No country for chinamen

While I've been working in Charlotte, my employer has generously put me up in a shopping mall. More precisely, a corporate housing park adjoining a shopping mall.

My neighborhood's centerpiece is a P.F. Chang's restaurant. In my 6+ months in Charlotte (no shit), I've run, walked, or driven by this restaurant hundreds of times. But last weekend was the first time I paid any attention to its full name: P.F. Chang's China Bistro.


Now, China is a noun. Bistro is a noun. Juxtaposed, the two words don't make any sense. Presumably, what Paul Fleming (P.F.) and Phillip Chiang (Chang; rather obviously sic) wanted to connote was the idea of a Chinese bistro. Why they didn't just use "Chinese Bistro" is anybody's guess.

(Not that "P.F. Chang's Chinese Bistro" would be totally accurate, either. But at least it's coherent. And I'm willing to admit that "P.F. Chang's Bistro Serving Food that One Might Charitably-- in a Moment of Postprandial Narcosis, Perhaps-- Call 'Chinese-Inspired'" doesn't exactly roll off the tongue.)

These days, every time I look at the sign, I can't help but think of the word "Chinaman". Am I the only person to make this connection? I won't go so far as to accuse P.F. Chang's of racism, but isn't it amazingly stupid to name your restaurant after something that evokes a well-known racial epithet? Especially when you have to butcher the English language to do so?

That's all for tonight. Please join me next time for another episode of Painful and Turgid Discourses on Stupid Shit that Nobody Else Could Possibly Care About.