COURTESY HIFF Michael Wong scoops a bowl of rice in the Chinese restaurant he owns in Tromso, Norway.

Tale of plucky immigrants
covers little new ground

Canada's Cheuk Kwan opens his documentary "Chinese Restaurants: Three Continents" with the premise that a visit to a Chinese restaurant in any corner of the world will reveal tales of courage and hope, as well as the history of a people willing to go anywhere to improve the lot of their children.

"Chinese Restaurants: Three Continents" Screens at 1 p.m. Sunday at Dole Cannery Stadium 18

It's a story Hawaii audiences are well familiar with because of our own multicultural past -- in fact, America is a nation of immigrants who share the same story. That's the problem with this documentary, part of a series that aired on television in Canada: It restates the obvious.

Yes, we have tales of sailors jumping ship to our shores, of picture brides and paper sons. This documentary offers up three more such tales from Madagascar; Tromso, Norway; and Outlook, Canada.

The documentary starts in Madagascar with the weakest story but picks up steam in Norway with a visit to Little Buddha in desolate Tromso, where it's hard to find workers because no one wants to live that far north. Yet this is where Michael and Ting Wong have set up shop because they learn there is money to be made -- another restaurant in town makes 1 million kroner a month (about $157,000) -- from tourists who head north to view the aurora borealis.

For these tourists, they've created a beautiful environment, but Michael says, "The food doesn't have to be top notch, only acceptable."

For years the couple could get away with serving chop suey and stir-fried vegetables to Norwegians and Japanese tourists, but now that more people are traveling to Thailand and China, their customers have become more sophisticated, even daring to order Peking duck.

But many difficulties come with the territory. Fresh produce must be trucked in from Oslo, Sweden, and as far away as Amsterdam. In the fishing village, the Wongs also have trouble getting fresh fish for their signature steamed fish with ginger and scallions, because the fishermen's catch is frozen or salted off the boat. Then there are help issues, as the restaurateurs complain Norwegians don't work as hard as the Chinese.

In Outlook, Canada, we meet "Noisy Jim" Yuen, a loquacious gent who retired from working his non-Chinese comfort-food diner but continues to help the couple who bought it from him by opening up in the morning and making breakfast for early risers. He passes on another tenet of the immigrant success story: Find a need and serve the community. "I open at 5 when no one else think of opening," says Jim.

The documentary provides a pleasant journey if you have the time, and is likely to be valuable to historians, for who else is asking those who staff these ubiquitous restaurants to share their life stories? But screenings would be of most interest to those of Chinese ancestry, of course, and restaurateurs who want to feel better about their workloads.