The next year, fish skin clothing was to receive an even bigger audience, this time coming from all over the world. The fish skin robe exhibited at the 2010 Shanghai World Expo drew big crowds of curious viewers, curious about this unusual item of clothing. Of traditional Hezhen design, it is of blue and white stripes and bears patterns of clouds and waves at the cuffs and flap. According to its designer, the dress was made of the skin of over 50 chum salmon weighing more than five kilos each.

It is no cheap to make a fish skin coat. Skinning and drying aside, the sewing work alone on the World Expo robe took 12 days by three tailors. The whole process has to be completely handmade. What's more, the piece was made from the skin of over 50 chum salmon weighing more than five kilos each. Only the fish weighing no less than four kilograms can produce the peel of a descent size, and dozens of them are needed to make an average garment.

There were plenty of fish, and big ones, in the Songhua River when You Wenfeng was a little girl. When fish was needed for dinner, her fellow tribesmen and women would jump into their boats, cast their nets, and soon get back with their catch. It took less time than going shopping for fish. This is no longer the case. Few Hezhen people still work in the occupation that has provided for them for the better part of their history, and fishermen have to go further and further afield to look for bigger hauls, and often the sale of their catch cannot cover the cost of diesel.

Like people in other parts of the nation, the Hezhens now go to markets or grocery stores to get fish. This has pushed up the cost of fish skin coats, which stands at RMB 3,000 or more. You Wenfeng only makes clothes to order, when she knows that there is a buyer for it and the fish skins do not go to waste.

The dwindling numbers of certain kinds of fish have also forced artisans to modernize some of their methods. Traditionally these skins would have been sown together with thread made of the skin of Siberian buso sturgeon and glue extracted from their bladders. In fact, until recently every single component of the fish skin clothes of the Hezhens came from their catch in the river and woods. Now cotton thread is used instead of fish skin thread as Siberian buso sturgeon is on the edge of extinction and under state protection. You Wenfeng keeps a piece of bladder glue, but only as a memento as it is the only one remaining.

As more and more tourists make their way to the Hezhen settlement, items made of fish skin have turned out to be wildly popular souvenirs, and the ancient technique of making them has become better known to the outside world. To introduce it to more people, You Wenfeng opened a fish skin culture display room in her village, and volunteered to serve as a commentator for visitors, speaking in both mandarin Chinese and the Hezhen language. Her explanations are often interspersed with singing, which is an essential vehicle of Hezhen culture as the group doesn't have a written language. The number of Hezhens who can speak their ethnic tongue is in sharp decline, and still less can sing their folk songs. Being one of the few, You Wenfeng feels obliged to save it from extinction.

You Wenfeng, now 60, is kept busy working to keep Hezhen's folklore alive. At her fish skin clothing business You instructs her daughters-in-law and granddaughters in the craft. She also runs a program in the village teaching traditional Hezhen songs to local youth. Modern technology and gadgets facilitate this study: the students can record the lectures and play them repeatedly after class until they can sing the songs from memory.

As a member of the village troupe, You also performs these same songs with her fellow players, along with dances and showcases of fish skin clothes, for visitors. They understand that for an ethnic group of fewer than 5,000 people their cultural heritage is highly vulnerable to modernization. Hezhen influence is slowly but steadily fading from local dress, buildings and day to day life – the very elements that most strongly make up a person's identity. Locals are determined in their desire to still stand as the Fish Skin Tribe as history turns from one page to another.