Dream Beyond

I started my journey in the U.S. in 2004 when my parents finally decided that they would stay in the U.S. after struggling with the idea of resuming their lives in China for the last couple of years. There had been both practical and sentimental reasons that they wanted to abridge their US journeys and return to China, but they found the strength to stay and to fight for a livelihood. I admired their spirits to be nimble and humble as Chinese immigrants in San Francisco when the American ideologies and socioeconomic realities of the racial minority and unaffordability would challenge everything they knew about the world. As I looked back to the moment my American relatives made and the words people used to judge me and my family, I sometimes felt unjust, but I also did not know what was appropriate. I learned many things about the individualism of my fellow Americans, especially those concerned with themselves and their interests.               In 2007, I entered 6th grade at the Herbert Hoover Middle School at the Inner Parkside. My daily routine involved a one-hour bus ride at 7 a.m. and another 20 minutes steady uphill from 19th Street. I enrolled in the newcomer class, which had a particular syllabus for students whose first language was not English. I had been studying English as part of my past curriculum but needed the entrance score to prove it. Hence, I was learning along with all the other students who also scored low on the placement exam. Some of these students were born in the US, but other issues prevented them from doing their best. These were problematic students placed in the same class as the newcomer students. The classroom experience had been chaotic. There would be newcomers like us sitting in our quiet corner and the other kids throwing spitballs at each other, flying paper airplanes, and passing notes. Keeping everyone under control took up most of the class time, and the rest of the time was spent self-reading the textbook and doing in-class assignments. These assignments would keep the newcomers busy, but the troublemakers would mock us for being silly and obedient.               While I was adapting to a new school life, my parents had been making their crossovers. Elaine was still managing her business in China when she would do her day job in the morning and participate in calls with Aunt Chang at night to review the weekly revenue and strategize for the next month. Elaine was still responsible for all the debts and significant business decisions. Lily’s Fashion was considered her third child, which consumed most of her evenings and offshore earnings to keep it alive and well, but things were still out of her control. Starting in 2010, E-commerce like Taobao, T-mall, and JD.com had overtaken offline apparel shopping. Most young people do not go out to shop anymore. Instead, they spend the time on experiences such as traveling, dining, and doing activities together. Our fashion business initially targeted young Chinese girls who had just come to the big city for work, so they needed city clothes at a reasonable price. Elaine started the fashion shop as a people business to help young girls find confidence since she was also a foreign worker. As big cities developed toward high-end office work, there were fewer low-end working girls, and these millennials were also internet natives who held smartphones and shopped with mobile e-commerce for deals all over the country. Technologies have widened the generation gaps. Our target customers had changed so much that Elaine and Lily’s Fashion fell behind.               The shrinking apparel shop took a toll on everyone, especially Aunt Chang, who was enduring a lot of psychological pressures, especially in 2008, which partially led to her declining health. Aunt Chang and Uncle Jian worked hard to capture the revenue from the shopping sessions so that Lily’s Fashion could break even every year. They turned the clothesline business into a relationship business that does custom retail orders for big customers. There were fewer people on the street, but those who shopped also spent more and wanted to get more things in the same place. Aunt Chang had turned the shop into a mini mall that supplied clothes, toys, and baby formulas. The store's income helped sustain twenty workers' livelihoods, including Aunt Chang and Uncle Jian, who worked as the managers. The shop gave them freedom and job security even in the turmoil of the Chinese economy, so Elaine never closed Lily’s Fashion. Even though the business made no income for us in the US, she let them run it. When Aunt Chang and Uncle Jian save enough money, they eventually own the shop by paying Elaine a transfer fee. When Elaine retired from the business, she spent more time and energy healing herself and her relationship with Ming. Elaine still had the mentality of competing with the shops on the same street, but people’s shopping habits had been a much more significant factor in the loss of street business. Lily’s Fashion had become the only clothesline shop on the street after three decades.               There are a lot of values in cheap, trendy, and caring. Lily’s Fashion had its unique appeal in new garments at half the price of those sold in the mall. It is a retail outlet like the US giant - Ross. Elaine and Aunt Chang used to do scavenger hunting for the tail end of the fashion line at factory retailers. A few pieces here and there resembled a collection of selective fashion. Our apparel raced faster than the shelves in the shopping malls, so there was a place for us in the market. Aunt Chang was more practical but could not invest in the shop when she worked for Elaine. She can now do so. She continued to operate under the same name – Lily’s Fashion Apparel.