Chinatowns in Europe
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This article discusses Chinatowns in Europe. Several urban Chinatowns exist in major European capital cities. There is Chinatown, London, England as well as a major Chinatown in Manchester, and two Chinatowns in Paris, France: One where many Vietnamese - specifically ethnic Chinese refugees from Vietnam - have settled in the Quartier chinois in the XIIIe arrondissement of Paris, and the other in Belleville in the northwest of Paris. In 2002 and 2003, Berlin, Germany was considering establishing a Chinatown.
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[edit] Colonialism and European Chinatowns
Some European Chinatowns have extraordinary histories while others are still relatively new developments. Many early Chinese traders settled in several European port cities and established several communities. The oldest chinatown in Europe is in Liverpool, England. It was established in the early 1800s when Liverpool began importing cotton and silk from Shanghai. In the 1910s, Mainland Chinese labourers from the Zhejiang province who remained in France established the first Chinatown of Paris. There are other Chinese who "jumped ship" to Europe after working as hired hands on European ships or docks.
As a legacy of European colonialism in Asia, many Asian subjects of British and Continental European empires immigrated to the colonizing country. During the 1950s, immigrants from Hong Kong began migrating to the United Kingdom in large numbers, which resulted in the formation of London's second Chinatown in the Soho district. Some Chinese from the former Portuguese colony of Macau have resettled in Portugal.
In 1998, many more Chinese Indonesian immigrants arrived to escape the violent pogroms in Indonesia towards ethnic Chinese (mainly as a result of the Asian financial crisis of 1997).
After the fall of Saigon at the close of the Vietnam War, the ethnic Chinese boat people from Vietnam were resettled in France and Germany in the late 1970s and 1980s and began settling extensively in Paris's Chinatown and immensely revitalising the area during that time. Paris's Chinatown currently has a vibrant Southeast Asian ethnic Chinese character, while its newer counterpart in the Belleville is largely consists of fairly recent Mainland Chinese. Some Chinese Vietnamese refugees also ended up in Hong Kong, then a British-administered territory. These Vietnamese were resettled in the United Kingdom, (there are several Vietnamese businesses in London's Chinatown).
Although Mainland China was carved into several Western spheres of influence, the country as a whole was not a colony of a foreign maritime power. Nevertheless, many mainland Chinese, legal and undocumented immigrants, have especially contributed to the development of Chinese communities in Europe, including the currently nascent Chinatown in the Equilino district of Rome, Italy. There has been new immigration from Fujian and Zhejiang provinces of China, many of whom are illegal immigrants who work in the unskilled service industries–especially in restaurants and garment sweatshops—of Europe.
[edit] Immigration trends to Europe
The European Union countries of France, Italy, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom has consistently attracted the most ethnic Chinese immigrants. Several cities in these countries now have vibrant and bustling Chinatowns. From the 1950s, immigration from the former French Indochina increased, with immigration reaching its peak during the Vietnam War. Since the 1980s, the major source of emigrants has been the People's Republic of China, with smaller number of migrants coming from Hong Kong - with exception to the United Kingdom - and Taiwan. Most emigrants from these latter two areas have headed to Australia and North America.
[edit] Specific European Chinatowns
[edit] Belgium
The small Chinatown (French: Quartier chinois) of Brussels in Belgium consists of two streets, rue Saint Géry and rue Antoine Dansaert. The area reflects more of a pan-Asian spirit, with various Asian ethnicities represented in the area businesses.
In Flanders, the city of Antwerp has a growing Chinatown on Van Wesenbekestraat near the Coninckplein.
[edit] France
Paris boasts of le plus grand quartier chinois, the second largest Chinatown in Europe. Located in the 13th arrondissement, the area contains many Chinese, Vietnamese and Laotian merchants and other inhabitants, living in high concrete towers and blocks. The residents also include Chinese from French Polynesia and French Guiana; and ethnic Vietnamese, Chinese Vietnamese and Chinese Indonesians from New Caledonia. Roughly speaking, the area extends between and around the avenue d'Ivry and avenue de Choisy streets, east of the rue de Tolbiac. One major point of attraction is the Tang Frères (owned by a Chinese Laotian) and Paristore supermarkets, selling Asian products, located close to each other. . On the Chinese New Year, there is a great parade through the streets, with lion and dragon dances. [1]
Lyon also has a Chinatown, located around the Condorcet neighbourhood, in the 7th arrondissement. It is much smaller than that of Paris, consisting mainly of a couple of blocks around rue Passet and rue Pasteur.
[edit] Germany
A German Chinatown is found in the city of Düsseldorf. The English term Chinatown is used in the German language.
Hamburg had a historic Chinatown that existed in the St. Pauli red light district from the 1920s to the 1940s. It was destroyed by the Gestapo under the Nazis, and there are only a few remnants left behind. During and after World War II, Germany's ethnic Chinese left for the United Kingdom.
After liberalising its immigration laws, the former West Germany saw an increase in Asian immigration in the late 1970s and 1980s. There were also many Vietnamese who were living as guest workers and students in East Germany prior to 1989, many of whom chose not to return to Vietnam. There are plans to develop a Chinatown or pan-Asian area in Berlin.
[edit] Hungary
An area with a semblance of Chinatown was developed in the rundown Józsefváros neighbourhood of Budapest. Many immigrants come from the coastal province of Fujian(福建) and Zhejiang(浙江) in Mainland China since the late 1980s and ealy 1990s. The major problems is that in Chinatown, low-priced and low quality mechandize are being offered there. Compounding to this problem is the fact they are generally popular with the Hungarian consumers. http://www.ucl.ac.uk/cds/pany1.htm
[edit] Ireland
The city of Dublin holds an annual Chinatown Festival [2] to mark the Chinese New Year. Plans to establish a Chinatown on Capel Street on the city's northside have been criticized by anonymous anti-immigration leaflets in the area [3].
[edit] Italy
Italy has a rapidly-growing Chinese population. The country has had a very small Chinese population since World War II, but most of the current population has arrived since the 1980s. Over 100,000 Chinese are thought to be living in Italy.
Rome The fastest-growing Roman Chinatown is in the Esquilino neighborhood.
The Chinatown of Milan is around Via Paolo Sarpi.
There is another Chinatown in the city of Prato, with the second largest Mainland Chinese immigrant population in Italy. Many first-generation immigrants work in the garment industries.
The Italian term for Chinatown is quartiere cinese but Chinatown is also used.
[edit] Netherlands
The Netherlands' major Chinatown is located in the famed De Wallen red light district of Amsterdam. The Chinatown, with its location on Zeedijk Street, was formed in the 1980s and has expanded beyond the red light district. The street signs in this neighbourhood are in Dutch and in Chinese.
To the southwest, the city of Rotterdam also has a Chinatown, on West Kruiskade.
The third Chinatown worth to be mentioned is in the city of The Hague (25 kilometres northwest of Rotterdam). The term "Chinatown" is used in the Dutch language.
Chinese Indonesian restaurants were common in the Netherlands until new immigrants from Mainland China began arriving and opening "authentic Chinese cuisine" restaurants.
[edit] Portugal
Portugal's major Chinatown is located in Lisbon, mostly in the form of shopping centres.
Porto Alto has a Chinatown as well.
Most Chinese immigrants to Portugal came from the former Portuguese territory of Macau, when it was returned to Mainland Chinese control in 1999, while others from Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam. Many Chinese also came from Brazil to Portugal. Besides Portuguese Chinese speaking Mandarin, Cantonese, and Portuguese, some of them speak a mixed Cantonese-Portuguese creole, Macanese (or Patuá).
In the North of Portugal there is a rapidly growing Chinatown in the Industrial Area of Vila do Conde in Porto.
[edit] Russia
A new proposed Chinatown is in the planning and development stages for the Krasnoselsky district of St. Petersburg, Russia with massive funding from mainland Chinese investors. Proposed plans call for restaurants, markets, a Buddhist temple, and housing developments on more than 2 km² that is to begin construction before 2010. [4] [5]
In keeping in line with its post-Soviet melting pot ideology, there is no established "Chinatown" in Moscow. Moscow currently has a small Chinese population.
- See also: Chinatowns in Asia#Russia
[edit] Serbia
Serbia's biggest Chinatown is located in the newer part of Belgrade. There are many Chinese stores all over the country. They sell many products at low prices, especially in Novi Pazar. Serbian Chinatowns don't have any special name; the term used is kinezi, which refers to Chinese people. Most of these immigrants tend to mainland Chinese, a legacy of Slobodan Milošević relaxing immigration restrictions when he made diplomatic approaches to China during the 1990s. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/685566.stm supplies more information.
[edit] Spain
While there has been Chinese immigration to Spain, it has not been as much as in other European countries, such as France, Germany, and the United Kingdom. There are about 100,000 Chinese in Spain. Most Chinese-Spanish residents are people whose ancestors were coolies from mainland China. Others are refugees from other places in mainland China, Hong Kong, Macao, Japan, Korea, Vietnam, Indonesia, and especially the Philippines, Cuba, and Puerto Rico, while still others are economic immigrants from Taiwan and other Southeast Asian countries. In Spain, Chinese immigrants tend not to form separate neighbourhoods (the quintessential image of a Chinatown) but live in areas mixed with other immigrants. However, in some places, Chinese immigration is enough to give a Chinese color to some streets.
The most important example of a Spanish Chinatown is the Lavapiés neighbourhood in Madrid, inhabited by mixed immigrants and Bohemian Spaniards. Barcelona, however, has had an area named Barrio Chino since the 1920s, in the old city between the Ramblas and the Parallel. The residents have been poor Spaniards and the area is marked by its prostitution, to the extent that any prostitution district of any Spanish city may be known as barrio chino, regardless of any Chinese presence, though the term doesn't imply a population of Chinese residents. The term came from an article whose author compared the state of the area with the popular image of foreign Chinatowns.
After the Spanish Miracle, Spain started receiving more Chinese immigrants, some of whom may have settled in the cheap Barrio Chino. As a result of the gentrification policy exemplified by the 1992 Summer Olympics, the areas is being rebuilt as a chic neighbourhood and the more neutral name of El Raval is preferred. Recent Chinese immigrants have established wholesale clothes business at La Ribera, Ronda San Pedro or Trafalgar street. Barrios Chinos are also pan-Asian areas. Many Japanese, Koreans, Vietnamese, and Thais settled Barrios Chinos.
[edit] United Kingdom
Main articles: Chinatown, London and Chinatown, Birmingham
Chinatowns in the UK are not heavily residential, the Chinese in the UK are relatively dispersed, and do not form ethnic enclaves as in many other countries, although the highest number are to be found in large cities and in the South-East. The United Kingdom has several Chinatowns, and the most Chinatowns to be found in any single European country, including the largest one in central London, located in the Soho area, established in the 1950s and 1960s. Other UK Chinatowns are found in the English cities of Liverpool, Manchester and Newcastle, the Scottish cities of Glasgow and Edinburgh, the Welsh capital Cardiff and a growing population of Chinese immigrants are present in Belfast, Northern Ireland.
[edit] England
- London
London's Chinatown is mainly commercial with many Chinese restaurants and businesses. It is the largest and busiest in Europe, and is much denser and more lively than, for example, the sprawled residential Chinatown in Paris's quiet 13th Arrondisement. A new Chinese gate over Wardour Street marking the entrance to Leicester Square is planned as well. London's Chinatown is undergoing the politics of gentrification, with a £50 million planned regeneration.
There are plans to revive London's original Chinese district in Limehouse as part of the wider regeneration of East London. This area was bombed out, as with much of London, during the Blitz in the Second World War causing a relocation of the few ethnic Chinese who had lived there to other areas.
Other major Chinese ran businesses can be found in other parts of London, eg in suburban Croydon. At present, it is mainly a shopping centre with a major Chinese British supermarket chain as the anchor. One such centre in Croydon is called China Town Mall and has been built complete with Chinese-style architecture and gateway. Oriental City in Colindale, with a well stocked supermarket, a large food court of E/SE Asian cuisines, several other restaurants, a games arcade, herbal shops, masseurs, and a cultural performance space. Queensway, though a cosmopolitan blend of many cultures, also has a sizable Chinese presence and a substantial cluster of Chinese restaurants and other businesses.
- Manchester
Manchester's Chinatown on Faulkner Street is the second largest in Britain after London's Soho Chinatown. The Chinese British population, many of whom are immigrants from former British-ruled Hong Kong, has especially settled in the Greater Manchester area. However, Hong Kong immigration to the United Kingdom has leveled off over the years and there has been a rise in Mainland Chinese immigration to the country.
- Newcastle
According to the BBC, Newcastle's Chinatown is also undergoing regeneration. A gateway costing £160,000 (€240,000) is being constructed by Mainland Chinese engineers as part of the plans.
- Liverpool
The Chinatown in Liverpool in the Merseyside area is on Duke Street and is home to the oldest Chinese community in Europe. The arch located at the gateway is also the largest of its kind outside of China. It has been under regeneration.
- Sheffield
Sheffield has no official Chinatown although London Road, Highfield is the centre of the Sheffield Chinese community. There are many Chinese restaurants, supermarkets and community stores and home of the Sheffield Chinese Community Centre. The Sheffield Chinese community is pressing for the street to be formally labelled Sheffield's Chinatown.
[edit] Northern Ireland
Belfast
Belfast in Northern Ireland has a large Chinese immigrant population. Although there is no formal Chinatown, the area on the street of Donegall Pass and Dublin Road exhibits the properties of many Chinatowns.
[edit] Scotland
Glasgow contains a Chinatown.
In 2003, the city council of Aberdeen approved plans for a new Chinatown in the northern part of the city.
[edit] External links
- The Emergence of a Chinatown as a Tourist Site in Antwerp?" - Article on the touristification of Chinatown in Antwerp, Belgium
- Dragons in Rotterdam: photo + article on ErasmusPC [6]
