Shops selling steaming snacks line the streets of Seoul's Daerim neighbourhood, home to thousands of ethnic Chinese, some feeling the pressure from mounting anti-Beijing sentiment ahead of South Korea's election.

China has displaced longtime foe and former colonial power Japan in many South Koreans' minds as the country's most distrusted neighbour in recent years.

And ahead of Tuesday's vote, anti-Chinese feeling has spread among South Koreans -- online, at right-wing rallies and in Seoul's Chinatown.

Many of the quarter's Chinese residents, such as 74-year-old Yu Shunzi, flocked to South Korea seeking economic opportunities in the 1990s and 2000s.

"A lot of Koreans still think China is a very backward country and discriminate against Chinese a lot," she told AFP.

Yu, who arrived in 2

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