Deer Park salon worker's life, and big goals remembered at Flushing service

Mei Zi Zhang wanted to do something other than nails, her job after she immigrated to the United States from China nearly 15 years ago.

For Zhang, 50 and living in Flushing, Queens, with a husband and two sons, the manicures, pedicures and spa work had taken a physical toll.

So she got her real estate license last month, Zhang's family said. Then an alleged drunken driver crashed into the Deer Park nail salon where she was working, killing her, a co-worker, the salon co-owner and a customer.

On Wednesday, the professional photo Zhang had taken for her new license accompanied an obituary, written in Chinese and posted outside a chapel inside the Chun Fook funeral home in Flushing. In the photo, she wore a faint smile, dressed in a black jacket layered over a white shirt with a lace collar.

The family 'pillar'

"She was the pillar of her family," said Xue Qin Li, an aunt of Zhang’s husband who traveled from Toronto to attend the service.

"Without her, the family is collapsing, like the sky has fallen over us," said Li, speaking in Mandarin, tears welling up in her eyes.

The memorial service was the final for the four victims of the June 28 van crash into the salon, Hawaii Nail & Spa. The van's driver, Steven Schwally, 64, allegedly had a blood alcohol content more than twice the legal limit in New York of 0.08%. 

The first funeral was July 6, in New Hyde Park, for salon customer Emilia Rennhack, 30, who lived in Deer Park and worked as an NYPD officer.

Funerals for the other three, all immigrants from China, were delayed weeks while their respective kin sought emergency visas from the U.S. government to travel from China. Zhang’s siblings, an older brother and older sister, were denied visas, according to the family. It remained unclear Wednesday why the visas were denied, according to Jordan Goldes, a spokesperson for U.S. Rep. Grace Meng (D-Queens), who announced earlier this month that she was trying to help the victims' families get the documents.

On Tuesday, a service was held for salon co-owner Jian Chai “Ken” Chen, 37, at Chun Fook, the same funeral home where there was a service July 20 for Zhang’s co-worker Yan “Jenny” Xu, 41.

Zhang, a homemaker without much formal education before coming to the United States, was a self-determined woman who learned some English on her own and worked to get her real estate license, even though she had yet to practice it, relatives said.

Life looking up

To Zhi Xin Dai, 30, the older of Zhang’s two sons, life for their family was looking up. They had bought a town house in Flushing and moved in less than a year ago.

"She worked so hard, for so long," Zhi Xin said in Mandarin. "She adored me and my brother. She gave us all we ever asked for, without expecting anything in return. All she wanted was for us to be well."

On June 28, Zhi Xin said, the family grew anxious when his mother didn’t return home from Deer Park. By midnight, they called the police and were told about the crash, which happened about 4:30 p.m. Family members weren't sure whether she was among the dead.

Then, in the middle of the night, Zhi Xin dozed off for a moment while waiting to hear confirmation about his mother's fate. In a vision, Zhi Xin, said, he saw his mother with red eyes looking at him. Before he could call out, she turned and walked away.

"Now I know, she was saying goodbye to me," he said, speaking through sobs. "I miss her so much."

Zhang was scheduled to be buried Thursday at Mount Prospect Cemetery in Neptune City, New Jersey — by coincidence the same day Schwally, 64, was arraigned at a Suffolk County court on four counts of second-degree murder.

An unspeakable blow

Schwally allegedly told the police that he had consumed 18 drinks the night before the crash. He’s been jailed since soon afterward on a driving while intoxicated charge.

For Zhang’s family, losing her has dealt an unspeakable emotional blow but also a tangible financial one.

For some years, Zhang was the sole breadwinner after her husband, Jian Wei Dai, could hardly work due to injuries he sustained laboring for many hours at restaurants.

Zhi Xin, picked up part-time work but hasn’t made much money yet. The younger son, Zhi Peng Dai, 20, is in college.

The family of four emigrated from a rural village in Fujian, in Southeastern China, and had come with nothing, said Na Li, a cousin who lives in Flushing.

To pay for the service and other related costs, they have had to borrow tens of thousands of dollars from relatives. The family still has the mortgage to pay, as well as tuition and expenses for Zhi Peng.

The family has told Zhang’s father-in-law in China of the terrible news but not her mother-in-law, fearing what it would do to her health. Zhang’s parents died when she was younger.

At the funeral home, men in Buddhist robes chanted scriptures in her hometown dialect. About a dozen family members attended the service. Her husband and sons fed joss paper and prayer money into a furnace next to the coffin, a Chinese tradition so the deceased has sufficient means in the afterlife.

At one point, her husband, sons and granddaughter huddled over the open casket, decorated with flowers. Her older son placed his hands on the outer rim and hunched over to share a private moment with his mom.