PAGO PAGO, American Samoa — For Faauluuluga Leota, a nurse who also serves in the U.S. Army Reserve, it is hard to find the words.
Her family has been staying in the small church hall at All Peoples Pentecostal Church since the earthquake and tsunami flushed through the bay. She can see, just down the steep hillside, the rubble that was her home.

“Total loss,” she said. “At least we’re all alive, as well as our children. We’re going to try to get our lives back together, start from scratch, since we don’t have anything.
“It’s hard. Words can’t explain how we feel, emotionally and mentally. We have to be strong, especially for our kids.”
Across the island, more than 2,000 people are staying in 17 temporary shelters, according to Betty Ah Soon, the public information officer for American Samoa’s homeland security office. Hundreds more are staying with family or friends or at informal shelters like the All Peoples church hall.
Many of the shelters are largely empty during the day, as people try to clean up their homes and businesses and wait for disaster relief officials to conduct damage assessments.
Assembly of God Church, on the hillside overlooking the capital, is operating two shelters serving about 500 people. Utaifeau Milton Taufa’asau, a village leader, said the challenge has been coordinating relief supplies with spotty telephone and cell phone service.
This morning, he said, was the first time the church was able to get food delivered for the needy, a breakfast of scrambled eggs, hash browns, diced peaches and toast from the territory’s school lunch program.
“It’s the miscommunication, that’s the biggest challenge,” Taufa’asau said. “It doesn’t help with our network being jammed. Everyone is on the phone calling to check on family. People are calling from off-island, worried.
“But we’re very grateful that we’re getting all of this help.”
For more on this story, see tomorrow’s Honolulu Advertiser.