The Week After

I've been putting off writing this, because I don't feel I'm a real witness to all that's been happening here. We go to school and work, I go shopping at Cost U Less, drink coffee and watch TV. Tafuna is pretty much unscathed and I'm still not quite over my disaster-tourism phobia, so I haven't ventured too far away.
Back to the beginning. Last Tuesday, 7am. I'm bouncing along to Cardio Overdrive, Taine's watching TV, Matt's gone to work. The blinds start shaking, and I'm thinking I'm not that much of an elephant, when the rumbling started. I got Taine and we stood/clutched under the kitchen doorway for what seemed like forever. I was watching the clock waiting for the quake to end, and it didn't for at least a minute. It was the worst quake by far I've ever been in - really shallow rolling.
Matt rang almost straight away to say he was on the road round the harbour when it happened. Some rocks had fallen down the cliff but hadn't landed on any cars. He said there was no tsunami warning at the moment but to listen to the radio. So I stood there, gulped down some breakfast and mentally scrolled through the survival kit. Matt rang again 10 minutes later to say there was a tsunami warning (police had driven through Fagatogo with loudspeakers) and to get out. So I grabbed Taine and the survival kit and water and ran. Although we had to go via neighbour Heidi's place as I knew she didn't have a car and her husband was at work at the canneries. I rang Heidi's bell, told her we were going, she asked if she had time to get dressed, she took one look at my face and got in the car.
Driving along the road to go up the hill, and we're listening to the radio. The announcers were sort of calm-ish, then the woman started screaming "Run for the hills and Pray", which made me lose it momentarily. We realised later that's when the wave got up to the second storey window of their studio and she could see her car floating past. There was lots of traffic on the road, but also a lot of people walking to school and driving towards the water. I only overtook once (why would you go 5mph in an evacuation), and 10 minutes later we were up at David and Sue's at Pavai'iai'i (spelling!) On the way we saw all the village bells being struck with a stick (local tsunami warning) and there were lots of cars heading up the hill.
Matt had rung while we were driving to say he was safe up the hill with all the staff (only 4 of them) so I didn't have to worry about him so much. Cell phone coverage was very intermittent for the rest of the day and poor Heidi couldn't get in touch with Willem until lunchtime.
We stayed at the Whitby's for the rest of the morning watching Australian ABC's coverage, getting phone calls every so often. Internet connection was fine, so we were able to let people know we were safe and to follow news and weather coverage. From the empty house next door to where we were, David and Sue had been watching the sea go in and out, and it was still very big surf over the blowholes when we were there. Taine was fine through all of this. He wasn't scared at all and only fretted because he wanted to go to school.
We eventually headed home once the warning had been lifted. And then to do what? Matt rang every hour or so to keep me updated, and I didn't move very far from the radio. Jane and Noah came round for a coffee/play as the power was out at their house. One by one all the other husbands came home but my intrepid explorer was out searching for the ATM that had gone missing from Pago Plaza, one of the destroyed buildings. He was right in the thick of things for that first day. The ATM was later discovered in the Social Security office at the other side of the plaza, all money intact, but they'd combed the harbour for it first.
Matt eventually got home about 7, absolutely exhausted. He said it was a mission to get everyone out of the building, as anyone who's ever been a fire warden can attest to; "herding cats" were his exact words. But they were safe up the hill for the three hours they were there. The water came up to the bottom of the branch in town but didn't get in. They could see people looting from shops even between the waves, and that's one of the really depressing things to come out from this. Although it's easy to be sanctimonious and critical, I bet it would happen anywhere.
So the water pipe breaking downstairs when Matt went to have a shower at 9pm (I'd filled all the baths and sinks with water, good Girl Guide, but our plugs are not particularly effective) was the last straw. It was like Huka Falls in there with the mighty Waikato snaking its way across the carpet and into the hallway. It took 10 minutes to get the water off (do you know where your water main is?) then we called the landlord, and the lovely reverend and Inga the Winger's brother came to fix it. Staying up till 2.30am for them to finish wasn't at all what I felt like doing, but I was very grateful our problems could be fixed so easily.
And so to the cleanup (ours was fine, the rest of the island's had problems). I got inspired on wednesday and rounded up old clothes and bought some supplies to donate to the Red cross which they then wouldn"t take> sorry my keyboard has lost the plot and the shift key"s doing the opposite of what it should> I realise that they don't want every Tom Dick and Harry showing up with their rubbish, but they should make it easy for people who do want to give.
There are a couple of problems. FEMA and aid arrived relatively quickly on island, but they took a long time to actually get out to the villages. Rumour has it the Governor had to give permission to them because it's not official US territory and he didn't until Friday night, but that just seems too ridiculous to be true (so it probably is). And villages can't start cleanup until FEMA has been to take photos, and some villages still hadn't been seen yesterday. Friends are being very active and loading their car and heading off all over the island but I just wouldn't know where to start. And another problem is the hierarchy/family connections things here. It's hard to be completely sure that what you give will actually get to the people who need it and not get siphoned off to the family of the person who collects the aid or people in positions.
There is masses of aid here, both people and things. The radio reported 3,500 people in shelters who are getting three meals a day, but others in the villages are getting nothing. Apparently FEMA has a very nice office though.
We did go for a drive out to the west of the island on Sunday to see for ourselves the damage (me really, Matt's seen Pago). It's very sudden - you're driving down the hill and everything's fine, then turn a corner and there's a fale with no roof and a car up a tree. Villages are devastated. Things like cars, furniture, clothes have just been picked up by the waves and dropped somewhere else completely. Many buildings have lost windows, walls and roofs. It's going to take a massive cleanup effort just to get places habitable.
I see on NZ websites that there are lots of collections going on. The American Red Cross doesn't seem very popular with its counterparts in other countries so that's affecting what aid gets here too. Like I say, we want to give, but it's very hard to know where to give it too.
So in summary, we are all fine. A large section of the island is devastated and the cleanup is going to take months. And I will probably continue to feel guilty about not doing enough for months too! But we feel very very lucky.
And people that go to the beach to watch tsunamis are stupid beyond belief.