Chengyang (a Dong minority village)

Not sure what happened to my last blog because the power just went out. So here goes attempt number two. Right now we are in Chengyang, which is a Dong village in the Guangxi Autonomous Region. We are staying in a very basic guest house with no heat in the rooms (and it is chilly!) and only squat toilets. They say there is hot water, but I think it takes about 15 min. to come on. All of our meals are served banquet style meaning they just bring out about 4 or 5 dishes and some rice. So far the food has been pretty good. I even ate eggplant today at lunch and it wasn't half bad.
All morning we walked around the area and visited a bunch of little villages and walked through the rice paddies. There is a Wind and Rain Bridge that was completed in 1916 after 12 years of construction and there isn't one nail in the whole thing. During the day local ladies set up shop on the bridge and sell their handicrafts. This afternoon we tried some oil tea, I think it was called. It was sweet and good, with little like rice crispy things floating in it. They grow a lot of green tea around here up on the hillsides and rice down where it is lower. They can't get a good price for the rice so they just grow it for their families for the year. Here the men basically plant rice or help build houses. When they are too old to do those things, they spend their days in the Drum Tower smoking tobacco and playing cards. Today we stopped and had tea in a drum tower with a guy who is 78 years old. He is really hunched over and has almost no teeth left. Here they don't go to the dentist because they think it is too expensive to go to the proper dentist in the nearest town. So instead they wait until the toothache gets really really bad then they pay just a few Yuan to get the tooth pulled in the local market. So most old people have almost no teeth and they ones they have seem to be all rotted. It's no good. And Tim, our local Dong guide who took us on the walk this morning, said that 90% of the men here smoke. He said the young people sort of know it is bad for them, but they do it anyway because they see all the older people doing it, and of course to look cool. He said he has cut way down on his smoking, though. He also said that unlike in the west, where they have tons of warnings on cigarette boxes, here their boxes say things like, "smoke these cigarettes and you'll be able to fly." I don't know if that is true or not, but the Chinese government basically owns or heavily subsidizes the tabacco industry and so instead of discouraging people to smoke, they are still encouraging people to smoke. I think it's part of their population control plan. Just kill off all the people by encouraging them to smoke. In the afternoon we saw a cultural dance performance, and someone in the village had a baby today so there were a bunch of men in the square eating and forcing each other to drink rice wine. I took a shot and it wasn't that bad. Kinda sweet, actually. We saw some other tourists, but they were Chinese tourists and they kept wanting to take pictures of Anne and I. It was weird. But I guess we really stick out around here.