Yonten Raza is living the American dream.
The Menlo Park resident, who grew up in a displaced Tibetan community in Nepal, moved to the United States in 1985 and eventually carved out a small-business empire despite being unable to read or write in English and having no real understanding of commerce.
But, of course, it wasn’t as easy as 1-2-3 for the president of Dolma Inc., with two stores in Menlo Park, one in Palo Alto and three in San Francisco.
Raza came to the United States to serve as an au pair for a family in San Francisco she had met in Nepal, but that arrangement only lasted three months.
“I’d never traveled, I’d never even been on a plane,” said Raza, whose parents had fled to Nepal before she was born, during the 1959 Tibetan revolution. “As Tibetans, we didn’t have much hope, much opportunity (in Nepal); we were basically refugees. … I wanted to go to America so bad; I (didn’t) even know where America (was) … but I knew that if you come to USA, you make a better living.”
Raza, who for paltry sums did odd jobs for Nepal tourists such as babysitting, cooking and getting groceries, said by the age of 15 she was already planning her exit, learning English by speaking to American visitors. But it would take another three years before she convinced a couple to take her back to the States.
She said she is grateful for the couple’s help now, but at the time, she was earning less than minimum wage and wasn’t able to save much money. She was also homesick; she had left her 3-month-old daughter back in Nepal. After making meager pay in other au-pair roles — settling for $2 an hour with one employer in Berkeley — she was back in Nepal nine months after coming to America.
With things no better in Nepal, she ventured back to the U.S. in 1987 to give it another shot.
“(This time), my mind was really set,” Raza said. “I cleaned four houses a day, believe it or not; I can’t even clean one now.
“I wasn’t spending one dollar on anything. I was just working, working, working. I wanted to buy a little land in Nepal and build a three-story home and that was my dream, because I thought the family can live on one floor and the other two could be rented out, and that rent could support the family, (but at the time) I wasn’t thinking about anyone else (because) I knew if I left, they would never let me back.”
Four years later, in 1991, Raza received her green card, which stated that she was a skilled worker in Tibetan carpets. Her destiny now set in type, she went back to Nepal to work on bringing her family over, also carting back two large duffel bags filled with Tibetan goods. She ended up traveling by Greyhound bus all over the country selling her wares and making contacts. She became celebrated, she said, for scarves she sold made from pashmina wool.
“They called me pashmina lady,” said Raza, who started filling bulk orders. “It was the peak of fashion; movie stars loved (the scarves).”
In 1999, with the help of her boyfriend at the time, she launched Dolma Tibetan Carpets in Menlo Park, at 611 Santa Cruz Ave., just across the street from the current 622 Santa Cruz location. Two doors down is one of her Dolma Tibetan Handicrafts locations, which opened a few years later.
“Immediately, people came in and loved (the carpets) and the price,” Raza said. “I believe in not marking too high. I believe everything revolves around me: Would I buy this in a store? Would I spend this much?
“We did really well over there, but it’s a very small place and very low ceilings (and) you couldn’t show the rugs properly.”
The idea for the gift stores — the 622 Santa Cruz showroom is her only store that sells carpets — came when she moved across the street and set up some tables with jewelry, clothing and knickknacks in the front.
“I thought, OK, I never knew there was this much interest in gift stores also,” Raza said. “But the carpet is what I really like (selling), because when people walk out of here with a carpet, I know for 100 percent that they’re getting a fantastic product and they can pass this along to five (or) 10 generations. Nothing can really ruin it; even if you have a fire burn it, you can fix it. It’s like a piece of art and it really supports a lot of people in Nepal.”
For Raza, Tibetan carpets are a passion, as well as a porthole to her past — she and her parents were among the many impoverished people making rugs when she was growing up in Nepal. In fact, she said she knows how to make every handmade item she sells. An average floor-length Tibetan carpet she sells, all of which are handmade in Nepal, takes five people three months to complete and costs consumers roughly $6,000.
“They are all 100 knots per square inch,” she said, adding that 70 percent of her rug sales are by custom order. “Everything we have is hand-knotted, hand-spun, hand-cut. Prices range about $68 to $78 per square foot (and) anything that stays here more than nine months I mark down, up to 60 percent off.”
Raza, 48, said she is thinking about selling off some of her gift stores so she can concentrate on the rug business — and learn how to relax.
“Right now, it’s a 14-15 hour day, every day — go, go, go,” she said. “I enjoy it, I love it, otherwise I couldn’t go, go, go, but it’s also getting tiring. I probably will give (some of the gift stores) to people who work for me.”
Email Kevin Kelly at kkelly@dailynewsgroup.com or call him at 650-391-1049.