Footage showed two gutted cars and a deep crater on a debris-strewn street lined by bare trees, and a red brick schoolhouse with its windows blown out and roof partly ripped off.

Down the wide, tree-lined boulevards, rows of nearly identical red-roofed villas sit side by side.

Red and other colored lanterns, small and large, blaze at every step along the cobbled streets, which are lined by shops selling all types of knick knacks.