The district of La Vigie on the French overseas territory of Mayotte was until last week a bustling hub of life. Now it no longer exists.

All that remains after Cyclone Chido rammed into Mayotte at the weekend, leaving devastation unprecedented in the last century in its wake, are ravaged hills, piles of tangled sheet metal and wood, and a few bare tree trunks.

"It was like a steamroller that crushed everything," said Nasrine, a teacher who did not give her last name, as she showed people around her now transformed neighbourhood.

Climbing up the hill clutching an umbrella to protect her from the sun, the young woman stopped in horror.

"We're not supposed to see the sea from here -- before, the vegetation covered the whole view," she said.

Nasrine lived in one of the few concrete buildings in the district around Pamandzi, a town close to Mayotte's main airport on the island of Petite Terre, just east of the main island of the Mayotte archipelago.

Her house survived the cyclone. But a little further on, Touharati Ali Moudou lost everything.

"The wind knocked down the house," said the........

© International Business Times