The American dream, cup by cup

By Farnoosh Torabi, Special to amNewYork | AMPersonalFinance@yahoo.com

June 11, 2007

At 11:30 am on a recent Wednesday, Ali Hafizi's eight-hour shift on Wall Street drew to a close.

He, unlike some others heading home from the financial district at that hour, was not logging off from an overseas trading desk. Instead, the 27-year-old, along with his younger brother Hash, is packing up his coffee-and-doughnut push cart and serving the last few customers of the day.

"I told you I'd be back!" said Jerry McCroy, a legal secretary who works in the neighborhood. He came running back to pay Ali for his morning coffee-and-doughnut usual. Hafizi greets McCroy with a smile.

"No problem."

McCroy has been a regular for three years at Hafizi's push cart on Wall Street between Broad and William streets. By now, his customers are not just faces, they are loyalists who line up for his iced coffee, Danishes and egg-and-cheese bagels, consciously selecting his menu over the Starbucks variety yards away.

"Wall Street is awesome," he says. "It's the heart of New York City."

Hafizi is among the city's legion of street vendors, many of them immigrants who come to the U.S. each year hoping to provide a better life for their families.

A devout Shiite Muslim and the sole supporter of his nine-member family, he is inspired by the "American dream."

Born in Kabul, Afghanistan, Hafizi, the eldest son, moved to the U.S. with his family in 1998, first to Atlanta, Ga., where he earned his high school diploma.

They later moved to Astoria, where Hafizi, his parents and six siblings lived in a cramped one-bedroom apartment for four years.

In 2004, after working for several push-cart owners, Hafizi saved enough money to buy a home in New Jersey. Soon after, he bought his own cart, which he proudly titled, "Good Morning America."

Hafizi didn't hesitate to set up on Wall Street, saying he was never the victim of discrimination following 9/11. Instead, seeing the city -- particularly the financial district -- reunite following the tragedy made him more proud to live in America.

"It makes me really appreciate [living here]," says Hafizi, whose family fled to the U.S. amid the Taliban regime.

In fact, on the day of the attacks, Hafizi had taken off but was in Midtown running errands. He ended up giving rides to stranded New Yorkers to get them closer to home. "I was helping just anyone," he says.

Hafizi views his cart not just as a way to get by, but as the means to reach bigger goals -- and financial security.

Each day starting at 4 a.m., he makes coffee for at least 500 customers and hopes to buy a Dunkin' Donuts in New Jersey. "For us it's the best," Hafizi said.

"You make good and fast money for a few years and then you can build up," Hafizi said, adding the Arabic phrase for "God willing."

"Inshallah."

Contact Farnoosh at amSmallBusiness@gmail.com.