Chinese tour guide dubbed ‘Mama Moon’ speaks 11 foreign languages and refuses to retire after 25 years
- ‘Mama Moon’ has been selling water and postcards to tourists since the mid-90s
- Her ability to speak with tourists in different languages has made her famous
Videos of Xu Xiuzhen, 77, speaking different languages with foreigners in 2018 brought her instant fame. And to this day, she is still working at the scenic spot selling water, postcards and headdress flowers after nearly 25 years, she told the South China Morning Post.
Xu, also known as “Mama Moon,” has been working as a tour guide and vendor in Yangshuo, a county and resort town in southern China’s Guangxi region since 1998, when the area became famous with foreign backpackers and organised tours.
Xu’s village is located at the base of Moon Hill, a popular tourist destination famed for a moon-shaped hole at the summit.
As a result of the massive influx of foreign tourists, many locals switched from farming to running small businesses catering to the tourists. One of them was Xu.
To support her family of five, Xu, who dropped out of junior school in the third grade, began to learn different languages in order to attract more foreign customers.
“We can earn more money by tour guiding foreigners, so I and the other villagers were all keen to learn different languages, and I am the person who speaks the most foreign languages,” Xu said proudly.
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Xu said she would convert words in any language into Chinese characters based on their pronunciation and then memorise them.