At a time when more young people are choosing the modern way of life, a young Samoan girl is staying true to her Samoan culture by weaving fine mats.

Olevia Sapena, 19, of Apolima-Uta dreams of keeping her culture strong and alive by weaving the traditional Samoan fine mats for her family’s faalavelave, especially now that she has taken time off school temporarily.

“I grew up observing my mother, aunties, and older cousins weaving all the time and it has become a norm for me which also aspired me to keep this Samoan custom alive in our family,” she told Samoan Observer in an interview. “I have been observing and learning since I was younger.

"I can’t remember the year exactly [when I initially started] but starting last year, I have started weaving like a professional and my aspiration for this weaving habit grew stronger and I just fell in love with it.

“Learning from my friends, my generation nowadays does not really favour this because I understand there’s been so much change in everything in this modern world hence why my passion for weaving fine mats also pushed me to inspire our generations these days.”

Ms. Sapena completed her college years and while she is expected to continue her academic journey at the tertiary level, she decided to take a break and weave fine mats for the time being as her family also looks for financial support for her to complete her studies.

Her academic ambition is to become a scientist as she also majored in science in college.

“Although my academic dream is halted for the time being, at least my other dream is becoming true just from the comfort of my own home and I’m happy about that,” she added.

She is a sibling to four sisters and five brothers and all her sisters were also taught to weave and know how to but Ms. Sapena is more advanced at weaving according to her aunty, Potoa’e Mealai.

Mrs. Mealai also told this newspaper that it’s been a blessing for her family to have instilled this tradition which has made things easier.

“Especially at times of family faalavelave, we never felt the need to buy ietoga as what most family would normally resort to nowadays because we have so many hands in the family who can help us weave,” she said.

“We’ve always been brought up by our parents to weave the fine mats for our family faalavelave and save us money from buying them and we are reaping the fruition of that tradition as we never have to worry about searching for ietoga.”

According to Mrs. Mealai, her family is well known in her village for this tradition and families would at times, buy ietoga from their family.

Mrs. Mealai’s 19-year-old niece is one of the many cousins in her family who all live under one roof, and who all know how to weave ietoga for their family.

When Samoa Observer visited their family on Tuesday, Ms. Sapena was weaving a fine mat with her four other cousins, her mother, and her aunty.