Modern-day Rapunzels in village where women never cut their hair (pics)

Hidden in the deep mountain of the Guangxi province live women known in China as Hongyao. They live in the Huangluoyao Village and, apart from wearing traditional costume and laughing when they hear a silver bell ring, they are also famous for never cutting their hair.

Huangluoyao Village, inside the Longji Scenic Area, lies in the foot of Pingan Terrace; it is the only Yao ethnic dwelling among the thirty villages of Longji.

60 Hongyao families live there, and there are more than 80 women out of 120 that keep their hair longer than 1.4 meters. The woman with the longest hair has 1.8-meter long locks in a group listed by the Guinness World Record as the “longest hair group”.

The women are blessed with naturally bushy and luxuriant hair and they consider their tufts an important part of their identity. Long hair stands for long life, wealth and prosperity. The girls stop cutting their hair once they turn twelve and they groom themselves using wooden combs and special herbal shampoo and water used to wash rice.

Unmarried girls always cover their hair with black cloth until they get married, and only their husbands are privy to seeing their beautiful hair. Once they have children they add top knots to their head, one for each child, so people know how many children these women have… just by looking at their head of hair.

Even women as old as 90 years have long hair, and strangely enough their locks never turn white. The women attribute this to the natural springs in the region where they go to wash themselves.

Hair grooming for these women is a ritual that is integral to their tradition and culture, and also responsible for putting their village on the tourist map.