by Stuart Wood

Brick Lane feels like a cultural festival even on a wet Sunday in December. It is a seamless blend of enticing restaurants, holistic health centres, bars, retro shops, junk and oh! the bagel shop down the end! As it was, Sunday's celebrations saw most of the restaurants erecting stalls and selling take away versions of their specials, to the accompaniment of honky-tonk east-end pianos, fire engine sirens, and ubiquitous, honking horns.

Other stalls reflected the ethnic mix which has always characterised this part of town. There were the usual hair wrap and tattoo places, some gorgeous textiles, environmental campaigns and the occasional ashtangi yoga promotion staffed by supple-looking North Londoners. Off Brick Lane, on a nearby park, was what they might have called the 'main stage' - a hefty rig with an even heftier PA system, and plenty more food.

Tower Hamlets, Brick Lane's governing Borough, is reputed to have the highest number of languages spoken within its boundaries than any other borough in London, and probably the UK. One statistic in 1995 put the amount at over 40, including dialect variations. Those of us who have worked with the community in Tower Hamlets would identify with this. You would not have guessed last Sunday, however, that Tower Hamlets houses the highest number of Vietnamese refugees in London.

Among the food stalls, traders and dancers you would be hard-pressed to have spotted a group from east / south east Asia or the Chinese Diaspora at all, despite its undoubted presence in the borough. I saw plenty of Chinese people among the crowd, as you'd expect in London. The job of promoting, representing and celebrating ethnicity went as always to the South Asians and Afro-Caribbeans.

In addition to the relentless hooting, this gave me a bit of a headache. This festival was a perfect example of how things currently are. The Chinese and east Asians were certainly at the party (I was with three of them) but you'd scarcely know it. People at festivals like to be smacked around a bit. We like big noises, garish colours and showmanship and these are not as alien to Chinese culture as you'd think. If you nip down to Chinatown in the next few weeks you might get a good eyeful of this at the Mooncake festival. Certainly at Chinese New Year it can be unsurpassed for munchies and a good musical kick. So why not elsewhere?

Maybe it's worth asking. Does Chineseness have nothing to bring to the party?