Miao Mother and Child
Friday, 23. May 2008, 09:41:08
The Maio are an ethnic group in Yunnan- the villages we passed were tiny slivers perched on the side of the road with mountains rising on one side and a river valley falling away to the rear.
Housing was pretty rudimentary, but portable satellite dishes appeared every so often. Yunnan is getting pretty tropical, so most of what is grown is bananas and pineapple. People would sit practailly on the edge of the road chewing sugar cane, while vehicles roared past. The side of the road also sufficed as the childrens' playground. This of course is China, so spotting villagers out in the fields with water buffalos or horses, and cell-phones, was no longer surprising.
We got to stop briefly at one village (as there was a wedding about to take place). This was a bit of a challenge, as the speak local dialects rather than Mandarin. So I couldn't understand them and they couldn't understand me. Anyway, they seemed to like me hamming it up a bit and gesturing a lot, and I was settling in to taking photos when we had to leave. There was another banquet organised for Hekeu, and punctuality is just one of those things that are taken fairly seriously. I was hoping to stay a lot longer...
Anyway, I got this shot of a Miao woman and her child. She's wearing traditonal garb, and the capped teeth seem very common amongst the married women.
Larger Image
Housing was pretty rudimentary, but portable satellite dishes appeared every so often. Yunnan is getting pretty tropical, so most of what is grown is bananas and pineapple. People would sit practailly on the edge of the road chewing sugar cane, while vehicles roared past. The side of the road also sufficed as the childrens' playground. This of course is China, so spotting villagers out in the fields with water buffalos or horses, and cell-phones, was no longer surprising.
We got to stop briefly at one village (as there was a wedding about to take place). This was a bit of a challenge, as the speak local dialects rather than Mandarin. So I couldn't understand them and they couldn't understand me. Anyway, they seemed to like me hamming it up a bit and gesturing a lot, and I was settling in to taking photos when we had to leave. There was another banquet organised for Hekeu, and punctuality is just one of those things that are taken fairly seriously. I was hoping to stay a lot longer...
Anyway, I got this shot of a Miao woman and her child. She's wearing traditonal garb, and the capped teeth seem very common amongst the married women.
Larger Image
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WIDGETIZE
By cakkleberrylane, # 23. May 2008, 11:21:16
I am having my morning coffee after my Yoga class and the moment I see this post I pulled a chair!
I smile reading about the satelite dishes since it is an indication of a child birth control
are there any restrictions of how many kids a family has in that area ??
Speaking of cell phones, we drove with my sister and brother in law to a remote place in Greece.
It is an area that the European Eagle could be seen.We asked a Shepperd close by if he saw any that day and he nodded to us.
We thought he did so he won't scare the birds away. To our astonishment when we approached him, he was on his cell phone listenig to a soccer game!
I hope the caps on the women's teeth are lead free.I can respect even an ugly(to me) custom but I always wonder how much decay this can cause to this poor woman's mouth.
Fantastic post! Thank you!
By ellinidata, # 23. May 2008, 11:40:19
By 1bluebox, # 23. May 2008, 19:22:35
thank you,
I do have some memory of such thing in my"junk never to be useful knowledge" for some reason I didn't connect it to Miao women. I need to refresh my knowledge on it !
I still wonder if the caps are lead free
By ellinidata, # 23. May 2008, 19:29:57
By 1bluebox, # 23. May 2008, 19:57:46
cellphones are getting pretty ubiquitous
I'm not sure what function the capped teeth have, as they always seem to be the top-front incisors. Chewing would tend to work the molars more than the biting teeth. Alas, I didn't know quite what the caps are made from. Of course, living by roads would tend to expose everyone to a lot of vehicle-borne contaminants also.
The Maio originally had reputations as fierce war-like hill-people. No problems this time
The official one-child policy in China has largely been abandoned, but most people still have 1 child, sometimes 2. The main problem now is the cost, as education has to be paid for largely out of private means. So the cost of children's education and child-care tend to deter most from going back to large families.
By chthoniid, # 25. May 2008, 00:20:12
I am amazed that at this time and age there are places that you could never imagined life is still so behind/or different from civilization (with the exception of the TV and cell phone invasion
By ellinidata, # 25. May 2008, 00:38:31