Chinese diaspora: Britain
As part of the BBC's China Week, Tim Luard looks at the Chinese
community in the UK, the first of a series of articles on the
Chinese diaspora.
As China rises in the East, big changes are also taking place in
the size, make-up and status of the Chinese community in
Britain.
While the bustling, brightly coloured Chinatowns in the centres of
otherwise grey and sedate cities like London and Liverpool may be
hard to miss - with their oriental arches and red telephone boxes
turned into pagodas - the Chinese themselves are often called
Britain's "hidden minority".
Yet the stereotype image of someone in a street-corner takeaway
writing down orders for egg fried rice is almost as out-dated as
the picture many Britons still have of a China full of peasants in
blue tunics, waving little red books.
Johnny Hon is chairman of a venture capital company based in one of
the most luxurious new tower blocks in London's Canary Wharf
district - similar in style to the high-rise temples of finance now
to be seen in Shanghai and other Chinese cities.
In one of his suite of offices, banks of TV screens flash up market
figures; in another hangs a picture of Tony Blair with the signed
inscription: "To Johnny and all at Global".
Hon, who is 33 and came to Britain from Hong Kong at the age of 12,
is due to meet at least four other prime ministers on a quick
business trip he's about to make to the Caribbean.
He also makes frequent trips to Beijing - and, naturally, he has
friends in the government there too.
"I help British companies go to China and help Chinese ones looking
to raise funds or invest in the UK," he explained.
He believes at least part of the reason for China's dynamic growth
is that Chinese are hard workers and good at business - something
that also helps explain the rising profile and prosperity of
Britain's Chinese community.
According to the last census, in 2001, there were 250,000 Chinese
in Britain - almost 100,000 more than 10 years previously.
Today they are among the highest-earning groups in Britain - and
the most likely of all groups to do well at school.
British schools and universities now educate more students from
China - about 60,000 - than from any other country.
China's leaders say they are the cream of the country's youth and
will get good jobs when they return, even though many choose to
stay on in the UK.
Historical links
The country's first Chinese immigrants were 19th century sailors
who settled in Liverpool and London's Limehouse district - next
door to the gleaming skyscrapers of today's Canary Wharf, but at
that time a rough area of docks, brothels and opium dens.
In the 1950s and '60s came a much bigger influx - of farmers from
Hong Kong. The collapse of traditional agriculture in the colony's
rural New Territories happily coincided with the development of a
British taste for foreign food. Soon almost every town boasted its
own Chinese restaurant.
Ethnic Chinese also arrived from all over South East Asia, settling
down to make a quiet living in a way that aroused far less
attention than has often been the case with other ethnic
minorities.
"We may be from many different countries, but we Chinese all work
here together like one family," said Millie Lee, a restaurant
worker who came in the early 1980s along with other "boat people"
from Vietnam.
"It's as if we got lost and came together," she said.
As China opens up, a growing proportion of British Chinese, these
days, come from the mainland.
But even the ones who have never been there still tend to regard
China as "home" - if only the home of their ancestors.
Until recently, many felt sad, or even ashamed, at their mother
country's poverty and backwardness. Fong Fu remembers the southern
Chinese province of Guangdong as a place of poor villages with no
toilets. Reports of its transformation into the workshop of the
world have made her feel proud, and perhaps also more confident and
assertive.
"We Chinese do well wherever we are," she said, as she outlined her
plans to move on from being a waitress.
CHINA'S DIASPORA
First major emigration in 14th-16thC by traders and seafarers
Colonial powers used Chinese as labourers in SE Asia and the
Americas
But also have reputation for business success
There are about 30m overseas Chinese in total
Indonesia and Thailand have the biggest numbers - 7-9m each
(estimates)
Singapore has the highest concentration - 3m, or 75% of its
population
"We know how to use our opportunities. We work for others for the
first three years. But after that we become the boss."
New mobility
The Chinese now coming to Britain - as well as the children of
those who arrived earlier - no longer feel the need to find work in
catering or other parts of an "ethnic economy", according to Dr
Frank Pieke, a specialist on Chinese migration at Oxford
University.
"Chinese, like others, are increasingly adopting a mobile,
transnational lifestyle, moving from one job and one country to
another as new opportunities present themselves," he said.
True, there are some, like the cockle-pickers who died at Morecambe
Bay last year, who pay large sums to come here and then find
themselves in jobs at the lowest end of the social scale.
But some 50,000 of Britain's Chinese - 20% of the total - now have
jobs in law, medicine and other professions. Zhu Yonggen is working
as a software engineer in Derby. His lifestyle, food and culture
remain Chinese, and he and his family keep a close eye on events at
home via the internet and the overseas version of the People's
Daily.
"We also talk about China with our British friends," he said. "The
British are becoming much more aware about our country".
The first Chinese to become a British Lord believes Britain is
taking more notice not only of China but also of the Chinese
community who live here.
Lord Chan - honoured for his work in medical science - said it was
significant that this year's Chinese New Year celebrations in
London had been attended for the first time by the foreign
secretary.
"We used to be seen as newcomers, only here temporarily," he
said.
"Chinese have lived and died here for a long time and will continue
to do so. But it's only now that China's new prominence has finally
focused attention on us."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/4304845.stm
