‘Chinese uncles’ talk mayor’s race in the morning at Claddagh Coffee

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Enter Claddagh Coffee on a typical weekday morning, and you will likely find at least 15 retired Chinese men — we call them Chinese uncles in China, a phrase for older men — having coffee and chatting about everything from family gossip to international affairs.  

The café, located at 951 Geneva Ave. near London Street in the Excelsior — San Francisco’s District 11 — has been serving coffee for about a century. Carrying its original Irish name, its orange walls accented with turquoise tiles and different coffee cup illustrations feel a bit run-down, but it has become a go-to hangout spot for the Chinese uncles. Some of them are newcomers to the United States, while others have been living in the neighborhood for decades.

Most of the uncles have retired from jobs at restaurants, construction companies and clothing factories. For all of them, the first stop of the day is at Claddagh, where they get coffee in to-go cups and drink from plastic straws — a habit among older generations of Chinese, for sanitary reasons.

They sit in metal dining chairs around one or two round wooden tables in the middle of the cafe, and talk loudly in Taishanese, a dialect that originated in Taishan, a city off the coast of the southern Guangdong province of China, from which they hail. No matter the ambient music, the Chinese uncles jabber away, easily heard. 

I wanted to talk about the upcoming elections. Why did they care? Did they care? What issues were on their minds? I asked them, one by one, and they all had the same reaction: A quiet pause, and then a few key words, most often about public safety, the economy and the cost of living.

“Public safety has gone a million times worse,” Mr. Wang, wearing a khaki jacket, said in Mandarin. Like most customers at Claddagh, he did not want to be identified by his full name.

He has been living in the city for about 40 years and, ever since Covid-19, he said, the Chinese community here doesn’t feel safe. Some of his friends have been robbed on the street, including his friend, another Mr. Wang, who sat across the table. The two of them, both in their 70s, came from the same village and share the same last name.

“It was two years ago,” Wang #2, said, taking over the conversation and offering an awkward smile as he nodded to confirm the truth of it. He then stood up from his chair and started to gesture how the gun was held against him while he described the incident, in a mix of Mandarin and Taishanese.

“We Chinese like to carry cash around, so we are more easily robbed,” Wang #1 explained.

The cost of living has also changed their routines. 

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“We don’t eat out as much now; at most, once or twice a month,” said Suki, who immigrated from China about 20 years ago when she was a teenager. Suki, who greets the Chinese uncles as a regular at Claddagh, is in her 30s now, and works at a Japanese restaurant in the Excelsior. 

San Francisco used to be a lot cheaper, she added.  

In the good old days, she said, she ate out two or three days a week. Back then, a bowl of pho cost $13.95. Now, it can easily cost her $17.95.

Even though most of the Chinese regulars at the Claddagh live in the southern neighborhoods, they care a lot about downtown’s decline. At least five of them shook their heads or waved their hands in disapproval when one of them started complaining about the lack of tourism downtown, and all the empty stores. 

While they are concerned with the issues, they have little faith in the ability of public officials to make a difference. The half-dozen Chinese uncles I talked to all said they are disappointed in Mayor London Breed for promising too much and delivering too little. Even so, they said they don’t care much about who is running for office this year, and none of them could even name an opponent to Breed. They had even less interest in the district supervisor’s race in their neighborhood. It’s unclear if they vote, or are even registered to vote; a conversation for our next visit. 

Suki felt slightly different about the elections. She said she thinks an Asian mayor, hopefully Chinese, would probably make a difference — or at least would come up with policies that benefit the Chinese community. 

Behind them on a walnut wooden bookcase lay some old books and three leftover copies of the voter guide from TogetherSF Action, a political pressure group, in traditional Chinese. There was also a small stack of door hangers in traditional Chinese as well, from Adlah Chisti, who is one of four candidates in District 11 where many of the uncles live.

Around noon, the men bade goodbye to each other and left in pairs or threes. Some went home, while others headed to nearby parks — to get their daily steps in, one explained. They will, like always, reconvene the next morning.