i never said i hated dc chinatown
I was eating with mrbunbun at Full Kee in Chinatown when she got a call from a friend who asked why we hate on Chinatown, now better known as Gallery Place. I hate the system, not the people who get the short end of the system. I like the places that have unpretentious flourescent lighting, $5 dinner menu items, folks swearing in Cantonese, and are open past midnight. I hate that Hooters restaurant roosts in Chinatown. I assume that the owners who named their restaurant "China Doll" didn't know that non-asians use that phrase as a sexist racist epithet. I know I've been called "china doll" by a street harasser pimp. Now that segregation isn't as much of an issue, should we call it a success for the community if its businesses gradually move out of urban centers and into the burbs, or do we call it gentrification?