Lindsay Faye Tuaileva, Orem, UT: an interview by Savani Aupiu, 15 November 2008: Pacific Islanders Oral History Project, U-1956

Transcript (36 pages) of an interview by Savani Aupiu with Lindsay Tuaileva on 15 November 2008. Part of the Pacific Islanders Oral History Project, Everett Cooley Collection tape no. U-1956

Lindsay Tuaileva (b. 1988) has lived in Orem, Utah her whole life. Her father is Tongan and her mother is from Tooele, Utah. She has three brothers and four sisters. Her father moved to Hawaii to take advantage of better opportunities for work, and then later moved to California to go to college and play football. He met his wife at an LDS church gathering while in California and they moved to Utah together and got married. Growing up, Lindsay danced a lot. She did ballet, jazz, tap, hip-hop, modern, lyrical, and break dancing. Some of her brothers and sisters went to the same dance school. She decided to stop dancing because it was taking up so much of her time and she wanted to be with her friends more often. She started to play sports because she would be able to play with her friends more. She played volleyball, softball, and basketball.She worked at the mall at a Greek restaurant for a while. Then she worked for her dad at his carpet cleaning business with her brothers but the hours didn´t fit her school schedule. After that she worked at a boutique in the mall. Now she works for Vantage, which installs home security systems.Lindsay´s parents didn´t expose her or her siblings to the Tongan culture very much when they were growing up. It wasn´t until they moved to a Tongan LDS church that they became interested in the Tongan culture. Lindsay also spent a summer in Hawaii working for the Polynesian Culture Center, where she gained a greater appreciation for her ancestry. She does feel like an outsider in the Polynesian culture in Utah because she´s only half Tongan, and because most of the other Tongans know the customs and culture better than she does because they were born in Tonga. Right now she´s studying elementary education at UVU and hopes to teach in the future. The company she works for may let her train new employees so she´ll be able to use her teaching skills there. She´s also part of the Legacy dance group at UVU. She enjoys learning about her culture and sharing Polynesian culture with a wide audience. Lindsay concludes the interview by saying she feels blessed to be a part of both American and Tongan culture, and she wants to make a difference in both worlds. In the future, she wants to start a family, and she would like to raise her family in Utah. Project: Pacific Islanders. Interviewer: Savani Aupiu.