Throughout my explorations in this project I initially concentrated on the activity within Richmond Public Market and Downtown Vancouver’s Chinatown. At first, I was extremely interested in the comparison of activity between these two places. There are activities in common between the two sites such as being a place of meeting and being a place to purchase food and textiles. However, there was still a clear divide in the types of people that these two areas were attracting. I noticed that Richmond Market Place was more community based and serving the people in that area with a place to grocery shop, or meet up for lunch. In Chinatown these same activities occurred, but there were far more tourists and people from all over the Vancouver area being drawn here. I decided that I was far more intrigued by this relationship within Chinatown and decided to hone in my narrative exploration on that pull to Chinatown.
There are many signifiers which notably mark Chinatown as Chinatown. When entering Chinatown you pass through the Millennium Gate, a large vibrantly colored archway comprised of three ornately covered tiled roofs. This traditional Chinese style of decoration is carried throughout the neighborhood from hanging lanterns to golden dragons places on lampposts. However, these signifiers lead me to ask the question, who are they for? By and large, I believe it is for tourists and those coming to Chinatown for some kind of cultural experience. Those who actually live in Chinatown and purchase goods on a day to day basis may not even notice this decor, as they are largely there to denote the neighborhood as Chinatown to the thousands of people passing through as observers. In many ways those who live in Chinatown become actors when purchasing goods in Chinatown to tourists passing by. Through my narrative drawings I wanted to highlight these signifiers at a small scale then work up to large scale detail showing the actual goods that are purchased, absent of these signifiers.
