Gaby Solomona, a Samoan woman from New Zealand who uses her skills and gifts to be an inspiration to other young aspiring creatives. If you are someone who is looking to be in the entertainment space, more specifically in acting and radio hosting, continue reading!
What’s beautiful about having the opportunity to connect with other Pasifika women around the world, is being able to see how other women are combining their values of culture and faith in their line of work. As Pacific Islanders, we all have acknowledged how our upbringings help shape who we become. In my chat with Gaby Solomona, we got to talk about navigating her calling in life throughout the past few years, dealing with mental health, and her experiences on Celebrity Treasure Island.
“To all the young woman, you are enough. Come into this industry knowing who you are. We don’t just represent ourselves, we represent our villages. So I want to encourage our young women to not find your worth in other people or in these jobs and know that you are enough! There are whole community of Pacific artists who are able to help and cheer you on along the way.”
– Gaby Solomona
“I always knew I was going to be an actress,” she exclaims in our chat, her radiant smile beaming as she recalls her early ages of theater and the arts. From a very young age, she has always been a performer. As much as she loved performing and being in the limelight, Gaby never saw anyone who looked like her – a beautiful, tan, Samoan woman on the screen or on stage. Growing up in the 90s and early 2000s, there weren’t many Pasifika women in these spaces, therefore she never thought she could be there. But God had plans for Gaby, little did she know, she would be a part of a generation of creative performers pionering in these spaces for more to come.
Soon after, Gaby enrolled into a performing arts school in New Zealand and was mentored by many mainstream Pasifika actors in Aotearoa. In her time of the early years of acting, Gaby learned a lot about the acting industry. Just like all of us wanting and aspiring to have our “big break,” sometimes when we get overzealous for something, we lose sight of the reality of it all. It doesn’t mean we are ignorant to our dreams and visions in our life, but we quickly learn there is always a humbling beginning to every big story.
Gaby took a well needed break from acting, where God placed in front of her a full time gig to be a radio host for The Morning Shack on NiuFm, New Zealand’s Pacific Islander radio station.
Fast forward, with her time on The Morning Shack and her break from acting, Gaby used her time to confront the internal battles going on that made her lose the love of acting.
After coming face to face with herself, Gaby realized there were many unhealthy habits and traits that were inhibiting her and causing her to be burnt out from acting. The people pleasing and wrong intentions towards her first love of acting almost came at the cost of her own health – mentally, spiritually, and physically.
Now that she’s been able to take a break, uprooting negative mindsets, Gaby has finally been able to breathe and take a moment to process a healthier holistic approach to acting. “I’ve been slowly getting back to acting because how can I do things differently this time as opposed to just throwing myself out there. I’m really big on ‘how do I do this safely’ to keep myself safe so I don’t have to go through what I have gone through. How do I do things wiser now?”
“God has been shaping me to WHO to become rather than WHAT to become. Acting is what I do, not who I am. Acting is a job and it is a gift of God but it’s not everything.”
– Gaby Solomona
Fast forward to recently, Gaby has been chipping away and slowly coming back to acting. Gaby recently found herself on New Zealand’s reality TV show “Celebrity Treasure Island.” Celebrity Treasure Island is a compilation of Aotearoa’s celebrities who compete against each other in challenges to win money for their charity of choice.
If your algorithm is in shambles, you may or may not have seen Gaby’s viral video with Carmel Sepuloni, former deputy prime minister of New Zealand. Carmel and Gaby’s relationship grew to be very sister-like on the show. With that, Carmel chose Gaby in an elimination challenge, picking a fellow Samoan sister who helped cultivate an experience that would be spread all throughout the Pacific.
In this elimination challenge, Gaby and Carmel had to hold up a box with their legs, and if they were to drop the box they would lose the challenge. “During the first half an hour I wanted to die!” Gaby recounts, her body dreading and hurting during the first portion of the challenge. Within the first half, Gaby would tell Carmel “I can’t do this!” and Carmel continuously encourages her to keep going.
Suddenly there was a shift in Gaby’s perspective and she didn’t want to be the reason they lost. “I just remember heavily breathing and praying, and in the midst of it, there was this spiritual moment I have never experienced before.” As she was praying, she went into another place and started zoning out. “All I remember is the song “Falealili Uma” came to me, which was random, and I started to sing that song, and as I was singing the pain in my legs were gone, and everything just stopped and went still. I just felt this strong presence amongst us during that moment.”
At the end, Gaby and Carmel, won their challenge after experiencing a beautiful, mana-filled, experience. “When we won, I dropped the box and started bawling my eyes out, and when I turned around everyone was still in tears – the crew, the other cast members, etc.” Gaby shares how this moment was super special because “it was almost as if we forgot we were filming a TV show.”
Gaby furthers to explain how special capturing the moment was for her because all around the world and throughout the Pacific she has received so much love and attention from the video that went around, “If you understand the Holy Spirit, then you know that is something the Holy Spirit can do. To be able to connect with our people around the world through that moment is so powerful.”
“Celebrity Treasure Island is very palagi, so for them to capture that moment, edit it, and then post it on TV and put it on social media so we can relive the moment and share it with our friends and family is huge for us!“
THIS IS REPRESENTATION. I was so excited to hear what Gaby had to say about this special moment and give us an in depth insight into the situation. When she was recounting, I was thinking about every single one of us, as Pasifika people. Gaby’s moment with Carmel was a glimpse of who we are as Pacific Islanders. It’s showcasing support, love, faith, hope, hardship, endurance, passion, family, and more! To see this moment on a mainstream level and for it to be shared publicly with the world is a win and it just means there’s more to come!
With that, on this season of Celebrity Treasure Island, it had the most Pacific Islander contestants ever in its TV show history. Not only did they have the most Pacific Islanders, but our fellow Tongan brother, JP Foliaki, won the whole entire show!
I would say this show, this season, this episode, these Pacific Islanders, have helped make more waves in the mainstream media and entertainment space to represent not only Polynesians, but Micronesians and Melanesians as well. A win for us, is a win for all.
