Mangra County

Upon arrival at the river’s edge, the donkey drinks thirstily.

This is an image of my niece, Limu, preparing to collect water. She takes a donkey and a pair of old tyre tubes in which to store the water. The trip takes one full day to complete.

Tashi prepares the tyre inner-tubes to collect the water. Limu takes a needed rest while the sheep drink for an hour or so.

Thirsty sheep have arrived at the river bank to drink the cool water. A herd of sheep will need to drink every second day in the summer. In the winter this drops to every third day.

Limu leads her donkey along the flat plain where village families graze their sheep. This stage of the journey takes about an hour. You can see that her donkey is unwilling. Limu’s task is not only to lead the donkey to fetch water. She must also use a slingshot to drive our herd of sheep to the water source. You can see the sheep in the distance at the right of this image.

The rising of the Yellow River (due to a dam) caused serious desertification in some parts of river bank. Limu and my brother, Tashi are shown here going down the mountain to the Yellow River’s bank. Their aim is get two tubes of water. It takes about one hour to walk from the mountaintop to the river. In the blue bag they are carrying food for their lunch.