Driving to Anshun Region

Driving to Anshun Region

Gentle Reader,

I am backtracking again, trying to pick up adventures from weekend excursions.  Two weekends ago, one of our weekend trips took us to the region around Anshun.  This area has many minority villages.  The one we journeyed to see housed a combination of Buyie, Miao, and Dong people.  If you remember back to the 2008 Summer Olympics in China, a large portion of the Opening Ceremonies featured the ethnic minority people in the country.  China as 58 minority groups (most of China, over 90% are Han), and over half of those minority groups live and work in Ghizhou Province.

Along the route to Anshun, we encountered a great deal of construction.  People often work 24/7, with machine lights on to guide them at night. There is a large corner in Xing Zhen where people looking for daily work gather each day.  They typically have the triangle packs (hods) on their backs and carry tools used for manual labor, such as shovels, picks, ax, hoes, etc...

The bridge at the entrance to the village was washed out, due to the torrential rains we had that weeks.  So, we worked our way around the back way, entering through what Scott calls "ideas of roads."  It was a very bumpy ride, but flexibility is a primary virtue in China, and we have learned to simply go with the flow.

Namaste,

Marianne/Bailing