Treacherous road to school

In Taxkorgan County of Xinjiang Autonomous Region, a rural village called Pili Village(皮里村) recently became famous when the above photo showing how children travel to school was posted on weibo by a CCTV journalist and retweeted over 16,000 times.

According to the journalist, there are 416 villagers scattering among the mountains, over 80 of them are children eligible for school. However, the school is more than 200 km away, 80 km of which consists of narrow mountain trails, dangerous cliffs and turbulent rivers.

Every year when school season starts, village officials and teachers from the county will come down to the village collecting school kids and escorting them to the boarding school, then send them back at the end of every semester.

To enter Pili village, you must wade through 4 freezing cold rivers, slide across a 200 m chain bridge and 4 Single-plank bridges made of just 2 pieces of wood. Because they can not wade through the turbulent Yarkand River, they must go around to bypass numerous mountain cliffs, gravel and rapids. Rocks might be falling above their heads at any time, and beneath the cliff trail which is only a few inches wide can only fit half of a foot, is the steady stream of flood. From dusk till down, It takes 2 days and one night to complete the journey .

The most difficult part of the journey is lack of drinking water. Looking at the river rushing by, they have to resist the urge to drink from it, but when they get too thirsty, they drink a gulp of flood.

More photos from tianya:

CCTV-1 covers the story: