changing of the guard...

the chinese food in flushing has significantly gotten better thru the years.  it's a very obvious attribute to the areas increase in ethnic population, infrastructure and growth.  there are more stores, more buildings, more parking lots and more street vendors.  every 2 steps you walk within flushing's 5 block core radius,  there seems to be not only another eating establishment, but now there are mini joints specializing in homeland street food.  just off the top of my head, 4 diff places just for noodles.  3 diff places just for breakfast.  6 huge canto wedding banquet places etc.  all chinese, but all specifically catered to each dialect and specific province of the greater chinese descent.  there's even quite a few street vendors for chinese skewers and noodles and pancakes and fried chicken and dumplings and...and and and ...etc.  even the korean side and the korean pockets a few blocks off have considerably gotten bigger...highlighted by amazingly good cuisine from the restaurants that boast not one word of english in the entire store.

it's a good thing.  im not exactly sure how this has affected overall city safety with basic population growth (im sure there are plenty of issues), but it's definitely become an ethnocentrics delight.  u never leave the motherland and u never have to.  u never learn english and u never have to.  however, flushings ethnic dichotomy hasn't grown in proportion to what the ethnic breakdowns used to be.  there's been a distinct changing of the guard as a city that used to be seemingly run by taiwanese, is now more korean, is now more mainland chinese.  it was obviously bound to happen, it just hit me when not only most of the new establishments are patrons are run by mainlanders, but yesterday i heard a glimpse of a man around 60 in the corner of the restaurant speaking in taiwanese mandarin still grasping to the glory of taiwanese economic hey day of the 70s and 80s.   when i realized.  the guard has changed.

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