Hei Day: Part II: Wa Village

We bullied our driver to taking us to the closest village – Wengding.An hour away, this village is a touristy village that lives 500, introducing the traditional living styles of the Wa people to all other people. The entrance was exorbitant in the sense that it existed at all but after we went inside… it was pretty interesting.

Upon entering, the welcoming Wa people of the village schmeared a mud spot on our foreheads to protect us from evil spirits and had us sip rice wine.

Look how happy about it we are:

Here, we also shot crossbows for 1kuai each and sat around eating from banana leaves.  The Wa people were originally head hunters – and were later convinced by the Han people to kill only cows. Apparently, as told to me from my driver, originally the Han people used to sacrifice Wa people every year for a hearty harvest – which when a united Wa people found out – decided that they would take up headhunting. Pretty cool, like this cow skull.

Now, cute Wa kids sell tea while speaking in unison. What’s cuter than one kid? SEVERAL, all saying the SAME thing. Tricky but effective!

We beat drums, drank tea with elderly village people, and posed in front of this Totoro totum pole.

The village itself was truly spectacular.

I’ll let you see for yourself.

Noon came around! The mudfight was at 2:30, we all jumped back into the minibus and headed back into town.