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Creatin g Community By Connecting Neighbors “Turn to me now and be saved, people all over the world! I am the only God there is.” Isaiah 45:22
Erie’s Brigg Street Café Is Home to Persian Cuisine and Resolve By Jan Sciacca
At
the north end of downtown Erie, snuggled downstairs in a quaint and comfortable setting, the Brigg Street Café. 698 Briggs St., at the corner of Briggs and Cheeseman, quietly celebrated its third anniversary in January. Restaurant and building owners Hooshang (“Joe” for short) and his wife Shahnaz (“Shin” for short) Haghbin are their only employees and they like it that way. They want to control the quality of their Persian entrees and pastries. Joe smiles as he says his wife Shin is a “good cook and beautiful too.” They love their customers and treat everyone like family. No one stays a stranger long.
Although Joe and Shin specialize in delicious Persian cuisine such as Kashke Badmjan (an Eggplant dish), the slow-cooked goodness of Haleem (a Middle East stew) and Chelow Kabab (a meat kabob that is the national dish of Iran), they have delicious American breakfasts, sandwiches and calzones for the more traditional American tastes. The restaurant is open daily except for Tuesdays, with hours being 7 am-3 pm. When I asked the Haghbins how they came to be restaurant owners, Joe and Shin sat and told me “the rest of the story” and what a story it is. The couple were married in 1976, when the Shah of Iran was in power. Joe prefers to say that he’s from Persia because Iran to him no longer represents the country where he was raised. Joe came to the United States on a scholarship as an exchange scientist under the J1 program and sponsored by the Iranian government. He received his doctorate in nuclear engineering from the University of Colorado. Shin has her Masters in Economics from CU as well. During this time, they were in the U. S. on Student Visas. After they completed their degrees, the home country they knew was in trouble. The Iran/Iraq was raging. The Shah was no longer in power. Their eldest son was 14. If they went back to Iran, their son would not be allowed to leave the country once he was
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15. The Haghbins were fearful to return and sought asylum in the United States. The couple said the process and all its regulations was very complicated in those days, although much simpler than today. They tediously worked through the asylum process, which took five years. Then they continued the journey of becoming permanent U. S. residents and, finally, U. S. citizens. The political climate took a toll on Joe’s career. In the early 1980s, no one wanted a nuclear engineer from Iran. Joe says that he and Shin have never been afraid of hard work and, to this day work about 70 hours a week, but those days were difficult. He worked at the Blue Parrot for $4.25 an hour for 9 years. Joe Colacci called him “Joe Jr.,” which is how he got his nickname. When the restaurant wanted him to sign a non-competition agreement in 1997, he left and found an empty lot on a dirt road in Erie where he decided to build a building to house a restaurant. That’s the location of the Briggs Street Café today. In 1998, they opened Lil’ Italy on the main floor. Through the years the building has housed a Chinese restaurant and an Italian-American Bar. When I asked the couple, who now has three grown children with successful
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careers, how they managed to buy property and expand their real estate holdings while they were working at such low wages, Joe indicated that they had a home in Iran that they were able to sell and transfer the funds here. It’s an amazing story of endurance in fighting for the “American Dream.” No wonder everyone is treated like family at the Briggs Street Café. The Erie community, 7000 miles from their original home, is “home” today and their patrons are “family.” The Briggs Street Café can be reached on Facebook and at (303) 828-1459.
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