Dianxi Xiaoge

Dianxi Xiaoge (born 1990) is a Chinese food vlogger and YouTuber from Yunnan.

Dianxi Xiaoge, whose actual name is Dong Meihua , was born in 1990 in Shidian County in Baoshan, a prefecture-level city in the southwestern part of China's Yunnan province which borders Myanmar.

In Chinese, "Dian" is for short for Yunnan and "Xi" means "west".

She included the phrase as part of her online name since she lives in the western part of Yunnan.

In Chinese, "Xiaoge" means "little brother".

Despite being a woman, she calls herself this since she had been a tomboy as a child.

She found "Xiaomei" to be too cute, whereas she liked "Xiaoge" for coming across as more playful and carefree.

Dianxi Xiaoge studied to become a police officer at Sichuan Police College though upon graduation in 2012 chose to join an Internet startup company in the marketing department.

She planned to eventually buy a house in Chongqing and move her parents in so they would all have a better life.

But she returned to her village in 2016 after her father had a heart attack.

To make a living in Yunnan, Dianxi Xiaoge began selling local specialities online before capitalizing on the rise in 2016 of short videos when she started posting her own.

She has had Dianxi Xiaoge as her online name since around 2016.

Dianxi Xiaoge also has the nickname Penji, and her viewers call her Apenjie , mimicking her younger brother , Xiaohao, who calls her Apenjie in the videos.

Her village's tradition is that when a baby is born, the mother's family will visit.

The newborn will be named by whatever the family brings.

Dianxi Xiaoge's maternal grandmother brought a bucket for cleansing and a chicken, which is why she was given the nickname "Penji" or "Bucket Chicken".

She created her YouTube channel in 2018 and first went viral internationally after releasing a video where she made hamburgers for her grandparents who had never eaten them before.

Scholars have called her a cottagecore content creator and an example of the rural living segment of the Wanghong economy.

Dianxi Xiaoge's videos showcase the calm, idyllic village life and feature her making videos of Yunnan cuisine using produce that she planted, harvested, and raised herself.

Her male Alaskan Malamute named Dawang follows her around in many videos.

She ends her videos with a family meal of what she cooked.

Urban dwellers have viewed her videos as a temporary refuge from the bustling, stressful city life.

Coda Media's Isobel Cockerell said Dianxi Xiaoge's presence and popularity on YouTube despite the censorship of YouTube in China indicates she has implicit government support.

Dianxi Xiaoge, along with Ms Yeah and Li Ziqi, are the only Chinese Internet celebrities who have reached international prominence, according to the Southern Metropolis Daily in 2019.

Her actual name is Dong Meihua, and she goes by the nicknames Penji and Apenjie.

Dianxi Xiaoge lives in a family farm in a small western mountain in the town of Youwang in Shidian County in Baoshan, Yunnan.

It was challenging for her parents to make a living farming in the village, which led her to seek schooling and employment outside her province.

Her younger male cousin lives in the house next door and in 2019 purchased 300 baby chickens using funds from jobs he did outside the province.

In 2020, she had roughly 16 million subscribers on all her platforms including Sina Weibo, YouTube, Douyin, and Facebook, and her videos each were receiving roughly 20 million views.

Her Weibo was among the 10 most subscribed independent accounts that year.

Dianxi Xiaoge lives in a family farm in a small western mountain in the town of Youwang in Shidian County.

Her village in which 140 families live is about a one-hour bus ride from Baoshan Yunrui Airport.

She lives about a 30-minute drive from the town in the remote mountains where houses including hers are constructed along the hillside.

In her courtyard, she has a pigpen where she raises pigs and a cowshed where she raises cows.

A stone bridge with water flowing downwards is at the right of the courtyard.

Succulent plants and other kinds of flowers and plants fill up the entire courtyard.

The house beams are made of old-style wooden frames.

Inside the house, the walls are covered in several old photos, while the floor is made of wood.

The farmhouse has a wood-fired stove.

The house's second story has a section where her family stores corn.