Newcastle’s Chinatown Without The Feel Of Chinatown

Newcastle’s Chinatown Without The Feel Of Chinatown – There’s like approximately 300,000 population in Newcastle Upon Tyne and there’s 7.6% of Asian living in the city according to Wikipedia, I don’t know does it includes International student like me or not. Interestingly, there’s a Chinatown in the city. I was pretty excited cause I thought it would be like New York or San Francisco’s Chinatown where it really has a blend of East & West with Cantonese language flooding the air of Chinatown.

Well, it’s not what you think it is. Chinatown in Newcastle is small with mainly Chinese restaurants, 2 Asian grocery supermarkets and that’s all. The only Chinese-looking thing is the Chinese-style arch entrance near St James Stadium. Bahhh. You don’t really see many people here, people come here just for food, or just to buy Asian food.

I went to tried out a Chinese buffet (Lau’s Buffet) here, which costs £6.75 per person and I thought it gonna be filled with good food. Oh no, it’s a place that I’m not coming back again, they are salty. Somehow, I saw a lot of local British came for their food, bring their kids and family here, maybe they like it the way it is and 70% of the dishes are chicken, fried chicken, Si Chuan chicken, sweet and sour chicken, kong pow chicken and more chicken. In short, Chinese buffet is just like mixed rice in Malaysia but it’s eat-all-you-can. Ang mo likes it, but not me.

After checking out the Chinese supermarket here (Wing Hong & Hiyou), I can tell you that you can find almost anything here. It’s like Cold Storage or B.I.G. (Big Independent Grocers) where you can find many imported food, just that they are imported from Asia. Spices, Asian’s vegetable, sauces, instant noodles and more are all available. It’s just that they are in £. If you happens to come to UK for study, don’t bother to bring food stuff if you have a limited luggage., you can find them all here.