In the Hawke's Bay settlement of Puketapu, the school is operating as a general store of donated items, and the local pub is an information centre with beer on the side.
Further up the island, everyday routines like showering are now luxuries.
In Puketapu, the settlement is alive with sounds of diggers scraping silt, people dragging flood-damaged items from their homes and the buzz of a community in clean-up mode.
Our reporter Jimmy Ellingham and cameraman Nick Monro have the story.
