him back little by little. The store was called House of Shalimar and she said it was very successful under her. They used to sell clothes, jewelry, and shoes. My grandma scrunched her nose a little and laughed when she mentioned the shoes.
“Well, the shoes didn’t work at all so we stuck to jewelry and clothes.” she explained with a smile. The necklaces were handmade with beads she would buy on 14th St and were especially popular amongst Columbia University students that would stop by her store after classes.
My grandma and grandpa decided to leave New York after four years because they wanted a better place to raise their children. Since the store in New York was so close to Columbia and most of their customers were students, they wanted to stick to a college town. After traveling for a month, they decided on Champaign, Illinois.
“The store in champaign did unbelievably good. From the very first day the clothes were flying off the shelves.” My grandmother explained, sipping her chai. The store was called Merakesh Imports and became an instant hit amongst the girls at University of Illinois. In fact, my grandma said that the girls would come visit her store in between their classes to catch her up on their gossip and drama. She established herself and her business to be an integral part of Champaign and she did it all on her own, no business degree and no outside help.
“When you are so successful coming from a small town in Pakistan, you feel very good.” I could see in her eyes how much that success meant to her. It was the basis of everything she has now. In fact, the success of Merakesh Imports was able to fund three other businesses she and the family owned, including another boutique in Bloomington Indiana, a video store in Champaign, and a restaurant in Champaign, where she did the cooking. The restaurant was called Taj Mahal. She said it did so well that “I didn’t even have time to count the money.”
My grandma eventually closed the restaurant because her father visited from Pakistan and thought she was doing too much work, but kept Merakesh Imports for 20 years. After collecting enough money, she decided to retire and move to Kalamazoo, Michigan to be near her grandchildren, but not without investing. My grandparents bought a 72 person motel in Kalamazoo which my grandfather still runs today, all possible only because of how hard my grandma worked and how much she believed in herself and her capabilities.
I stroked her hand as I listened to her tell her story, asking her if she was scared of moving to a brand new country with all of her children, not really knowing anything. She was silent for a few seconds, as if trying to remember what she really felt in that exact moment of leaving the country she was raised in.
“No.” she said. It was that simple. My grandmother was brave and strong, and still is brave and strong. She worked hard from nothing and created a foundation for her entire family’s success and for that I am forever grateful.
“I worked very hard, but I was very successful and I was very happy. very happy. I don’t know how I worked that hard. I didn’t know anything about how to buy or how to sell. But it was so successful. Girls would take clothes while I was still hanging them. As a housewife who didn’t really know anything, It was a big thing for me.” she told me, looking at me, my mom, and my dad. We were products of her hard work. The reason my dad married my mom. The reason his worth ethic is just as strong as hers. The reason we all have a drive and passion for success. It is because of her and her story that we are where we are.
My grandma misses her stores very much. She says when she sits alone in her house she wishes she never sold them. But with a smile she remembered something, a final thought maybe.
“Razak’s wife is still a very good friend of mine and when I talked to her on the phone she said ‘I give you lots of compliments. You are a real business woman.’”
I could tell that meant the absolute world to her. Because do you think it’s easy to come from a tiny town with almost nothing and become a successful business woman without attending a fancy school while still supporting a family of six people in a country you just moved to? Absolutely not. But that is what she did and the success that she earned is the exact reason she immigrated. She was never scared because she knew she had it within her, and now after hearing her story I feel as if I, and anyone who reads this, has that same strength and power too.
