Well, rain or no rain, I had to get out. It was raining in the city called Crown when I first set out, at about noon, so naturally I drove instead to a nearby location and bought Chinese food and ate lunch. It rained as I sat in the parking lot eating, and I reflected on a lost opportunity, but then, it started clearing up. As I drove home I could see large patches of blue sky. The clouds were there still, but they were separating and crowding to the edges. It looked as if it had been a quick shower, and not that intense.
As I arrived home I made my decision. I was not going to stay there while there were large patches of blue outside. It was still chilly, but in direct sunlight, it didn't feel bad. I got ready and brushed my teeth, picked up my backpack with my Fuji GW690ii and my Travelwide 4x5, and went out. These are my cellphone photos.
Long line for dim sum. I have been taught that when a restaurant has a long line, it is an automatic sign that you need to go join it. People only wait in line when they have something good, so it must be very good here. I wasn't hungry, though, having eating some Chinese food just an hour earlier.
When you look around other areas, the place seems all too quiet. See the patches of blue? They are a big sea in the sky!
Love the architecture for what seems to be a bank. They say that Chinatown LA is a quaint relic, it is not as "Chinese" as it used to be because the Asian community has gone over to the San Gabriel Valley where they have remade cities such as Alhambra, Monterey Park and Arcadia. It is true, I have been to those cities, especially the mansions all located in Arcadia. Also, there you see the ubiquitous 99 Ranch Markets that cater to Asians. They are polite enough when a non-Asian such as myself ventures in, and the food and other items on sale do not seem to be inordinately expensive. You see pots, brooms, other household items, making those markets a combination of ethnic food supermarket and swapmeet.
I don't know if these are offices or apartments.
Love the feeling of the decorations. To have so many units and to have so few people walking around seems eerie. Are they apartments? Are they places for the elderly?
These are appealing restaurant facades. Of course I took color slide photos with my Fuji GW690ii. I was using Provia film. Now that I think about it, I might have overexposed it if I was using Provia 400, because my settings were f16 at 1/125.
I took about four photos of these commercial fronts.
A very appealing commercial village, with almost no traffic of people. How are they surviving? I remember this area in pre-Covid times, and it used to be heavily visited.
A tribute to who else? To Bruce Lee. This statue is gigantic.
Many shops selling merchandise from boxes and bins outside. Many were selling vegetables, so many that I would see entire sections of a block with different people selling. The competition must have been intense, I wonder how they turn a profit. Also, many bakery stores in Chinatown, almost on every block. Cigar stores too, and restaurants, and stores selling trinkets.
The English-Only people would have a fit seeing these signs. This is the same situation we see in the San Gabriel Valley cities, English is strictly secondary. I guess that that is where many Asian people settle their elderly, and the elderly are much less likely to speak any English than the young people who are proficient and English-dominant (but also bilingual).
I took a slide photo here, I think. I hope I framed it better.
I always appreciate a plant store!
The iconic sign that welcomes people to Chinatown along Broadway Avenue. As a cross street, we have Cesar Chavez Avenue. The Asian community is growing by leaps and bounds, while the Latino community, while still growing, is not on the same pace. How long before Cesar Chavez Avenue is renamed? (It used to be Brooklyn Avenue to honor the Jewish-American community.)
Modest little toy rides, no kids anywhere.
The Velvet Turtle, but this is just an empty dirt lot now. What will come next?
The wall facing the parking lot where I purchase parking. It cost half as much as it usually costs, only $4. The image on the wall looks like Mao Tse-Tung, the Communist Leader, and I always found it so unusual that they would have placed it here in Chinatown, in the USA.
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