CAKES.(Chinese food cart vendor in New York, New York)

Publication: The New Yorker

Publication Date: 19-MAY-03

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COPYRIGHT 2003 All rights reserved. Reproduced by permission of The Condé Nast Publications Inc.

SALES DEPT.

The other day in Chinatown, at the corner of Bowery and Grand, David Chen, the seventy-year-old, five-foot-three Cantonese-born owner and proprietor of a small food cart, was going about his business. There was no hint of any anxiety about sars, nuclear weaponry, or banking flimflam--just the usual focus on coming and going, especially of honking cars and trucks and of backpack wearers shuffling on foot. There was not a face mask in sight.

Chen stood inside his gleaming stainless-steel roofed cart, which was stocked with his single ware--"all natural hot mini cakes--20 pieces for $1.00."This label, in English and Chinese, appears on three sides of the cart. He seemed to be spotting every likely customer from half a block away, and they came...

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