Former leprosy village escapes from poverty

When Ahe Tiequ was just 15 years old, she was kicked off the bus during her first trip down the mountains to the outside world and had to trek for two days to visit her relatives in the neighboring township.

That was the only time that Ahe, now 54, had ever left her home village of Wajiji, which sits on a cliff-side in the remote Daliang Mountains in southwestern China's Sichuan province.

Wajiji used to be called leprosy village, after lepers who were banished from their hometowns gathered on the isolated and barren land decades ago.