The expats living the quiet life in rural southwest China
Trading city life for remote villages in the South China Karst region might seem an unlikely choice for expats but, as Thomas Bird discovers, some wouldn't have it any other way
The South China Karst is a region of extraordinary topography - a land defined by limestone crags, seemingly otherworldly in their gravity-defying composition. The karst may be nothing more than a product of several millennia of limestone dissolution, but it's easy to grow misty-eyed when confronted with this natural spectacle.
Historically, this area, which spans the provinces of Guangxi, Guizhou and Yunnan, was a hotbed of ethnic insurrection and separatist movements. The region proved so difficult to pacify that the Chinese have long dubbed it "the land of a hundred barbarians" and even today, ethic minorities, as well as local Han, eke out lives as removed from mainstream affairs as one can be in today's China.
In a remote corner of karst country, the Bama Yao autonomous county has risen to prominence in recent years. The Bama Longevity Village is the county's hot ticket, due in no small part to the disproportionate number of centenarians living there. The native Zhuang and Yao all claim a family member who is at least 100 years old, with the eldest villager, Huang Xinbo, having chalked up 118 years, if all is to be believed.
Busloads of health-conscious pilgrims descend upon Bama from around the nation. In Poyue, a market town near Bama Longevity Village, holistic holidaymakers can be found bartering over exotic mountain fungi or glugging down "river of life" water - when viewed from the hills, one of Bama's principal waterways looks the calligraphic version of the character " ming", meaning "life". Yet despite the new timeshare apartments erected to accommodate the sick and elderly, bucolic Bama county is largely untouched, especially when compared with other Chinese tourist destinations.
Beat the rush to China’s last tourism frontier – remote Dulong Valley
"They're just bussing in Cantonese grannies to buy herbal remedies for their colds, that's it!" as my host, Stephen Cramb, puts it.