"A Chinatown is a section of an urban area with a large number of Chinese residents, usually outside of Greater China……

In the past, overcrowded Chinatowns in urban areas were generally shunned by the non-Chinese public as ethnic ghettos, and seen as places of vice and cultural insularity where "unassimilable foreigners" congregated. Nowadays, many old and new Chinatowns are considered significant centers of commercialism and tourism. Some of them also serve, to varying degrees, as centers of multiculturalism, if in a somewhat superficial manner….."

- Wikipedia -

When I began photographing Chinatown a fellow photographer made a comment that people often go back to document the place where they are familiar with, which in this case a ethnic Chinese photographer like me documenting a community where large group of Chinese congregated on foreign soil. Though there is no denying fact that there is a connection between myself and Chinatown the bound remains only cosmetic. However, through the course of the journey I discover something unexpected yet profound – that this is another theme park.

Chinatown is another theme park in the sense that it is a highly enclosed space that offers surrealistic fantasy. Although unlike theme parks, which there are no actual barrier that separates the reality and the artificial fantasy, its boundary is replaced by the exotic physical structures, which incidentally resemble that of abstract structures in theme parks. Cartoon characters that parade through theme parks is replaced by mythical creatures during the festivities in Chinatown. Similarly, exotic gifts that sell in the store to lure customers in Chinatown found its resemblance to the toys or animated customs offered at theme parks. In essence, if theme parks offer a fantastic excitements for urban dwellers, Chinatown provides an economical get-away to an exotic foreign land.

Though the sad truth is that many less fortunate migrants are still dwelling in Chinatown today and their struggles are in some way diminished as part of the ‘cultural exhibition’.