Huanggang Village, located in Liping County, Qiandongnan Prefecture, Guizhou Province, is an ancient Dong village with a history of nearly a thousand years, and the male Dong song originated here.

In 2012, Huanggang Village was among the first batch to be selected into the "Traditional Chinese Villages" list. In recent years, the development of tourism has brought considerable changes to this small village.

Dong villages maintain traditions

Farming does not require chemical fertilizers, sickles, or machinery

Currently, there are five batches of villages in my country totaling 6,819 Selected into the "List of Traditional Chinese Villages". Such a large number of traditional Chinese villages have formed the largest and most valuable agricultural civilization village group in the world.

Among them, 724 villages in Guizhou Province have been selected into the list of traditional Chinese villages, ranking first in the country in number.

Huanggang Village, Liping County, Guizhou Province

Overlooking Huanggang Village from the air, it is a row of stilted buildings and residential buildings scattered in the mountains. A small stream passes through the village, and the clear water flows through the village. The stream flows slowly and people live along the stream. Against the background of blue sky, white clouds, green mountains and green water, this place has become a paradise landscape.

Luo Deyin, associate professor at the School of Architecture, Tsinghua University: The first time I came to Huanggang Village, I was particularly shocked. It is very rare to find traditional villages without impurities in China. They are extremely rare.

Associate Professor Luo Deyin has long been committed to the research and utilization of traditional villages. He is very familiar with Huanggang Village and has visited here many times.

Diaojiaolou in Huanggang Village

The most iconic building in Huanggang Village is the five drum towers. All major and minor matters in the village are discussed in the drum towers. Villagers also gather in the drum towers when they have nothing to do. Come to chat and meet friends. During major festivals, villagers gather here to sing and dance. It can be said that the Drum Tower has a supreme status in the hearts of the Dong villagers.

The five drum towers in Huanggang Village represent the five Fang clans. This drum tower is both the temple and the home of the Dong people.

Huanggang Village Drum Tower

Huanggang Dong Village has a history of more than 800 years, dating back to the late Song Dynasty. Since the Dong people do not have their own written language, part of the remaining history is only It can be sung through songs, and another part of the history has been written into the traditional life of the local people.

The three stone tablets standing at the entrance of Huanggang Village Primary School can be traced back to the third year of Xuantong in the Qing Dynasty. Most of the content engraved on the tablets are village rules and regulations and etiquette of the way of life. This is also the reason why Huanggang Village The only historical evidence with written records currently preserved.

Huanggang Village Stone Stele

In Huanggang Village, a Dong village that has existed for nearly a thousand years, many unique local cultural traditions are still preserved, and this cultural tradition is also deeply reflected in their Among the living habits.

This purely Dong village, home to more than 1,500 people, maintains traditional farming methods. There is no need for chemical fertilizers in farming, no sickles for harvesting, and no machinery for rice grinding. Most of the villagers wear traditional Dong costumes every day. This is not possible in most traditional villages.

Ducks in the village

Wu Xianzhong, a 34-year-old villager, is a native Dong person here. He said that the Dong people like ducks. When working in the fields early in the morning, they will pick the ducks up the mountain to raise them when the sun sets. If you pick them back again, they will stay with the ducks all day long and treat the ducks like "children".

Every Drum Tower must raise a big buffalo king, which proves the prosperity of the Drum Tower family. The treatment of the Ox King is more nurturing than that of humans. Not only does it have a dedicated bull trainer to take care of it, but the villagers in the Drum Tower also take turns to go to the mountains to cut fresh grass to feed it, and feed it once a day. Jin glutinous rice wine, if it is hot summer, take a bath at least three times a day.

Buffalo King

The chief executive of Huanggang Village has five surnames, and 95% of them have the surname Wu. Wu Xianjin, who was born in the 1990s, was elected as the youngest village committee director of Huanggang Village through villagers' voting in 2017. Although he is young, he knows everything about Huanggang.

Villagers cooking

Wu Xianjin said that although the villagers are self-sufficient, the economy is very backward and it is a well-known poor village. What makes them happy is gathering together to sing Dong songs.

Dong big song is a multi-part, non-conductor, unaccompanied, natural chorus folk chorus form in the Dong area of ??China. It originated in the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period and has a history of more than 2,500 years. In 2009, Dong folk songs were included in the World Representative List of Human Intangible Cultural Heritage. There is a local proverb, "If people don't sing, they will grow old; if flowers don't sing, they won't bloom."

Wu Chenglong, inheritor of Dong folk songs in Huanggang Village, Liping County, Guizhou Province: If you can’t sing, you will have no friends and no status in the village. Then if you want to find a girlfriend or date, many girls will not like you.

Villagers sing Dong songs

The beautiful natural environment, simple and rich Dong culture, beautiful tunes and majestic Dong songs attract tourists from all directions.

Foreign tourists

It is difficult to find a room in a B&B

Protecting the village from generation to generation has become the bottom line of the villagers

With the promotion of the rural revitalization plan , tourism development has become a major trend in Huanggang Village. Huanggang Village, a thousand-year-old Dong village, has both profound Dong traditional culture and cultural inheritance of Dong songs, attracting more and more tourists. However, the supporting facilities such as catering and accommodation are not perfect, and the tourist experience is not good. Wu Lianxing, a 22-year-old villager, is the first person in the village to renovate old houses. His inn has been expanded twice from 20 rooms to 35 rooms, but it is still hard to find a room. Now he can make an income a year by opening the inn. More than 200,000 yuan. Being able to earn so much money by guarding his home was something he had never even dreamed of before.

Wu Lianxing’s B&B

While Wu Lianxing was planning the next development plan, the Maker Center invested and constructed by the China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation was also in full swing. The first phase of the Maker Center and the second phase of the B&B project under construction are a tourism poverty alleviation demonstration project launched in response to the country's poverty alleviation task. They are expected to be completed by the end of October 2019.

Construction site of the Maker Center

Regarding the development, the villagers have two opinions. The young people advocate development, while the elderly are opposed and cannot get the support of the elderly. It is difficult to carry out large-scale development in the village.

Under the coordination of the village committee director Wu Xianjin and Professor Luo Deyin, the villagers finally reached a consensus, that is, to maintain the appearance of the existing original village and not to over-develop it. , the first point is that red brick houses cannot be used to replace the traditional factors of wood. This generation has defended the village, and the next generation must also defend it.

Homestays under development in Huanggang Village

Liping County currently has 98 traditional Chinese villages, making it the county with the largest number of traditional villages in Guizhou Province, of which there are as many as 70 villages inhabited by the Dong ethnic group. In recent years, the tourism industry in Liping County has developed vigorously. The county has coordinated and connected the "Baili Dong Village" to form a tourism "Baili Dong Village" tourist belt.

According to data, in the first half of 2019, Liping County received 2.1326 million tourists, a year-on-year increase of 31.9%, and achieved a comprehensive tourism revenue of 1.954 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 34.55%.

Liping County

Half-hour observation:

Traditional villages have multiple values ??such as history, folk customs, aesthetics, literature, etc. They are the carrier of history and culture and the embodiment of nostalgia and nostalgia. It is also a concentrated expression of the long history and national spirit of the nation. Traditional villages need to be well protected. At the same time, many traditional villages belong to underdeveloped areas and have an urgent need to get rid of poverty and become rich.

Protection requires funds, and getting rich requires financial means. Driven by these two needs, many people have thought of developing the tourism industry. Some traditional villages have brought wealth to the villagers and changes to the villages through the development of tourism.

However, it should be noted that the development of tourism must be based on the protection of traditional villages. It is necessary to build a long-term plan through top-level design to coordinate the development of tourism development and original ecological protection. Only in this way can the beautiful scenery of nostalgia and nostalgia be preserved forever. Keep it.