PodCasting in Chinatown

Nov 7th

This group task with Susan and Devon on Podcasting China, I wanted to do a comparison with Chinatown and Vaughan; basically I will focus on how the two places differ from one another with atmosphere, people and the many establishments.
In my opinion, Chinatown is known to be the lower class of Toronto a place where everyone is always moving and changing; the "New York" life. Chinatown is a place where the rules are bent and the lifestyle is luxurious. While Vaughan is the upper class of Toronto as well as where the ‘American Dream’ lies for many people. It is the place where many of the working strive to achieve when they want a family of their own; it is the lifestyle where our children can play on the street and we do not fear for the worst. Vaughan is considered to be clean and secure for many people including my family.

We started off by using the subway from Yorkdale mall to Spadina station; even though I am an Asian girl going to an Asian area I still felt out of place when I arrived there. The subway ride was extremely quite; people were either listening to their music, reading, sleeping or just to themselves which made me feel uncomfortable to speak or move; the people appear to be tired and restless.

Goldstone Noodle restaurant could make many individuals feel as if they were in China; mainly because most of the employees were Chinese speaking individuals and could not speak English well. Before entering into the restaurant many people would be shocked with the design of Goldstone, because it is all windows and anyone and everyone could see in and out of the restaurant. A reason as to why Goldstone is different and unique than other restaurant is because they display their meat product in the window in eyes view; by doing this, it has allow any walking pedestrian to see the freshness and attractiveness of the restaurant. In my opinion, there are no Canadian or American restaurant that would ever display their food menu; because many consumers find it disturbing. By allowing costumers to see what and how their meal is being cook, I believe gives the costumer a sense of security that their food is being cooked right.

Dragon City Mall is another reason why I believe that Vaughan is different from Chinatown; Dragon City is a 3 level mall with at least 20 stores available to the public. while an average mall such as Vaughan Mills is a 1 level mall with at least 100 stores. The stores in Dragon City, appears to be empty and dull, as if they do not make much income; one of the main reason as to why dragon city is different from Vaughan mills is because the shops in dragon city, you are able to bargain for your desired item, while in Vaughan mills the set price is stay the same and there is no negotiation with the value of the item.

With this Podcasting project in Chinatown, it has forced me to take a closer look at the differences in lifestyle due to our surroundings. The people and atmosphere we choose to live with could some how represent the kind of person we are; I believe that the lifestyle of the Vaughan community is the future that we all want to achieve while Chinatown is the life that many people find intriguing but too fast.

During this process my part in the podcasting was filming mainly as well as editing the script with Susan while Devon was in charge of editing the video itself, unfortunately Devon did not come through with the audio podcasting.

SCRIPT

ON THE BUS:
Susan: We’re at spadina stations right now and waiting for the bus to Chinatown.
Lisa: I feel claustrophobic
Susan: Because there’s a lot of people in line waiting for the bus, to go home.

IN CHINATOWN:
Lisa: We just got to Chinatown
Susan: we’re really hungry so we’re going to find a restaurant. Now we’re walking down…
Lisa: Spadina
Lisa: Now we’re going to a restaurant called…
Susan: Today is not as crowded because it’s a weekday try coming here on a Sunday.
Lisa: It smells so bad!
Lisa: We just arrived to our restaurant called Goldenstone, It’s surrounded by windows so that you could sort of see inside of the restaurant and you could see how they are cooking your food.
Susan: There is pork, duck, chicken displaying in the windows front.
Susan: Here we are.

IN THE GOLDSTONE:
Lisa: Now we’re going to wash the chopsticks just incase its dirty
*chopsticks being washed
Devon: What are you washing it in?
Susan: hot tea
Lisa: Just incase, because it may not be as clean as we want it to be
Devon: Is that why they give you the tea?
Lisa: No
Susan: So heres the menu, the good thing is that there are pictures as well.

*Susan is speaking to the Chinese waitress
Susan orders rice noodle roll with shrimp and seafood chow mein
Lisa orders wonton noodles with chicken and rice noodle roll with shrimp
Chinese waitress repeats our orders back in Chinese to us.
Susan confirms the order being said is correct.

Lisa: This is devon trying to work with chopsticks, we’re teaching her how to do it.
Susan: This is her first wonton.
Lisa: wonton is basically a thin layer of flour wrapped around shrimp, chives and sometimes mushrooms.
Devon: It works more when I stab it.
Susan: Mind as well drink it from the bowl.
Lisa: So how does it taste?
*Devon nodds

Lisa: We just received our wonton noodles. Steam rice rolls and chow mein with vegetables, and scallop (I think)
Devon: which I wouldn’t be trying.
Lisa: its looks good and worth it.
Lisa: rice noodles is usually dipped with soy sauce, to add a little flavor to it. Lisa: Devon apparently knows how to use chopsticks
Lisa: Basically the environment of Goldenstone restaurant is too yourself, you eat your own thing and you don’t bother with other people.
Devon: its nice though
Lisa: its not loud, people kind of respect eachother. They just have their own space when their here.
Susan: What I like about it, they always bug you and ask if you need any help.
Lisa: Its very different
Lisa: Its different from a Chinese restuarurant compare to a American restaurant. Chinese people have a little more taste than American restuarnat.

OUTSIDE THE RESTURANT
Devon: You could see all the chicken in the window.
Susan: Okkay we just left the Goldstone noodle restaurant.
Susan: There’s roasted chicken with their heads, beaks and eyes, and I guess to some Asians its really good to them.
Lisa: Usually Chinese people can view what they want to order, to see if the meat is fresh or not by looking at it.
Devon: people who don’t go to Chinatown would find it a little freaky.
Susan: the head is still on.
Lisa: That’s the difference between Chinatown and uptown.

WALKING:
Susan: We’re walking to spadina and dundas.
Lisa: as you can see we’re actually outside right now and we’re walking towards Dragon City.
Lisa: Its really cold and a bit windy.
Lisa: Let’s see what happens when we’re in dragon city

INFRONT OF DRAGON CITY:
Susan: Now we’re in dragon city, the centre of Chinatown
Devon: There’s a restaurant ontop but we’re not going to because apparently its very expensive. You could already see how different it is;
Susan: So we just odered asian style walffles. These are $5.
Devon: Its really hot. mmmMmM!

Lisa: in you will notice there is like a waterfall as we enter dragon city, and now we’re going to go up the stairs to see more of the stores available to us, gifts shops and clothes and stuff like that.
Lisa: They sell dvds for a very cheap price. Why go to a theather when you can come to Chinatown
Susan: The store doesn’t sell one specific thing they sell everything, from sunglasses to clocks.

*Radio – Chinese language
Lisa: as you can hear we are in a Chinese gift shop right now, and there are a lot of Chinese speaking radios on.
*Chinese women talks to us in Chinese

IN A RETAIL STORE:
Susan: We’re loving the asian style
*susan finds herself a nice pair of Miss Sixty Jeans.
Susan: For half price.
Lisa: actually this mall is very small, theres not much variety of stuff.

Lisa: This is flower slash accessories kind of thing.
Lisa: It doesn’t have a name it only has a Chinese title. There is roses, glasses and medallions, stuff like that. It’s really nice
Lisa: It looks very bright in there to an average person.
Lisa: Because we’re in Chinese mall there is a lot of different product with Japanese and Chinese writing
Lisa: Chinese which is also in Cantonese and mandrian
*Chinese speaking men
Devon: it’s really nice.
*Chinese men speaking about prices of gum
Lisa: that was a Chinese man speaking which we do not understand at all.

IN ACCESSORIES STORE:
Lisa: There so much jewelry, so much variety of jewllery.
Lisa: There a great thing about Chinese mall is that you can buy one thing and get one free.

LEAVING DRAGON CITY:
Lisa: now we’re leaving Chinatown; bye Chinatown
Susan: we’re gonna hop on the bus now and go back to Spadina station, we had a nice evening so we’ll be back sometime soon.

END OF PODCAST .