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Speaking of Flushing, NY, I grew up there in the late 70's/early 80's before there was a single Asian there. It was a very pleasant, clean, typicial American neighborhood. I drove through it yesterday with my husband and son to show them my old house. The house is gone, replaced by apartment buildings. What a beautiful house it was. The whole block was dimolished. The neighborhood was dark, dirty, gritty, and unkept. I was literally brought to tears. I truly don't mean this in a disrespectful way, but why do Chinese neighborhoods look like this? It reminded me of Gotham City compared to what it was 25 years ago.
Of the US Chinatowns I have been to I would rank them:
1) NYC - in a league of its own 2) Bos -in someways I found Boston's the most enjoyable; dense, vibrant and lively w/o the over the top crowds of NYC. 3) Philly -similar to Boston in terms of size, but Boston's seems to have a little more bustle/more interesting architecture.
big gap... 4) DC - basically 1 block, vibrant neighborhood, but completely fake Chinatown.
I picked NYC's... The largest concentration of Chinese people outside of China. New York has more than one Chinatown. All of them are real. There are Chinese people playing Chinese games on the street, Chinese newspapers, etc.
Image from - www.angryasianman.com
San Francisco's seemed too tourist-centered and I've never been to LA's.
Actually, this is incorrect. Manhattan's Chinatown hasn't been the largest since at least 2000. San Francisco city-mandated counts in collaboration with the federal govt. in 2000 and 2008 indicated that SF's Chinatown had eclipsed New York's in population and geographical size. This is due in part to NY's chinatown shrinking as a result of damage sustained from 9/11/2001 and the recent economic recession. There has also been talk throughout New York that Flushing, Queens has surpassed Manhattan as 3rd largest Chinatown in N. America after Old SF Chinatown and New SF Chinatown(Richmond District). Whether or not this is fact is debatable. What is certain is that most of the American consensus, from the Mid-West, to the South and all the way to the West Coast believe that San Francisco is larger, while a smaller part of the country, mainly along the Eastern Seaboard tend to favor New York. There has also been a noticeable trend in recent years where many popular travel guides have revised their NY Chinatown publications to read from "the largest" to "one of the largest". About 70% percent of travel websites have also made similar revisions to reflect the recent changes. WWW.CHINATOWNOLOGY.COM, probably the most authoratative internet site on all things Chinatown, has since relagated New York Chinatown. Chinatownology's world-wide rankings of largest Chinatowns currently had San Francisco, Yokohama, and Vancouver taking up the top3 spots respectively in that order. Also, people keep on saying how SF Chinatown is "too touristy". This was never the case, until the city officially declared it a tourist site. Up until that point, it was just another Chinatown. Nothing has actually changed since that time, other than the tourist declaration. Finally- San Francisco also has 4 other real Chinatowns where they play games on the street as well, incl. the big New Chinatown(actualy 40+ years old) in the Richmond District which stretches some 30 blocks on Clement St. concurrent to Geary Blvd. and parts of Balboa St.
Of the US Chinatowns I have been to I would rank them:
1) NYC - in a league of its own 2) Bos -in someways I found Boston's the most enjoyable; dense, vibrant and lively w/o the over the top crowds of NYC. 3) Philly -similar to Boston in terms of size, but Boston's seems to have a little more bustle/more interesting architecture.
big gap... 4) DC - basically 1 block, vibrant neighborhood, but completely fake Chinatown.
Those aren't even close in my estimation. Here are my picks(worldwide):
1. San Francisco (in a league of its own of a league of its own)
2. Yokohama (Yokohama-mama, this place is a crowd frenzy. All of its major streets are almost as narrow as SF Chinatown Alleys! Talk about a tight squeeze!
3. Vancouver - Similar to San Fran's, but with less people.
4. London - Compact, but thriving and colorful nonetheless.
Those aren't even close in my estimation. Here are my picks(worldwide):
1. San Francisco (in a league of its own of a league of its own)
2. Yokohama (Yokohama-mama, this place is a crowd frenzy. All of its major streets are almost as narrow as SF Chinatown Alleys! Talk about a tight squeeze!
3. Vancouver - Similar to San Fran's, but with less people.
4. London - Compact, but thriving and colorful nonetheless.
Notice Caymon said "Of the US Chinatowns I have been to..."
He probably hasn't been to the Chinatowns which you mentioned.
Says who? I like both SF's and NY's but NYC's are certainly less centered around tourists. San Francisco's was almost too English. There was a part of SF's Chinatown that was strictly centered around Chinese culture, but 90% of it was tourism and SF gift shops that sold SF shirts. In New York's Chinatowns, 99% of the signs are in just Chinese, you can walk on the streets most of the time like in China, you can find Chinese people playing Chinese games outside of the stores, you can small the Chinese incense, the food, hear the languages, and it's dense, gritty, and dirty like Chinese cities.
San Francisco too touristy? Geese, Futcha. You forget to mention he fact that more tour buses roll through Manhattan's Chinatown than that of San Fran, L.A., and London combined. If only you'd stray off of Grant Ave. for just a bit, you'll start to find the grime and grit as NYC, although not quite as dirty.
I have to admit that I havent been to LA's and SF's but I find it hard to believe that anything is better than NYC's. It was pretty amazing when I went there. To me, thats the closest that Ive ever felt Ive been to a large city in Asia, while still being in the US.
It was actually probably my favorite neighborhood Ive ever been to, it was very unique. On the streets you would really think you were in Hong Kong or someplace. There were all these weird little shops, signs, and restaurants everywhere. I barely heard a word of english the whole time I was there, all Chinese. Probably 9/10 people I saw were of SE asian descent. It was pretty amazing. If you walk about 5 blocks away from it your right back in America and NYC though. It was an experience being there.
Well, I have been to quite a lot of Chinatowns throughout the world, incl. NYC. I can tell you that there are better Chinatowns than NYC's, San Fran for starters although I can't say that it's the best. It is by far the most colorful, however.
Out of these three, LA is by far my favorite. In North America I think Vancouver takes the cake. I also like the strip-mall styled Chinese business (mostly restaurants) areas in Silicon Valley and Houston, and some other cities as long as they are clean. Other Chinatowns are mostly dirty areas with Chinese food from the last century. They look and smell like slums in China and the cooking style is also terribly dated and too focused on the Hong Kong and Taiwan styles in those areas. I personally think the quality of a Chinatown (or a Chinese business center) depends totally on how many new immigrants the city attracts. One thing for sure is that the new immigrants don't want to be in the dirtiest part of town any more because they didn't grow up in areas like that as their ancestors did, and they want to start business with a better cleaner enviroment.
Last edited by fashionguy; 05-18-2010 at 03:08 PM..
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