Taiwanese Restaurant Owner Gets Parkinson’s Disease, Reno Community Comes Together to Help

On March 13, Serena Lee took to Twitter to ask for the community’s help in their restaurant. According to the post, their family business has been very slow and that her family is trying their best to save up money after learning that her mother is ill.

“My mom has stage 3 parkinson’s and is trying to save up money so she can retire. business has been very slow at my parent’s restaurant recently, so if you’re craving fresh and cheap chinese food in reno pls pay them a visit!! taiwan restaurant on mae anne/mccarran,” Lee wrote in her tweet.

Serena’s parents, Chang and Shu Lee, immigrated to the United States from Taiwan in 1986, according to News4. It wasn’t until in 1993 when the family decided to open up a restaurant, and for the past 24 years, they have been serving the community in Reno, Nevada with fresh and hot plates of Chinese dishes.

The family business was rated with four stars on the local-search service Yelp, AsAm News reported.

Their lives began to change six years ago when the family noticed that their mother, Shu, was running out of energy quickly. Curious as to what’s happening to her, they took Shu to a local doctor and found out that she has stage three Parkinson’s disease.

“It’s been very difficult for her,” Chang said. “She keeps working but she really can only work for about two hours before she gets exhausted and needs to go home.”

At the time, the community rallied to help Shu prepare for her retirement. But even so, she continued to work on their family business, and had received two different accidents where she fell and broke each of her hips, according to News4.

“It was hard for her to recover but she still wants to keep working,” Serena told the news network. “I am always inspired for her motivation to work but the family agrees it’s time for her to settle down and retire.”

The family, meanwhile, was overwhelmed by what the community did for them, and how fast it all happened after sending out that one tweet.

“I didn’t think this would happen so fast,” Serena said. “We are just so thankful that the community is reaching out to help.”

“We cannot thank our customers enough,” She said.

Those who want to check the place out, Taiwan Restaurant can be found at 5150 Mae Anne Avenue in northwest Reno. Those who’d like to reach out can call (775) 746-5353.

Featured image via Twitter / hiimserena