In contrast to their parents, who are fed up with US culture, more and more teenagers are opting for Mandarin in high school and drinking bubble tea while listening to C-pop.
It’s a concrete slab lined with quadrangular towers, as high as skyscrapers, in the 13th arrondissement (synonyme of district), the largest Asian neighborhood in Paris. The “P13 roof”, as the regulars call it, covers the Oslo shopping mall, with windows saturated with Buddhas and golden cats.
People meet there to “chill” and “fart”, tasting “bubble waffles” and sipping “bubble teas” (tea, fruit juice and tapioca).
Here, we talk about the Asian series broadcasted on the Viki website (subsidiary of the Japanese giant Rakuten). There, we mark with a ballpoint pen our “crush” for Jin, V, Jimin and Jungkook, members of the South Korean boy band BTS, and we parade with our monolid makeup (makeup for a bridled effect). The P13, Olympiades metro, is none other than the center of gravity of Asian fans under 20 years. “I met a girl from Tours who wanted to come here more than to visit the Eiffel Tower,” recalls Emilie, an 18-year-old Parisian.
From 4th to 2nd grade, Emilie spent almost all her weekends on this roof, with her friend Nandita, from 91. Both of them like to describe themselves as former “groupies” — that is, fans of K-pop (Korean pop). “Most of us start out loving Korea before we get interested in China,” Nandita admits.
Here they go into the gallery, with its low ceiling and yellow light, to push the door of the specialized store Musica, a dozen square meters at most, covered with acidulous album covers. The salesman pulls out the latest WayV, the Chinese sub-unit of the Korean group NCT: “To conquer the Chinese market, which is still very closed, the major Korean record companies are re-recording their flagship singles in Mandarin and hiring Chinese artists. So the K-pop business is gradually leading its fans to discover modern China.
A true and deep love for the country
Emilie and Nandita gently laugh at all the gadgets — cushions, school bags and magnets — bearing the effigy of the “idols”, sold in the rest of the gallery. Today, as high school graduates, they have a true and deep love for China, whose language they have been learning since high school: Nandita is passionate about the “Silk Roads”, Emilie follows the adventures of Detective Dee — “an investigator of ancient China, it’s magic! — in a series of feature films in Mandarin, directed by the Hong Kong filmmaker Tsui Hark.
Both of them are distressed by the trivialization of anti-Chinese racism suffered by one of their friends: “Someone told her to go eat her dog, on Twitter! I was shocked,” says Nandita.
The girls walk with a determined step towards Paris Store, the temple of Asian food: Emilie immediately spots the fake dried meat made of plants, Nandita the jelly jars. “When we go to a Chinese restaurant, we don’t choose the clichéd buffets with Cantonese rice. Last time, we tasted chicken feet with soy sauce. There were still the nails!” they say proudly before making a stop at the sweet drinks section. Nandita is leaning towards the Taisun with frozen herbs, Emilie for the coffee with milk in a can. “It doesn’t sound like much, but it’s really good,” she explains before informing a customer.
“THERE ARE CHICKS WHO FOCUS EXCLUSIVELY ON ASIANS. THEY ARE READY TO HANG AROUND THE EIFFEL TOWER TO PICK THEM UP.”
-NANDITA
Next step in the competition: Tang Frères. But, after the turnstile, the girls stop dead in their tracks at a pile of magazines with a devastating title — “The mixed couple, is it possible? They flip through the pages, exchange a few glances, and memories come flooding back: Emilie dated “a boy with Chinese papers” from her high school for nine months. “The problem is that I didn’t exist in the eyes of his family”, she regrets, before solemnly specifying: “I was in love, right! It was not a fetish… “ The subject is thorny : “There are chicks who focus exclusively on Asians. They are ready to hang around the Eiffel Tower to pick them up,” says Nandita. “And some guys want to date Chinese girls because they think they are quiet and obedient. When a guy from school told me that, I wanted to send him to get a sex robot!
Towards Sainte-Anne Street
It’s time for an aperitif. Direction Pyramides by line 14, “the line for Asian fans” since it connects Olympiades to the fried noodle shops of rue Sainte-Anne, in the 1st arrondissement of Paris.
Connoisseurs sit down at The Alley, a Taiwanese bubble tea shop — “the tastiest,” says Emilie, who also appreciates the uncluttered decor around an artificial tree. “It’s really modern China!” she says as she relaxes. They order a fruit tea and a chocolate tea. “We pierce the lid with the straw, taste the brown sugar, stir nine times and drink…”, explains Emilie, placing on the table some Mikado with mango bought at the Paris Store.
This bubble tea, to be drunk with a very wide straw to let the tapioca pearls pass through, the girls discovered it before the media started advertising it. “In Newcastle, England, in 2012, I found one, please!” assures Emilie. They also saw it in the Taiwanese series The Garden of Meteors on Netflix, which features a group of popular students who play bridge and get top grades at Ming De College in Shanghai. The campus is beautiful,” says Nandita. You just want to go and study there.”
Glossary
Baozi :
A small bread made from wheat flour and water or milk, stuffed and steamed. The dough of the South Chinese and Vietnamese versions contains sugar, while the Northern Baozi is salty.
Bubble waffle :
Hong Kong bubble waffle, topped with ice cream, fruit or cookie pieces. Baked in a honeycomb mold, it is crispy on the outside and soft on the inside.
Bubble tea :
Also called “zenzoo”, originating from Taiwan, it is a mixture of cold or hot tea and milk, flavored and embellished with tapioca pearls, which is sucked with a large diameter straw.
C-pop :
Chinese popular music, sung in Mandarin or Cantonese. During the Cultural Revolution, it was considered by the authorities as a “capitalist poison”. It is divided into two main trends: “mandopop” mainly in Beijing and Taiwan, and “cantopop” (Cantonese popular music) produced mainly in Hong Kong.
Funny pandas :
Comic videos broadcast on the Internet, in which pandas are seen scratching their bellies, swinging or sliding down a slide. Also called “cute pandas”.
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