December 16, 2005
Is Chinatown It?
Whether you like the sterile, quasi-corporate feel of the newly-invigorated Chinatown or not, it's near impossible to deny how far the neighborhood has come in recent years. It's brighter, louder, crowded with life, and packed with $5.3 billion worth of development spurred by the MCI Center.
But is it the city's hottest nightspot?
The Examiner's Harry Jaffe -- a longtime District resident and political observer -- thinks so. In a column published yesterday, Jaffe threw down the gauntlet on any neighborhood that would want to challenge Chinatown/Gallery Place/Penn Quarter/Seventh Street/East End for nightlife supremacy:
Move over, Georgetown. Step aside, Adams Morgan. Capitol Hill may have had its day. The New U doesn't look so new. Gallery Place, anchored by the MCI Center, may have just become the hippest, hottest place in D.C. You have to walk the streets to grasp the change.Those are fightin' words, Harry. Anyone care to disagree?
Picture snapped by otavio_dc.
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$5.3 billion worth of development spurred by the MCI Center.
I wonder how much tax revenue that has funneled into the city's coffers? Hopefully we'll be saying the same thing about the SW Waterfront after the new stadium is built.
Those are fightin' words, Harry. Anyone care?
I fixed that for you. ;)
Seriously, though, I've always found these silly "such-and-such is the hippest place to go out" discussions pointless. Go where you like. Who cares if it's hip?
Where is Chinatown again?
It loses for the shear fact of, who really wants to say, "Hey do you wanna go out in Chinatown/Gallery Place/Penn Quarter/Seventh Street/East End tonight?" too effin long if you ask me.
Must we anthropomorphize everything? I don't know if its Hip, exactly. That’s an awful lot of bone. Its thigh maybe, knee certainly. Hip is kind of a stretch.
Does anyone else find it strange that, in Chinatown, most of the actual Chinese restaurants and establishments names are written in English, but places like Ruby Tuesday’s and Starbuck’s are written in Chinese? Why is that?
My is that Potbelly's savory. Oh, and I love me some Fuddrucker's - and that Subway (licks lips in anticipation of joy only a footlong steak and cheese can bring). But where in this area (aside from the theatre and dress-code bowling) can you really go out? The Urban Outfitters? I can count on one hand the number of bars in the area, and with that many commas, it's a big area. Just seems over-hyped.
Personally, I think Jaffe has called it. Or rather he called it two years two early. Give Penn Quarter another couple of years and we will be celebrating the Superbowl victory by the Redskins, Nats or whoever in front of the MCI center. Wisc. and M used to be the focal point of DC but its changing.
ChinaPlaceQuarter is entirely too contrived to be hip. Besides, the whole neighborhood clears out after 11. There are approximately 100 times as many people in Adams Morgan or U Street than ChinaPlaceQuarter on a typical Saturday night, so that says something. But for my money, I think the Wisconsin Avenue strip of Glover Park is the hippest hood in DC. 2 strip clubs AND 2 massage parlors within 3 blocks - can't beat it. Pun intended.
I'd just like to say that if Chinatown is what passes for hip in DC, this city's got a looong way to go.
Wow only 8 comments before someone had to make the obligatory. DC isn't hip or cool or fun or a real city. Congratulations on being the first.
Um... yeah, sure, Chinatown's hip. That's the ticket. So everyone should go hang out there. I hear Coyote Ugly is totes fun.
wow only 8 comments before someone had to make the obligatory DC isn't hip or cool or fun or a real city comment. Congratulations on being first.
Every city needs a place like Chinatown. Will I go there every weekend? NO. Will I go there looking for something "cool" to do. NO. But I will go there when I feel like a movie and a big corporate burger. At least now, I'll get the benefit of my tax dollars when I get a hankering to be a corporate whore. That and any thing's gotta be better than what is was 5 years ago. Please.
Stealing from Richard Layman over on Urban Places, this area is not the "hip" part of town. This is the part of town that all of the B&Ts feel comfortable going to. "Hey, look they have a Subway. Just like we do in Nova!" but without any local flavor - and it has little beyond Mathbox and few other spots, it will never supplant Adams Morgan or Georgetown.
Alec: Don't get so defensive. My point wasn't that DC isn't hip. That's outside the scope of my argument. Rather, my point is that Harry Jaffe's definition of hip just doesn't jive with what most people think.
Does anyone else find it strange that, in Chinatown, most of the actual Chinese restaurants and establishments names are written in English, but places like Ruby Tuesday’s and Starbuck’s are written in Chinese? Why is that?
Because it's cute. The fucking signs are in Chinese so that when fat slobs waddle into the city to catch a game at the MCI center, they feel like they're being hip by being in a part of the city that requires signs to be in a foreign language because it's so secluded that the locals haven't learned to read english.
The signs would have been useful 15-20 years ago, when China town was ghetto.
Now that China town doesn't have ANY chinese people living in it, it's fucking insulting to have all business signs in chinese.
This guy is off base but I appreciate his efforts. I remember going to the Boat Show and Auto Show with my Dad and Grandad at the old Convention center when the area was a reallly rough- theres no doubt it has changed for the better.
Would you call Times Square Hip? Probably not. At the same time most people probably wouldnt call the Upper East Side, Lenox Hill for example, "Hip" but there a ton of cool bars and restaurants up there.
Sorry for the obligatory NY example but it fits. Chinatown isnt my idea of Hip but neither is Millie and Als for the 100th time, but hey both are fun. I like chicks and cheap beer, whatever.
You want hip in DC, you gotta go to Cleveland Park. Ton of cool options, Metro Accessible, just off the beaten path enough, great variety. I should do a write up.
Why do people insist on using B&T when describing suburbanites? Last time I checked, you could drive in from Maryland without crossing a bridge OR taking a tunnel.
Manhattan is an island. Last time I checked, the District is not.
Hip? I don't think so. The few hipsters in DC are decidedly not hanging out around the MCI center. Try 14th street, Mt. Pleasant, and a few pockets on 18th/u street. Hip is not a bunch of bagadouches wearing Banana Republic talking about how they're going to fly to Miami and rent a yacht.
is fado hip? i think not. are corporate eateries hip? I think not.
jaffe is off the mark. way off.
"The few hipsters in DC are decidedly not hanging out around the MCI center."
And let me thank $LOCALDIETY for that.
Oh, god, the obligatory "Mt Pleasant is the true hipster place" comment. Mt Pleasant has been supposedly hip since the late '80s. Sure, it has a couple of neat bars, but really folks who live in MtP, as much as you would love it to be true, your neighborhood is dirty, smelly, crime-ridden, and ain't got anything going for it. Aside from a short time in the early '90s, it has never been Hip.
Glover Park? Shhhh! We don't want the suburbanites and MtP residents overrunning us!
maybe not hip, as in Florida Ave. Grill hip, but happenin. The place draws quite a crowd, even on a wednesday night. And some of the non-chain restaurants are good (though maybe not sanitary).
That's a great idea. You guys all go to Chinatown, and the rest of use will be happier in the really hip places that aren't quite as crowded any more. You'll be happier. We'll be happier. Good idea.
Hey dcbubble - if the Nats ever win the Superbowl, I'll eat my hat.
Isn't "hip" a personal choice or perference? Does it really matter what a few hippie liberals think is cool. If you like Chinatown, go there. If you like Adams Morgan, again go there if you want. Whatever makes you happy.
I'd have to second the protest against the B&T comment. NoVa residents are worlds better than the NYC B&T crowd. NYC B&T types are WAAAY meatheadier than NoVa residents. I mean, B&T's in NYC are from Jersey and Long Island, for christ's sake! That's where meatheads are born. NoVa residents are generally intelligent people who work jobs that require good educations. Do they make the same choices you make? No, not always. But are they all greasy-fake-tan-tribal-tattoo-in-from-Nassau-County-To-mate B&T shitheads? No. Not even close.
And besides, if you want to find some real Grade-A B&T, take a look at GWU. And last time I checked, that was in the District.
ewwww there is no hip spot in DC. only old, classy places are acceptable if you want to be a cool DC person, and most of those are in Georgetown. Hip is on the other side of the river in Arlington, more specifically Clarendon. Chinatown is too dodgy to be hip or attract the kind of people I would hang out with.
Hip or not, I think you will find most people in the Metro area in Georgetown than in any other area and more often.
De gustibus non est disputandum!
It's become popular, but crowded is not the same as hip. Fuddrucker's, Legal Sea Food, and other chains...ugh.
Yes, there's Fuddrucker's and Legal Sea Foods. But there's also Zengo, Oya, Indebleu, Zola, Rasika, Zaytinya, Acadania, etc in or close to Gallery Place/Chinatown.
Sophie, you are retarded.
I echo Celena's post, but would like to add Ella's, RFD, Jaleo, 701, Le Pardou and the Shakespeare Theater. As for the person that said there are no Chinese people living in Chinatown, that's bull. Check out some of the buildings on I street, plus the rather large senior's building at 6th and H. Are there thousands of Chinese living there? No, but there are more than you would think, and there are still a few good Chinese eateries around: Eat First, Full Kee, New Big Wong, Chintown Express, etc. As someone who lived in the neighborhood in the bad old '80's, I gotta say, it's improved tremendously.
Chinatown has a big wong!!!!
Since the new Clydes in Chinatown opened I go there almost every night after work for happy hour and good deals on Seafood. The neighborhood is cooking. I also love to hang out at the bars - Zengo, Oya, and oh so cool Indeblue not to mention Zola. This neighborhood is quickly giving DC residents our own version of New York. If you haven't been yet this is a must go and the area just keeps getting better and better. I love going to the grand openings of the new bars which now happens once every few weeks in the area!
Wu, Chinatown has a New Big Wong.
hey, don't hate on GWU. I feel like the Long Island/NJ contingent has decreased in recent years.
Come on guys!! we all know Manassas is the hippest place in D.C.
but really, sometimes I would rather check out asylum (the shop) and a wizards game then die from eyeliner and cigarette smoke up 18th st and U
Ignore Sophie's post. Just visited her blog and she is a Hill intern living in VA. And she thinks Tequila Beach is a cool place to hang out.
Chinatown "dodgy?" Gimme a break. A few panhandlers here and there, yes, but that's in any large city. Been to San Francisco rececntly?
Seriously-a person who says that Chinatown is "dodgy" is a person who has not been there for five years.
What's REALLY interesting is the line in Jaffe's column that says "Capitol Hill may have had its day." Because if I were going to pick a place and call it "the new hip spot in DC," it would be the 8th Street SE Corridor.
Hooters 4lyfe!
The only reason Chinatown is "hip" is that the Chineseness has been driven out and replaced by the boilerplate yuppie establishments that you Anglo purveyors of "hip" prefer.
When will you all realize that anything dubbed "hip" is utterly antithetical to hipness?
DCist has become the caricature of hipster - right down to your beards and nappy haircuts.
My my... such passion! I think we can all agree that the slow closure of ethnic landmarks and businesses in Chinatown is unfortunate. (Remember the Market with all the authentic Chinese ingredients that's now a Vincent Orange campaign HQ?)
That said, it's nice to have some things to do in this neighborhood that my hipster friends from Dupont can enjoy at the same time as my more suburban bretheren. No, I don't mean the Fuddruckers, but any of the bars previous posters have mentioned. Maybe the hipster-boy and the NOVA-ite could come together over free pizza at Ella's. Don't laugh, it could happen!
Save for the fact that, as pointed out elsewhere, "Chinatown's losing it's Chinaness," I feel the same way about the homogenization of that neighborhood as I do about the Olive Garden in Times Square: Gives tourists/suburbanites/exurbanites somewhere to flock to and leave me in peace.
There, I said it.