¶ … Chinatown in San Francisco. The reason I chose it is because there are so many things that are appealing to me. It is the largest Chinatown in the United States and is often regarded as an Asian micro-town within America. It is a place where one can immerse himself/herself into an Asian culture -- or, so I assume (I want to find out). It is home to many attractions. One can see Chinese architecture, restaurants (try Chinese and Chinese-Western cuisine), and herbal shops where one can buy unique herbs used in Chinese traditional medicine. It is also interesting to me how citizens of Chinatown understand their identity. Do they consider themselves Chinese, American, or someone in-between? What is their lingua franca? What is their attitude toward Americans and Chinese? These are interesting questions that I would like to find out. After all, they live in the Chinatown but are still located in the United States.
I plan to visit the site several times. I have been to Chinatown once but then it did not occur to me...
I just visited it out of curiosity. My plan is to visit it as many times as necessary and go to areas that will help me find answers to the questions I mentioned above. I want to do enough sightseeing to gain insight into the aesthetics of the town; I want to learn more about the architecture. I plan to visit a couple of relatively cheaper restaurants, look at their menus carefully, and possibly interview some servants or managers. I also plan to visit a few herbal shops to observe and, again, if possible, ask questions from the sellers and owners of those shops. And finally, I want to interview random people on the street who can observe things around the town. I am thinking about Chinese food carts where a seller spends the whole day in the street, talking to people and observing the neighborhood. These people, I hope, can answer a lot of my questions.
The classes I have taken within the last year convinced me that I need to be careful with preconceived notions. I try to…
