Orcha and nearby village.

Once more we found ourselves on a long bus journey this time we were heading to Orcha, this by far has been the nicest place we have visited so far. It is only a small town/ village and is really only starting to get tourists so is still very, rustic shall we say, it had a nice calm feel to it. We were even brave enough to walk the street alone. Although to be fair David is happier walking the streets than I am. The reason we came here was because it has a very important temple close by and another fort. We are seeing a lot of temples and forts! To the point of , please no not another one.

 These are cenotaphs made for the royal family that lived in the area. They were quite impressive. It looks like I have caught an UFO  as well but there were vultures flying around. Proper vultures like you see on TV , with the bald heads. After going to the fort we got the chance to visit a local village,
this was very interesting and we really enjoyed it.

 The school as you can see it is very basic. The children have no furniture and one of the classrooms 

is outside. There are up to 100 children at this school at times, but it is not mandatory and only 60% 

of children go to school and not always on a regular basis. On the day we went some children were not there because it was hot. At the school nearest to this one, the children were not going to school as there were no teachers, one was ill and the other hadn't appeared for over a week. There are 4 classrooms but one of these is outside and all are tiny.

That is the teacher' s desk you are seeing, when we entered there was a small boy stood on it. 

This girl is reciting the English alphabet, others stood up and spelt words in English. There are a wide range of ages in the class because they go by what stage or ability they are at rather than age. There is no specific starting age, our tour guide told us if he wanted he could start today, he is 23.

As you can see they do have text books. That is their bags laid out in front of them too. This class was doing maths. 

  Me, with some of the children.

I also have a video of the class singing the national anthem.

The blackboard at the school.

Then we went into the village. The houses below were provided by the government for families who were struggling financially they have one room and an outside toilet . Before this they had mud houses with a thatch roof. 

The children below are ones who have chosen not to go to school but one of them was pleading with us for a pen, and none of us had any on us. One person gave him paper and he clung onto it like it was treasure.

These ladies are splitting the wheat from the chaff.

They have lovely goats, the ones in the village are well looked after, in the towns they are often rooting in rubbish.

A baby cow again being cared for. 

There are tyres holding down the roof, some of the house roofs are like this too.

This man is the village potter, he showed us how to make pots, he spun the stone base by putting a stick in a hole in the stone and turning it round. David had a go at making pots too. The lady beside the man is mixing the clay, this is mud from local river and powdered cow dung. Some of the pots are used for lassi, a yoghurt type drink and ice cream which are sold on the street. 

This lady is spreading watered down cow dung at her front door, apparently it keeps flies away, this is replaced after a few weeks. 

Local village children these are from the more well off end of the village. One girl is proudly holding up new dolls that she has just got. The children were desperate to have their photo taken and then look at it. 

This girl showed this doll off as if it was the greatest thing in the world and is obviously her prized possession, it's eyes are missing, it has only one full arm and one tuft of hair. 

This baby is about 8 months old, if you look carefully it has black kohl at its eyes this is supposed to stop evil spirits. 

It was lovely of the villagers to let us into their lives, we also got to go into one house, one big room but it did have a telly. Some of the villagers have put wires from street lights to their own houses, looked very dodgy and dangerous!