See moment that shocked CNN reporter during interview deep in rural China

This is how people celebrate the Lunar New Year in Daly Village. This year's celebration is particularly special. All the adults around this table work in factories in cities. This is the only time many of them can see their children; China's zero COVID policy for the past three years has made everything even more difficult. The people here are warm and welcoming. They are very friendly. I was passing by and they said, Come join us for lunch. We came to this place in China, province of Guedes O del Sur, to help. A part of

rural

China celebrates the Lunar New Year without pandemic restrictions.

This town is nestled

deep

in the mountains. It is difficult to access the remote control because of that. For hundreds of years since the villagers settled here, most of the food they eat is grown or raised by themselves. We visited the houses of the villagers. Sanjaya welcomes us with a gift and alcohol, both made with rice from the nearby rice fields. Gourmet drinking is a big part of the celebration here. Don't go and Sanjay is popular in this town. The door is barely closed. Family members arrive to use this machine. The poor and the freshly baked sticky rice.

It turns into paste. His machine is a novelty here. Before they had to pound the rice by hand with sticks for hours. About 1,000 people live in this town. And for hundreds of years they have lived in these traditional wooden houses. And you can hear the chickens singing and there are also ducks that they raise to eat. In many ways, this place is like a time capsule. Their physical isolation has preserved their way of life for centuries. Through China's Dong ethnic minority. They have their own language, tradition and culture, but they cannot escape the economic realities of modernity.

Normally, this town is full of old people and small children and most of the working-age adults are gone, working in distant factories and sending money home. It is only during these few days during the Lunar New Year holiday that you can all really be together. We meet this migrant worker who has just returned from Jiangxi province, more than 600 miles away. This is a job, he told me. He brought some oranges and candy for his son and traveled more than a day to get home by bus. This couple works in a factory 500 miles away in Guangdong province, manufacturing circuit boards.

I hate it when parents are away, their grandparents take care of the kids. This is common in

rural

China. For the first time in three years, millions of Chinese immigrant families can finally reunite without fear of COVID lockdowns. I'm trying to find out if the remoteness of this village has in any way protected it from the devastating wave of COVID cases and deaths in the country. It's all of Asia. Almost everyone I talk to on camera says no, someone around them has contracted COVID, like this elderly woman who makes traditional crafts. But we come across another group of young people who say the opposite.

The man in the brown jacket with his back turned is a doctor at a hospital in a nearby city. So we have the three government vigilantes following us. A group of six government caretakers greeted us the

moment

we arrived at the village. It is common for local officials to keep a close eye on foreign journalists in their jurisdictions, especially persistent in this town, following our every move. So we just wrapped up the

interview

and one of the government caretakers sat there right away. At least four of them booked rooms in the same hotel as us or nearby.

So we left town to visit a public hospital in a neighboring county about two hours away, hoping that these government caretakers wouldn't follow us so that people would feel more comfortable speaking freely. We entered the fever clinic. It is almost completely empty. In the main area of ​​the hospital there are more people, but it is not crowded. It's a stark contrast to images of overflowing hospitals in China's major cities for weeks before he asked a nurse on another hospital floor if it was full of patients a few weeks ago. She says there are always a lot of people here.

We try to ask why it looks empty here. But another doctor interrupts and ends our

interview

. We find a woman, a relative of a patient, who is willing to talk to us. Shortly after we realized we were being followed, apparently by a completely different team, there are at least two or three government vigilantes. They still follow us here. It is very obvious that they follow us from hospital to hospital, preventing anyone from talking to us. I try to confront them: Are you thinking, Karl, that he is leaving now? And what happens next? During my interview, with this girl we were

shocked

.

Okay, so I interviewed the girl and then her caregivers literally took her away. The man takes the girl and her family away from her and then leaves them alone. But his interviews at the market have ended. The China CDC says the peak of COVID nationwide has passed. But in rural areas like this, experts say there are likely many more people suffering silently who died at home because they couldn't afford to go to the hospital or couldn't get there in time. On their way back to town they were greeted by the squealing of pigs preparing to be slaughtered.

It is a Lunar New Year tradition. Some of the families raised the pigs themselves. Others buy them from sellers like this woman, who tells me that now people can get together and barbecue together. Her business is booming. Decades ago for most rural families. This was the only time of year when they could afford to eat meat. Now let's talk about getting the family together to celebrate. So a whole family of relatives is gathering for the Lunar New Year, enjoying that freshly slaughtered pork. Sanjaya shows me how they dress and style their hair for special occasions, showing me all the clothes and fabrics from her house that she has made herself.

Just a thin strip of this fabric takes more than a day. But mothers here tell me that they don't expect their children to follow all the traditions. One of Sandy's relatives, a young woman who works in a cosmetics factory 600 miles away in Guangdong, invites us to her home. Her parents and grandparents are proud that she sends most of her earnings to them, whether in town or in distant factories. . They are working people. They will do whatever it takes to give their children a better life, even if it means a long time away from them. Make meetings like these even more meaningful.

Selina Wang, Daily People. Guedes in China