Travels in North West Yunnan: Life with the Yi in Yangyu Chang

Our Yi family were part of a small family clan made up from five brothers their wives . Each of the brothers had built their home nearby the family house ,creating a small fiefdom at the top of the village. The elder brother had inherited the family home where he, his wife and daughter in law looked after his father. Life is very basic in these small holdings but to our astonishment we did have a toilet in fact the only one in our part of the village.
The Yi diet is based around potatoes since it can be grown at high altitudes. Pork is another important aspect of their diet but greens in the the winter were a rarity.
The following pictures are a snap shot of daily life, ending with images taken at the evening parties give by the Yi and boy what parties they were.
As a family we felt very privileged to be invited into these families lives and I hope they got as much from the experience as we did

This is the couple who we stayed with sitting by the fire in the main house used for eating and food storage . Their children went away during our stay and I don't have any pictures but most of the conversation was about the impending marriage of their son who sadly I don't have a record of.

On average the Yi women will carry ten loads of firewood a day. I can only hope this only is during the winter .

This is the main house where we eat, exchanged stories and answered a barrage questions about our life in the UK and how we found China.
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The kitchen. What you can't see in this room are a large store of turnips and preserved food for the winter.

In these two pictures illustrate the main room where the fire was kept burning and some of the food preperation was undertaken.

Grandpa appeared in the late afternoon, often sitting by the fire, rocking on his heels until the late evening. He often smoked a pipe with something reminiscent of marijuana, which might account for his condition by the end of the day. Well he looked very happy. The fire is going all day with logs pushed into the fire by those keeping their hands toasted.

I felt this cockerel was a perfect match for the paintwork. He strutted about all day keeping his chickens in check.

The family toilet and a fine one it is to.

The lady on the right was the wife of our hosts brother,we met her in the wood collecting firewood. See the picture above. I spied her from a distance in her bright clothes contrasting with the rich mountain undergrowth. Later our girls danced with her in the evening. She had a wonderful aura about her , always smiling with a glorious positive energy about her.

Our bedroom which is normally the family bedroom and TV room.

The girls played cards during partof the day but even in the bright mountain sunlight it was still very chilly indeed.

On our first evening these girls arrived looking very sheepish . Things lightened up once we all got dancing.

Here are India and Shelly giving it one with the Yi girls. They asked India and Iona to dance one of our dances from home. Ever resourceful Iona performed a Tusheti dance in the absence of traditional English dancing something she learned during the summer. The Tusheti routine felt more akin to the Yi dancing , however as things hotted up our girls got the Yi girls going with some London clubbing dancing .The whole occasion was terrific.

The Yi girls got India and Iona dressed up in their traditional clothes . This got everyone very excited and the occasion started to feel more like a Yi wedding than and evenings dancing.

The brothers were all keen to get in on the act and pose with India and Iona.

Yes I even got into the garb, intoxicated by the party atmosphere and as ever ,given the chance I'll make a fool of myself.

We finnished off the evening by all sitting by the fire and exchanging questions and jokes. It's amazing how much fun you can have when you don't know each others language .