3.The representative nature of the geographical and cultural environment of Poya Village provides the possibility that the Poya folksongs’ symbols could be preserved and spread.

Funing County can be called a goldmine of Zhuang culture.For a long time,due to historical reasons and geographical factors,Funing has been sealed off from outsiders only during the Song Dynasty until Han Chinese culture begin to influence the area.Thus,the full richness of Zhuang traditional customs has been well retained.And Poya Village can be said to be typical of this situation.According to the testimony of Ms.Nong Fengmei,the singer of Poya Village,as soon as she was able to remember things,the elders in the village taught them how to sing the folksongs by the fireplace or in the fields and helped them remember the songs by drawing the meaningful pictograph symbols.As time went by,these symbols became dear to the people’s hearts.Whenever they viewed a particular symbol,the song that symbol represents was sung.This way of cultural heritage transmission by oral teaching paired with picture drawing can be considered as the third way of transmitting living cultural heritage,after pure oral transmission and the use of writing systems like the Zhuang square characters.The studies of many Chinese and foreign Zhuang researchers have shown that the Youjiang Valley on the upper reaches of the Zhujiang River is one of the important sources of Zhuang culture.The melody of“Fwen Da Lau”(or“River Valley Songs”)has spread out from the center of Bo’ai into Guangnan,Tianlin,Xilin Counties to Baise,Guangxi,and other places,and can be considered a common Zhuang folk tune of Youjiang River Basin.The singing competition fairs have been a longstanding tradition.Just looking at Funing County,there are over twenty Zhuang folk tunes that have been passed down from generation to generation,more than are usually in use in a single Zhuang area,even in Guangxi region where most of Zhuang people live.The poem“A Spring Outing to Bolai”as follows by He Yu,a magistrate of Guangnan County during the Qing Dynasty,described the spectacular event of the annual folksong competition fair at Bolai Village in Bo’ai Township:

It is enjoyed around the Qingming Festival in April,

One’d better arrive early at the Bolai riverbank.

Those colorful clouds are well-dressed beauties,

And that blue-shirted fogs are the servants.

Who knows who are their masters?

Would you believe that Ms.Luo Yan has a husband?

On the river,they laugh so hard,they flip their boats!

Through the spring rain,we see blurry apricot flowers.

This poem depicts the scene of the Longduan fairs of Zhuang people two hundred years ago,in the Bo’ai area,and reveals,in vivid detail,the prosperous scene of the singing fairs of Bo’ai and other upstream areas along the Youjiang River Basin.The Longduan Festival“singing fair is held every April and all are welcome,young and old.”It is not only a good place for the young to“court by singing”,but also a place where the Zhuang folksongs were passed down from one generation to another.This cultural background formed an important element in the emergence and development of the Poya folksongs.