Panwang Festival celebrated in Hunan (1/5)

A master climbs a pole with knives at the Panwang Festival, which kicked off at Jianghua Yao Autonomous Prefecture in central China's Hunan province on November 18, 2013. Nearly 1,000 representatives of Yao counties and villages from Hunan, Guangdong and Guangxi gathered here to attend the annual event, which is celebrated by the people of the Yao ethnic group on the 16th day of the 10th month in the Chinese lunar calendar to worship their mythological ancestor Pan Hu. [Photo: China News Service /Tang Xiaoqing]