“I was still going through assessing but I used comedy as a distraction and as a way to help me deal with what I was going through” – Ama Mosese
They say laughter is the best medicine.
And there’s a ring of truth to that for Mangere tour guide Ama Mosese who’s been doing stand-up comedy for just under a year.
“There was a local comedian called Rihannon McCall. She was running a free workshop called ‘Vaine Fresh’ for people to get into comedy,” Ama says.
“So, ten of us from the local community, we will look this up and we answered the call and we went along to this free workshop.
“They had a free kai, so that got me there. And we learned the very basics on how to construct a comedy skit and it ended in a showcase at the Mangere Arts Centre.”
Ama says the show was a sellout and each of the ten women did a four-minute segment each. While it looked seamless, a lot of work went on behind the scene to make the magic happen.
“So, when you watch stand-up comedy on TV, you see that people are just getting up and talking, but actually behind the scenes is a real fine art.” Ama says.
Ama and five others went on to form their own comedy collective called the South Side Queens.
A comedian by night, Ama is a tour guide by day. Along with her sister Louisa, they have run “Glorious NZ” for over 10 years, a service that focuses on Pasifika and Māori attractions in Auckland.
“Glorious is a small tour company that my sister and I started. We’re based in Mangere – we’re proud Mangere girls,” Ama says.
“We focus on indigenous tourism, and we believe that we have such a vibrant community that we want to share with tourists and visitors to New Zealand.”
Looking back Ama says her comedy journey came at an opportune time for her, she had just learned that she could have breast cancer.
“When I answered the call to take up that workshop, I was going through testing,” she says.
“I was told that I had breast cancer June-July 2025. So I knew I had it at the time that I did this workshop, but I didn’t know how far it was, if it had spread.
“I was still going through assessing but I used comedy as a distraction and as a way to help me deal with what I was going through.”
Ama says it was a lot to wrap her head around especially after she had also lost her mother to breast cancer in 2017.
“I saw what she went through and comedy was a good thing to help me cope and also to form that sisterhood of the collective,” she says.
“The girls and I are so close now, they’ve gone through things as well. And the fact that we have each other has been a huge support system.”
Now under control, Ama wants to use her voice to help those in their own battle with cancer and she has joined the Pasifika cancer support group “Taime” who encourage members not to keep things to themselves.
“In our community I think we don’t speak about this enough to normalise it,” she says.
“It’s sad when you hear that or when I speak so openly about my story, Later on, in private, ladies will come and say, oh I’m going through that too or, I went through that before, but I didn’t tell anyone. And so, I would say, you don’t have to do it alone.”
For Ama, her cancer battle has given her the courage not only to step up to the mic, but also to step into ‘better living’.
“Early detection is everything,” Ama says.
“You know bowel, cervical, prostate, breast, all of it. These things we need to normalize more.”
