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To see pictures of
the different locations please click the marked text
Before we are leaving
Oslo I will have to explain the reason for this journey.
We are looking for Chinese restaurants.
We are following the assumption that no matter where you travel on the
western hemisphere you are likely to find a Chinese restaurant. That if
you leave the periphery of the periphery and sets out, you might find
something unexpected , but what you can expect to find is a small location
, run by some small south-east Asian family serving Chop-suey.
Why this assumption?
I have been interested in the phenomena for some time. I remember travelling
the west coast of Norway with my father some years ago, how the impression
of white wooden towns and picturesque scenery was blended with taste of
sweet and sour sauces and red paper lamps. That was where we ate, not
only because we liked it, or because they were affordable, but mostly
because it was the only places serving food after 4.pm.
I started to wonder about where they came from, why they came, how do
they fit in.
I went to the library.
In a text in a database containing all articles from the major Norwegian
newspapers the last 16 years I got 258 hits. Mostly restaurant reviews,
or articles on rather ordinary events taking place in a Chinese restaurant:
some local folk music band gave their first concert; a woman was spotted
naked, Per-Kristian and Veronica's alibi at a particular night. That kind
of stuff. Or there are articles with titles like : “The Grorud valley
is fast asleep, a place God have forgotten!” About Hokksund, ”The hotdog
kingdom” -a somewhat grumpy culinary journey through Hallingdal. Commonly
the presence of a Chinese restaurant is associated with the absence of
world events.
How far from the “world”
can you get in western Europe? We left the main road to Trondheim at Kløfta
about 60 kilometres north of Oslo and headed east towards Kongsvinger.
The fertile land and wealthy farmhouses along the river Glomma indicates
that you are still in a cultivated part of Europe, but on each side of
the river valley are the dark boreal forests which starts somewhere outside
Oslo and stretches all the way through Russia until it ends at the Russian
Pacific coast.
Kongsvinger is located
where the river bends by an old fort. Once it was an outpost towards the
Finnskogen wilderness and the Swedish border with a garrison and a 18.century
fortress , a Norwegian equivalent of El Alamo. Now it is a centre of forest
industry with an aging population of about 8000 innhabitants. Kongsvinger
is not exactly a melting pot, but a young couple has travelled from the
far east to there in order to offer its dining citizens and travellers
an option to pizza, kebab, and burgers. It’s funny how the last twenty
years have changed peoples expectation to a meal.
The Chang-Ching House
is located in a traditional “Kafeteria” where you used to get meatballs
and sausages with mashed potatoes in a linoleum and respatex interior,
-authentic Norwegian sixties boredom. You can still get meatballs, if
that is your preference, and the interior is nearly intact except for
some red rice lamps and a shrine of Chinese glitter. I guess that is partly
the reason for their success, their gold painted Buddha and spring rolls
offers a welcomed opportunity for escapism, for some hours wage you can
get a sense of voyage.
We
are travelling north, along the river Glomma , after a cold and rather
uncomfortable night in the camping wagon (The Mobile Gallery) , we arrive
at Flisa . You are not likely to find Flisa on the map, and unless you
are a local you are not likely to have heard about it.
Haiping Pang (31) and his wife Lin Jie (29) heard about it, they settled
there in 1997 and opened their Qui-Qui
Restaurant (and bar) next to the gas station. Haiping has followed
a seemingly well trodden path into Norwegian communities. He arrived in
Oslo eight years ago as a cook at a Chinatown restaurant since then his
plan was first to learn Norwegian, then to get his driving license, while
working as much as he could. The final step was to open his own restaurant.
When he lived in China Haiping used to see outlandish movies, American
movies. They were filled with neon lights. Haiping points out that there
are not many neon lights at Flisa, but after all Flisa is a quiet place,
and he has loyal customers which he drives home after closing time and
a daughter in kindergarten. It did’t matter to him which country he settled
in, as long as he could earn a living there.
We
approached Elverum with high expectation. We had heard from the man at
the gas station next to Qui-Qui that Haiping and Lin sometimes went there
to meet other Chinese, and wage rumours about some mind blowing karaoke
parties with the local Chinese, and that there were at least two Chinese
restaurants in town.
Wildlife. We are trying out hunting garments and drink coffee in a 19th.
century inn, but we can’t find any restaurants. The streets are crowded
with soldiers participating in an exercise where Elverum is supposed to
represent a Kosovo-Albanian town, and that is basically how I feel about;
grey, dull and rainy like the pictures on CNN.
A woman in a camera store explains that there used to be a place at main
street, but the couple who owned it left a year ago, most likely for China.
With the changing political and economical climate in China, most exile
Chinese are welcomed and are actually counting for a main part of the
investments in the booming Chinese economy.
But there were this other place; Graaberg,
it is not exactly a Chinese restaurant , until February it was actually
a Kafeteria frequently used by the local students, and it still is, only
the owners and some rice lamps are new.
Maipin (30) and Zhuge (30) came from Shanghai to Norway 8 years ago, they
have been working at a Chinatown restaurant in Oslo until they came to
Elverum to fill the gap and fulfil my assumption about a Chinese presence
in every nowhere in Norway.
Next
stop is Rena, known from a ever ongoing wolf debate in Norwegian media
and a heavily subsidised cardboard industry which was closed down some
years ago.
We expected a town with no cheers, but really, there is one place which
keeps the spirits up; Shanghai
Kafe and Restaurant. It is located on top of the local SPAR super
marked at main street (the street) some blokes are drinking beer at a
respatex table by the window under the Chinese lamps, they are laughing
as I arrive, they are laughing a lot. A woman enters just after me she
asks her husband to come over to the Kafeteria at the other side of the
street, but no way if he is going to sit there sipping coffee with the
women. Shanghai is the place for blokes. It is most likely the only liberal
space for a male in town, the only place where you can come and go as
you please.
We
are travelling further north, we pass several places; Koppang, Atna, Alvdal,
but no luck, the assumption seems wrong, we are several hours from Elverum
and there are even more hours till we reach the outskirts of Trondheim.
It is as if we have reached a doll drum between two centres of gravitation.
But suddenly out of nowhere, at Tynset,
the centre of nowhere; a red paper lamp in the entrance of the Hotel and
suddenly our hearts are lifted. The hotel restaurant serves Chinese dishes
along with traditional dishes like mountain trout with sour cream, but
the china-man has left the kitchen and gone to Langesund to start on his
own. The restaurant manager explains; she has had 4 Chinese cooks; first
there where Manchu , then Kamwah, Sing, and then there was Ming. They
are the best you see, it takes seven or eight years to become a cook in
China, the first year they chop vegetables, then meat, then they arrange
dishes for a year. They are used to hard work and they never complain.
If she wants another Chinese cook?
O yes, but it’s very difficult to make them come to Tynset you see, all
of her cooks came from the Hong Kong region, they know English and make
the kind of Chinese food we are used to.
The food is very popular with the local people here, since Ming left they
have been trying to make the food themselves, but its very difficult,
its all improvised; a little bit of this and a little bit of that you
know.
Why they leave?
They get lonely I guess, lonely and bored, there are not many foreigners
here, its a very stable community so to speak, even someone from Oslo
would sense that he was an outsider here. I don’t know what Ming and the
other guys did when they wasn’t working, watching telly I guess, sometimes
they went to Trondheim or Hamar to meet friends or play ma-jong or whatever.
”DEAR GUESTS
We allow ourselves
to tell you a little about the history of the China House.
This is the first
Chinese restaurant in Trondheim, owned buy BOBBY KUI with family, and
was opened August 9, 1976. The original China House was located in Oslo,
Sofies gate 15”
where Bobby worked
both as a cook and a waiter for several years. The desire of opening his
own China House was fulfilled by Bobby’s boss when he gave him TRONDHEIM.
From 1976-94 there
have been 13 China House Restaurants along the coast of Norway. A Norwegian
TV commercial says: “Lotto millionaires are not like other millionaires.
” But one thing is
for certain; Bobby is a millionaire, a millionaire in chopsticks…
“We serve Real Chinese
courses as you never have tasted them in Norway,
tasteful courses from
SZECHUAN, SHANGHAI, & KANTON. The courses are served with new and exciting
spices and will always be hot, but not without an experience of taste.
We serve one meal
at the time so that you get the maximum experience of taste. If you are
in a hurry though, we can of course serve all the dishes at once. Please
ask your waiter.
We hope you all have
a delicious meal!
With all the
best,BOBBY
with family.
This Journey through
South-eastern Norway was made in September 2000 with spontan.nets Mobile
Gallery and
Martin
Moe project leader, organizer and author of the article.
Ståle
Sørensen driver, handyman and photograph
(to
see us on rent an artist, click our names!)
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