Everybody loves Chinese Restaurants! Everybody's eaten at one.

But Cheuk Kwan loves Chinese restaurants so much, he has created a film series called Chinese Restaurants. It is not difficult for Chinese Canadians to start getting the munchies for some rice or noodles when travelling around the world. Like many world travellers, sooner or later you start to crave the comfort food that you grew up with. If you are a contemporary Canadian, sooner or later around the world, you pop into a MacDonalds. But if you grew up Chinese-Canadian, you pop into a Chinese Restaurant.

I have found these restaurants across Canada and the United States. They are abundant in Toronto and Honolulu, but more rare in Needles, California; Boise, Idaho; Provo, Utah; Sedona, Arizona, Nakusp BC... but still they are there... and I eat there. The funny thing is that in these small town areas, you could be the only Chinese people besides the restaurant owners... In fact you could be the only other Chinese person they have seen in days, weeks or months... so sometimes they try their Chinese out on you, or they bring their children out to meet you. "Are you Chinese?" they say...

The Chinese diaspora has spread throughout the world. Filmaker Cheuk Kwan has travelled to Norway, Madagascar, Turkey and even tiny Outlook Sasketchewan to tell the story about how the Chinese have settled the world and made their contribution through Chinese restaurants. It was with interest that I read Kevin Griffin's story in Monday's Vancouver Sun on May 2, 2005, as he wrote about "Noisy Jim" Kook , from Outlook Sasketchewan, profiled in "Three Continents." I first met Noisy Jim at Expo 86. It was my first experience with "clapper tales" the Chinese art of story telling, or of "shop sellers" inviting people to come buy their wares. Here in Vancouver, Dr. Jan Walls is an expert on clapper tales. But there was something intriguing about this single elderly wizened Chinese man, speaking in Chinese and English on the deck of Canada Place at Expo 86. I did talk with Mr. Kook and take his picture (I will dig into my photo boxes from 19 years ago).

Stories of Noisy Jim would resurface when I discoverd that the woman who would become my sister-in-law, was raised in Outlook Sasketchewan. She was surprised that I had heard her tiny hometown of Outlook, and even more that I had met one of its most famous citizens. It turns out that everybody in Outlook knew Noisy Jim, and Noisy Jim knew everybody in Outlook. He sponsored the local hockey team, and everybody at sometime, ate in his restaurant. In fact everybody loved eating, and hanging in his restaurant... so much so that Noisy Jim would give people the keys, so they could open the restaurant early in the morning so he could stay in bed sleeping, while they cooked their bacon and eggs, made coffee, paid their bills. A famous story was that one time, Noisy Jim arrived at his restaurant to be asked "What do you want for breakfast" by and American women, having a great time cooking in the kitchen. She was a tourist, and she had stopped for breakfast - only to join right in. She thought it was great.

I love Chinese restaurants. I grew up with them here in Vancouver's Chinatown. We would frequent the old Bamboo Terrace where "Auntie Winnie" would always give us gum, the HoHo where we would go for a traditional Friday night dinner with family friends before shopping at the Army & Navy or going to "Father and Son" swim nights at the YMCA on Burrard Street, and especially the Marco Polo, where all our family banquets would be held, and my father was the local sign writer who painted all the show cards for the Louie Brothers who ran the restaurant nightclub. It was a sad day, when the Marco Polo closed down.

I'm booking tickets for Chinese Restaurants. I'm inviting my parents, my family, my girlfriend and my sister-in-law.

Book tickets at the Pacific Cinemateque on-line or get there early when the box office opens...

CHINESE RESTAURANTS

Western Canada Premiere of "Three Continents" by Cheuk Kwan
( Madagasgar, Norway and Canada)
Director and Cinematographer in attendance
Q & A after screening

Location: Pacific Cinematheque

May 4th 7pm, 9pm
Chinese Restaurants: Three Continenents (first showing)
Chinese Restaurants: Song of the Exile (second showing)

May 5th 7pm, 9pm
Chinese Restaurants: Three Continenents (first showing)
Chinese Restaurants: The Islands (second showing)

May 7th, 7pm
Chinese Restaurants: Three Continenents
Location: Studio Theatre, Surrey Arts Centre

May 8th, 7pm
Chinese Restaurants: Song of the Exile
Location: Studio Theatre, Surrey Arts Centre