Well, I'm not so much in a small town as a small city, but I know of at least 3 studios and several gyms that offer classes.
It's true, the more I watch, particularly training videos, it seems that Chinese style is pretty different.
Boots sure help to make it up the pole and stay there when starting out. On the other hand, classes go a lot faster here. I was reading the post about safety… I started doing inverts within 2 weeks og starting class (though the class does meet every day)