{"id":316,"date":"2007-12-01T18:35:10","date_gmt":"2007-12-01T22:35:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spacingmontreal.ca\/?p=316"},"modified":"2013-01-21T11:45:12","modified_gmt":"2013-01-21T16:45:12","slug":"chinatowns-changing-but-its-still-a-vital-place","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2007\/12\/01\/chinatowns-changing-but-its-still-a-vital-place\/","title":{"rendered":"Chinatown’s changing, but it’s still a vital place"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Chinatown is changing: new businesses are opening and a set of vacant lots on St. Laurent is set to be transformed next year into a $20 million shopping and retail complex. <\/p>\n

At the same time, Montreal’s Chinese population, now estimated at about 80,000, is changing, too. A surge of immigrants and students from mainland China, most of them Mandarin-speakers, are making their influence felt in a community traditionally dominated by Cantonese-speakers from Hong Kong and Southeast Asia. Many of the city’s best regional Chinese restaurants, grocery stores and boutiques are found outside of Chinatown in neighbourhoods like the Brossard, Ville St. Laurent and C\u00f4te des Neiges. In the downtown west end, between Guy and Atwater, there has been a particularly recent explosion of new Chinese businesses<\/a>.<\/p>\n

So what does this mean for Chinatown? Is it still relevant to Chinese Montrealers? That’s the question I ask in today’s Gazette<\/a>. What I find is that, aside from the obvious truth — that everyone has a different relationship with Chinatown — the neighbourhood maintains its symbolic role as the heart of a culture and community. Here’s an excerpt:<\/p>\n

Gilberte, a West Island woman in her 50s who also withheld her last name, feels a strong cultural connection to Chinatown, even if she lives in the suburbs and visits it only occasionally.<\/p>\n

“Even though it’s crowded, even though parking is difficult, you feel a sense of attachment, especially when there’s a festival. I speak French, Cantonese, Mandarin, English perfectly, so it’s not a question of comfort, but when I’m in Chinatown, I feel a bit chez moi, maybe more than when I go downtown,” she said.<\/p>\n

Since she came to Montreal from Vietnam in 1973, Gilberte has seen Chinatown change dramatically, from a fairly marginal neighbourhood to one that draws people from across the city and across ethnic lines. She credits the wave of Chinese from Vietnam that arrived in the late 1970s for transforming the neighbourhood.<\/p>\n

“I’m very proud that Chinatown has changed like this. I knew it before and I wasn’t very proud — people were scared to go there. There was nothing going on like today, not as many restaurants or grocery stores,” she said.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, Gilberte only heads to Chinatown for family gatherings, or when she needs something that can only be found in one of its supermarkets. For the most part, she goes to Kim Hoa, a supermarket on the West Island, for her Chinese groceries. “It’s not big but it has a lot of selection. It’s practical,” she said. “March\u00e9 Hawaii is big and also very practical. It’s like an IGA with a lot of parking.”<\/p>\n

But Gilberte is quick to point to the ambitious Swatow development as evidence Chinatown still holds appeal. “That’s a good thing. It will bring more people, especially if we could fix the problem of parking,” she said. Xiao Fei Yang, the slick hot pot chain from mainland China, is a symbol of the changes that will come to Chinatown’s retail scene, she added. “That’s the future of Chinatown.”<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Check it out<\/a> in today’s Saturday Extra section. <\/p>\n

I’m curious to know how all of you relate to Chinatown, whatever your cultural and ethnic origins. Do you go there for an occasional meal? To buy groceries? A summer evening’s stroll? Or does it simply not exist on your Montreal radar?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chinatown is changing: new businesses are opening and a set of vacant lots on St. Laurent is set to be transformed next year into a $20 million shopping and retail complex. At the same time, Montreal’s Chinese population, now estimated at about 80,000, is changing, too. A surge of immigrants and students from mainland China,Continue reading “Chinatown’s changing, but it’s still a vital place”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5008,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7831,7839,7842],"tags":[7,319,53,9,1205,125,443,1207,45,1206,1208,302,978,1204],"class_list":["post-316","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-community","category-neighbourhoods","category-urban-design","tag-behaviour","tag-china","tag-chinatown","tag-development","tag-kim-hoa","tag-montreal","tag-retail-complex","tag-retail-scene","tag-revitalisation","tag-slick-hot-pot-chain","tag-southeast-asia","tag-usd","tag-vietnam","tag-xiao-fei-yang"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nChinatown's changing, but it's still a vital place - Spacing Montreal<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2007\/12\/01\/chinatowns-changing-but-its-still-a-vital-place\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Chinatown's changing, but it's still a vital place - Spacing Montreal\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Chinatown is changing: new businesses are opening and a set of vacant lots on St. Laurent is set to be transformed next year into a $20 million shopping and retail complex. 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