‘Everybody was kung fu fighting!’: the Chinese village where virtually everyone is a martial arts expert
Almost every villager living in a remote community in southern China is a kung fu master, according to a news website report.
People living in the village in Tianzhu county in Guizhou province can be seen daily practising martial arts while going about their everyday lives, according to Chinanews.com.
The villagers belong to the Dong ethnic minority group and are mainly farmers.
The community is in a rural area bordering Hunan province and villagers are expert at various martial arts, including fighting with sticks and knives, the article said.
It is not clear why there is such a level of expertise in the village.
One story is that people practised martial arts to protect their livestock from wild animals when they first moved to the area many years ago.
Another is that the skills were learned from two kung fu masters who were invited to teach villagers because they faced attack from other communities in the area, the report said.
The fighting skills have been carefully passed down the generations, according to the article.