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Gold Rush of 1849. When gold was discovered at
Sutter's Mill in 1848, the lure of economic prosperity
abroad encouraged tens of thousands of Chinese
to emigrate to the U.S.
It
was the discovery of gold in 1851 which attracted
Chinese immigration to Victoria on a large scale.
Ships sailed to Australia from Hong Kong with
their cargo of men who had come in search of
the "New Gold Mountain".
Unlike
some of our neighbouring Chinatowns, there was
no gold discovered in Britain. Chinese people
first settled in Britain around 1885. They were
mainly seamen working on steamships. By 1900,
there were about 400 Chinese living in Britain.
Many Chinese who live in Britain today came
in the 1960s from rural Hong Kong and set up
'Takeaway' food shops and other related business,
while Chinese from Malaysia and Singapore came
for education and university degrees. Others
came from China, Taiwan and Vietnam. The 1991
Census put the number of Chinese in Britain
at 156,938. In the mid-1990s, there was another
influx of Hong Kong Chinese immigrants who were
granted British passports as a result of the
'hand-over' of Hong Kong to mainland China (July
1997). These new immigrants are relatively better
educated and have better professional skills.
Chinatowns
are well established in London, Birmingham,
Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle-upon-Tyne etc,
and there are noticeable Chinese communities
in other major cities, e.g. Edinburgh, Belfast,
Cardiff, Bristol, Sheffield, Cambridge, Milton
Keynes etc.
Refugees
and asylum seekers from China are some of the
emerging issues affecting the Chinese community
in Britain today.
Chinatowns
are now established in many major cities around
the world. It was said that the bigger the Chinatown
the more it reflects the success of the City.
It is a port of reception for immigrants from
Mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, at least
as part of their initial stage of adjustment.
Immigrants in South Chinatown under went a process
of replacement. New comers come and stay with
their extended families or on their own in Chinatown
for help, security and protection. But once
they develop a better understanding of the English
language and when they were familiar with life
in the city, they would move out to the suburb
for a better quality of life. However, they
are continuously replaced by other new comers.
Most
Chinatowns are successful in meeting the needs
of early immigrants. The family associations
were the social glue and surrogate families
in the early days. They offered food, housing
and employment and information to new arrivals.
But these associations are less active now,
in helping new immigrants as the numbers of
new comers are greater and their needs are more
complicated.
Even the Chinese Association began offering
social service programs in recent years, including
a government funded lunch program for the elderly
and training classes for clerical work.
Now the traditional associations have given
way to more professional ones. While the problems
of the older generations remain, the younger
generations are addressing community problems
of unemployment, juvenile delinquency, health
care and housing shortages.
For
most Chinese Immigrants, locals and tourists
Chinatown was and still is part of a great heritage
and cultural identification, where a lot of
locals and tourists alike come for Chinese groceries,
Chinese food and Chinese publications or just
to soak up the hustle and bustle of everyday
life in these great cultural towns.
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