Peng Yinyu got to know her husband Tang Gan Zhusan when they worked at a textile factory in Guangzhou in 2000.

Three years later, the couple decided to live in Tang's hometown in the Liannan Yao autonomous county, one of the poorest areas in Guangdong province.

They bought a van and opened a store selling local products, including mushrooms, herbs and handicrafts, to attract tourists to the ancient houses of the Yao ethnic people in the village of Nangang in Sanpai, a town in Liannan, which dates back more than 1,000 years.