The Le Mamea family is celebrating the graduation of their third generation pharmacist after Leah Yvette Mualia completed a bachelor’s degree in pharmacy from Otago University.

Ms Mualia is the daughter of local pharmacist Le Mamea Mathew Mualia and his wife Caroline Mualia and the granddaughter of the Council of Deputies member Le Mamea Ropati Mualia, who was Samoa’s first pharmacist.

Le Mamea said he was proud of his daughter seeing the dedication she displayed over the past four years of her studies to eventually pass out of university with a bachelor’s degree.

"Still, as a father, after seeing how hard my daughter Leah had studied and worked over the past four years to achieve her Bachelor’s of Pharmacy Degree from the  University of Otago," he said.

"My heart and soul were extremely grateful and thankful to God almighty for what he had allowed through his grace and timing – that the youngest of my [two] daughters were now a third-generation pharmacist in our family of pharmacists."

Le Mamea said he and his wife initially planned to attend their daughter's graduation earlier this year but due to the COVID-19 global pandemic the ceremony was cancelled.

"My wife and I were both looking forward to travelling to Dunedin, [New Zealand] this May. But then in early March this year, COVID-19 spread across the world [...] New Zealand was in lockdown and the undergraduate ceremony for May was cancelled."

Le Mamea added that the global pandemic had put life into perspective for his family and urged everyone to accept the state that the world is now in.

"This COVID-19 global pandemic proved to me that everything around us is so temporary. Things our lives evolved around work, entertainment, sports and society have all gone [...] as we are learning to live without them.

“It’s taught us that in the end, it’s God and family that keeps you safe. And we are grateful for his blessings.”

Ms Mualia, an alumni of the Robert Louis Stevenson College and the National University of Samoa, is now working in New Zealand and hopes to one day return to Samoa to help in the family business as she was not on a Government scholarship. 

“She worked odd jobs to pay her way through university with little help from her parents," Le Mamea added.