The Girl Who Dances Saye'erhe

Success isn't escaping your impoverished hometown. It's helping your hometown escape poverty.

Born into a family that favored boys over girls, Xiaohua hated it with all her heart. She wanted to get away. She had to get away. So she chose the traditional dance Saye'erho, a cultural practice everyone else avoided.

Saye'erho is a traditional Tujia funeral custom that has been passed down for 3,000 years, also known as "beating the funeral drum."

Some say funeral drumming is inauspicious and means profiting from the dead. Others say a woman performing funeral drumming is simply unheard of.

But she was determined to do what others said couldn't be done. Through sheer conviction, perseverance, and innovation, she brought tradition into the modern age and gave it a fresh look, guiding her hometown onto the broad road to prosperity.