Humans Of The Islands - Poloma Iosefa (Momeachokes)

I was born in Samoa but I came here when I was about 8 months old. I've pretty much spent my whole life in New Zealand. I only have two sisters - I'm the middle child. We all do our own thing but I'm pretty much the comedian in the family.

I've lived in Mangere (South Auckland) pretty much my whole life.  Mangere's home to me, it's where I grew up.  I went to Wesley College, a Methodist boarding school which is a mean Tongan school (laughs).  I grew up with a lot of Tongans there.

 

I was a real Mummy's boy so it was really hard.  In the first week I think I cried like every night. But I got used to it - you know when you stay somewhere for so long - for me it was 5 years throughout high school -  it becomes your home.  So when I actually left in my last year I was pretty sad.  It was hard to leave Wesley.  That school taught me a lot about respect.

It's funny because dreams always change but around the time I finished school, I was hard out into drama, singing and just performing.  To be honest, I liked the attention (laughs). I liked main roles. I always wanted to be in front, in the spotlight.  I think I always wanted to be an actor either on film or on stage. And I love teaching. I've been doing a bit of that at church as well.

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Never (laughs).

One time I just decided to do a video, just to give it a go. And it wasn't until my third video that I posted - that video took off.  It was about me imitating my parents.  I did that video around 2012/2013 and at the time no one was doing videos like that.  I just did everything on my phone - film and editing on my laptop and that video blew up online.  You know, sometimes you just make this one video that does really good.  And it kind of motivated me to do more.  I had a lot of people saying "You should do more, you should make your own page" because at the time I was just posting from my personal page.  It was scary doing a page - you know, you don't know what people are going to think about you. Then I was like "Ugh. Who cares." (laughs).

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(laughs) Oh sometimes I do my videos straight after something happens.  Sometimes I'm at home and something happens and I just crack up and I'm like "Man - video. Boom." Or sometimes I'm just sitting there and I have a flashback of something that happens. Sometimes you see the struggles and you know that everyone can relate, so I'm like, why not make a joke out of it.  It's good for people to know that we don't have to be embarassed and they're not going through things alone. It's cool when you see people like "Oh yeah, my mum's like that too." And you don't have to be embarrassed about it.

Yeah that was a big part of my passion for Drama and performing aswell - there was a lot of dancing involved. When I joined the group - a huge part of the dancing they do is comedy. And I like being funny and making people laugh so to do that together with dancing was perfect for me.

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 Yeah hard out! The internet is key to connecting overseas. We're so lucky. Especially when I go somewhere like Samoa I'm like "oh nah, they won't know us coz they don't have internet here" - not to be sad or anything (laughs) but then when we get there they're like "oh my gosh you're that guy" and I'm like "do you guys have the internet?" (laughs) I went to one of the villages, like in the kuabacks (remote area) and I thought no one will know me and then we walk into a store and the shopkeeper gasps and is like "oh my gosh you're Momea Chokes " and my brother and sister were like cracking up.

Wow. It's family. I love that family is a big thing in my culture. Family is everything.

By Indira Stewart