where once there were houses

today we visited a town located in the mountains an hour outside pengzhou where many lost their lives and homes in the earthquake that hit sichuan on may 12th 2008. i'd seen pictures on the bbc of a couple getting married at an old church built in the mountains by the french 100 years or so ago which had become a local attraction. the pictures showed the church falling apart during the earthquake. its now closed off to the public whilst its being cleared of debris - a very slow process - but the people we went with persuaded the guard to let us walk around the ruins for i was a foreigner and had come so far. this was embarrassing but kind also.
we saw bridges that had collapsed, a school that had been raised 3 metres along a fault line (fortunately the whole building stayed intact as it rose so the students survived), so many houses destroyed and thousands living in temporary shelters. the chinese prime minister wen jiabao will be visiting this area over spring festival (chinese new year) so we also saw scaffolding up along a whole street for the buildings to be re-painted for the occasion.
it was really impressive to see how many new homes had been built since the earthquake. some are being built amongst the rubble of the houses that once stood there and others are being built on what i assume must have been farmland.
apparently these house are all being built by the local community with funds from the government. although there seems to be some standard approved design that everyone is adhering to as they all look the same but not unattractive. their appearance is like something you might find in sunnier parts of europe - villas with coloured clay tilled roofs.

theres a story on the news at the moment about millions of yuan meant for the those affected by the earthquake that have gone missing. 3 millions were siphoned by the pengzhou police department for no-one knows what. this is not an uncommon event in china.

it was quite something to stand on rubble that was once someones home and to see a town being rebuilt by those who had lost the old one.

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