Miao Still Life

A shot from the Miao village of Wudong in Guizhou, China. The careful woodwork on the windows, the orange of the drying corn, the weathered wood of the walls. Image has a nice autumn feel to it.

Miao Girl

Portrait of a Miao girl in full ceremonial dress from the village of Lang De (see Welcome and Fixing an Earring) in Guizhou, China.

Minzu (中华民族)

Part of an enormous mural in the Ethnic Museum at Minzu University showing the 55 recognized ethnic minorities in China. The Miao (see A Gathering of Miao and Welcome), with their beautiful silver headdresses and necklaces, are shown in the lower right of the image. I was told to put my camera away shortly after taking this picture. [NOTE: Non-Han Chinese are known as "nationalities"; the Chinese word for this is minzu (中华民族)]. 

Ancient Way of Life

This clip shows Miao villagers tending and planting their rice fields. Which is something that they have done for hundreds - if not thousands - of years and are very good at. [NOTE: If you look carefully, you can see the string the farmers lay out to make sure they plant in a straight line. I love the water buffalo lounging in the mud.]

Firewood

Many of the Miao families in southeastern Guizhao cook and heat with firewood. Household interviews (see Wudong and Tao Jiung) suggest that a family harvests about 75 kg of firewood a week, and twice that amount during the winter months. Taken together, this represent about 1.2 tons of wood per family. Villages with 100 families, e.g Taojiang and Wudong, may remove over 100 tons of firewood a year from local forests. This material reportedly comes from fallen or dead trees, or live broadleaf stems less than 6 cm in diameter (such as those shown in the image above). This annual creaming of small diameter broadleaf trees is undoubtedly having an impact on the floristic composition of the forest. Conifers are being planted, while the regeneration of broadleaf species is continually eliminated through firewood collection. [NOTE: Among other things, our research in Guizhou will asses the impact of firewood collection on the structure and composition of local forests.]

Welcome

Miao villagers at Lang De (see A Gathering of Miao and Fixing an Earring) perform a dance of welcome for visitors. [NOTE: The entire village came down from their fields to do this.]   

Fixing an Earring

Another image from Lang De (see Matriarchs and Fire Hydrant).  A young Miao woman adjusts her earring before walking into the village plaza. 

A Good Bowl of Noodles

Breakfast in a small Miao cafe in Xijiang, Guizhou.  Delicious noodles. [NOTE: Very few of us answered in the affirmative when asked if we wanted chili sauce with our noodles.  The Miao have killer hot chili peppers]. 

Fire Hydrant

When you live in a village made entirely of wood (Cunninghamia lanceolata (Lamb.) Hook wood, to be exact), the last thing that you want is a fire.  Image shows one the fire hydrants scattered throughout the 700 year-old Miao village of Lang De in Guizhao, China.  

Room With A View II

This little back room was in one of the Miao houses in Wudong village where we did an interview.  Can you imagine brushing your teeth every morning with this view in front of you? [NOTE: See Room With a View for another beautiful dwelling vista].