Currently in Berlin, I couldn't help but notice a great restaurant in the Mitte district called Monsieur Vuong which serves some of the best Vietnamese food in the city.

I especially appreciated the owner's mini-shrine to the French-made film, "The Lover." My good vibes of the place were also boosted when I experienced an unusually high level of flirting by a couple of gorgeous German blondes seated next to my table.

The owner of this popular, trendy restaurant that's overflowing with the Mitte art crowd day and night is Dat Vuong. Having found success in the restaurant business, he's now moved into real estate, purchasing a string of flats in this low-cost capital that he's decorated in "Asian fashion" to rent to short-time Asians and Asiaphiles in the city. I've noticed a sizeable Vietnamese community in a number of European countries, such as Germany, France, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Norway. For the most part, they represent a model immigrant group in terms of assimilation and achievement at a time when unassimilated immigrants from Africa and the Middle East have become a lightning rod of controversy for the EU.

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