Dozens of boys clamber over the ruined remains of their school, hoping the cease-fire in Kashmir will hold long enough to allow them to rebuild it.
The surrounding houses, a hospital and an administrative centre have been reduced to rubble, the result of intense bouts of shelling by Indian artillery positioned on snow-capped mountains across the valley.
For over a decade the village of Athmuqam has been a target in the low-intensity conflict between India and Pakistan in occupied Kashmir that has flared into two wars and almost ignited a third in 2002.
Local people, accustomed to diving into bunkers and shelters for cover, gave up trying to repair damaged property, so sure were they that it would be flattened again.
That was until a cease-fire was declared in November, raising hopes that tentative peace moves between India and Pakistan might lead to a lasting end to hostilities.
The village hospital is being raised from the rubble, houses have been restored and the Madressa, where 60 boys study the Quran, eat and sleep, is starting to look like a religious school again.