The DIY Realtor of Sunset Park
How my father went from waiter to realtor, and transformed a community
In the depths of a Chinese restaurant, my father hovered over a large industrial sink, diligently scrubbing dishes. Amidst the kitchen hustle, a mild elderly Chinese man, donning a stained white chef’s uniform, with flour stuck to his perspiring skin approached my father.
Like an apparition emerging from the clouds, he asked, “Young man did you just arrive to this country?”
“Yes, just got off the plane last week,” my dad replied.
The man, powdered in white and glistening from kitchen oils, welcomed my dad with a dose of old school wisdom:
“For us Chinese, coming to the U.S. is already like reaching paradise. There’s no place higher you can go from here.”
The sunlight streamed through a small window and cast a halo around the elderly man. He stood before my dad as if he came for the purpose of delivering that prophetic message.
Surrounded by veteran waiters, my dad surveyed the frenetic kitchen scene and wondered, wide eyed:
“Is this really it? Have I really reached paradise?”
While the waiters and kitchen staff gathered around the mahjong table during breaks, my father…
