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Wherever there are Chinese people in the world…. you’d probably find a takeaway. There is a Chinese takeaway in every town in the UK. Nowadays, it’s so common to order a Chinese from an app, that you never get to see the people who prepare your food.

In the 1950s, immigrants from Hong Kong and the New Territories started coming to UK to make a new start. Their spoken English may not have been good enough to get other jobs they were actually skilled in, and so in order to survive they opened up Chinese takeaways. They moved all over the UK, bringing their cuisine to people. By the 1970s, there was at least one takeaway in every British town.

Then the second generation of British Chinese kids were born and they grew up in the UK. As they spoke much better English than their parents, the takeaway kids were often the ones who were at the front of house, taking the customers’ orders. Rather than go out and play with their friends, the takeaway kids missed out on a normal childhood because they helped out to ease the burden of their exhausted parents after school.

From peeling shrimp to dealing with racist customers, the takeaway kids had to grow up fast. Growing up in their respective towns, takeaway families were often the only Chinese people for miles around, certainly the only British Chinese kids in their school. In this film they share memories of what it was like to grow up in a takeaway, and the other side of the story: the customers themselves. Â鶹Éç Stories go behind the counter to meet the Britain’s Chinese takeaway kids.