WAIKOLOA, Big Island — The Oct. 15 earthquakes battered Dee Dixon and her Waimea home, slamming her from one wall to another. They tossed her belongings on the floor and left a ceiling fan and light fixtures dangling from their wires. The temblors caused her second-floor lanai to sag so dangerously that a county inspector warned her not to use it.

Nearly six months later, Dixon still hasn't been able to complete many of the repairs she needs to restore her home.

Most contractors were so swamped after the earthquakes they wouldn't answer their phones or return Dixon's calls, so she and her neighbors did the best they could on their own.

"Having money isn't any good; you can't get anybody to do anything," Dixon said. "It's just been a matter of waiting and waiting and doing it yourself."

While some Big Island residents were quickly able to tidy up their belongings and right their lives after the magnitude 6.7 and 6.0 earthquakes, others face more discouraging times. For some, there is much more to be done.

In North Kohala, Senior Minister George Baybrook wonders how his small congregation will restore the historic Kalahikiola Congregational Church, a daunting project that may cost far more than the money the church has available from donations and insurance. Each time he meets with the experts, Baybrook said, the project looks more complex and costly.

On the Kohala Coast, it will probably take a year or more to complete structural repairs at the 310-room Mauna Kea Beach Hotel. About 230 laid-off workers won't be back until the repairs are done and the hotel re-opens.

In Waikoloa, crews have finally finished shoring up the structure of Tom Halley's third-floor condominium, which swayed with a "whip effect" during the earthquake and dropped chunks from the masonry walls. Last month, Halley and his wife, Jennifer, were finally able to enter their home to begin the interior repairs they must make before they can move back in.

STRUCTURES RAZED

Others gave up on repairs and ripped their damaged structures down.

Dixon's neighbor, James Besse, said the earthquakes caused his two-story weekend home in Waimea to leap off its piers, leaving the single-wall cedar structure with a "twist." The county declared the building as uninhabitable, and Besse finally had it torn down when he couldn't find anyone willing to fix it.

Dixon, a retired journalist, is dismayed when she reads articles about the earthquakes that dismiss the damage to Big Island homes with a passing mention. She is a veteran of some large California earthquakes, and she knows better.

"This earthquake was totally different than any I have ever been in," she said. "It was just vicious, and it was like it was never going to stop."

Noelani Whittington, spokeswoman for the county Public Works Department, said Big Island inspectors checked about 1,600 buildings after the earthquakes and concluded about 1,300 had suffered what inspectors considered to be "cosmetic damage."

"Red tags" were issued for another 67 homes that were too damaged to occupy. Whittington said 30 of those red tags are still in place, meaning those repairs have not been completed.

The county also issued 227 "yellow tags" to other owners indicating parts of their homes could not be used. Whittington said 92 of those are still in place.

The county also is working on 20 earthquake-related repair projects for drainage culverts, roads and other facilities that are expected to cost a total of $8.4 million. The federal government is expected to pick up most of the cost.

$200 MILLION DAMAGE

The total damage from the earthquake has been estimated at $200 million, but none of the agencies involved in the recovery are sure whether that is accurate. No government agency has attempted to compile a complete list of the damage.

The earthquake hit after years of an overheated construction market, so even the largest jobs are not immune from the Big Island's shortage of contractors and workers.

Charles Park, general manager of hotel operations for Mauna Kea Resort, said his company normally gets three bids for any kind of work. Now, as the closed resort seeks contractors for structural and other repairs, "you're lucky if you get one," Park said.

"You just get one bid and you just have to live with it, right?" he said. "You may not like the bid, but what the hell you gonna do?"

Park said the hotel has started filling in cracks with epoxy and removing rocks and concrete that need to be replaced. Major structural work is still needed to replace bent and broken steel braces supporting the eighth floor of the hotel, which was added nine years after the resort opened in 1965.

In Pa'auilo, Domingo Gomes tore down his mother's home because it was in danger of collapsing into a gulch. Gomes originally planned to salvage the house by hauling it away from the gulch, but gave up after the contractor more than doubled his original estimate on the cost to move the structure.

Gomes is now building a new house next to the original site, but the experience has been painful for his mother, Mabel, who's in her 80s. She moved into the home as a young bride and raised her children there.

"I couldn't have her around here when I was tearing it down," Domingo Gomes said. After most of the demolition was done, "I brought her over here - it was just the concrete for the steps, she would stand over there, and all she would do was cry, cry, cry."

She didn't feel better until the deacon from her church visited to offer encouraging words, "just like God had sent him," he said. The crew, Baptist Builders, which is providing most of the labor to build the new house, planned to put a new roof on the home this week.

COMING HOME

For Vivian Clark, the progress being made on repairing her Waikoloa condominium means she can return home soon from Florida.

Clark, 81, lived on the ground floor of a three-story building in the Paniolo Club Condominiums, where the earthquake revealed construction defects that must be repaired before residents could return.

The masonry walls of the condominium's seven buildings weren't properly anchored to the walls, floors and roof of the structure, which caused the walls to wobble wildly, separate from wooden support beams, and even drop some bricks during the earthquake, said John Burke, a condo owner who is managing the retrofit of the complex.

After the earthquake, Clark had to gather her possessions and get out, but she lingered in Waikoloa as long as she could. Then she began suffering from anxiety and her blood pressure soared. She finally decided to stay with family in Australia and Florida while the repairs were completed, which helped reduce her stress.

Now, she wants to return to Waikoloa, she said.

"It's beginning to sound like it's going to be very soon. I'm so excited, I can't wait," she said. "I've got to go home, I've missed it. I've missed living my life, and doing my things, and being with my friends.

"That's where I belong, that's where my home is, and that's where I want to be."