A Manurewa teacher nearly said no to Jason Derulo's dance moment

Mele Ta’e’iloa was sitting with her snacks when a text message asked if she wanted to dance on stage with Jason Derulo.

Her first answer was almost no.

“From where I was sitting, I could see the thousands of people out in front,” Ta’e’iloa tells PMN Tonga. “I was like, no, I'm okay. I will sit here and enjoy the show.”

The Manurewa school teacher was at the American pop star’s last tour performance in Auckland on Saturday night to support her friend Rochka, one of Derulo’s backup dancers.

It took some convincing from her hip hop and street dance collective, Projekt Team, before she agreed.

Rochka then taught her the choreography backstage, which gave Ta’e’iloa only a short time to learn the moves before she walked on stage.

Watch Mele Ta'e'iloa's full interview below.

What followed has become one of the biggest moments from Derulo’s Auckland shows.

Ta’e’iloa grabbed the microphone, said “Mālō e lelei!”, gave a shoutout to Manurewa and joined Derulo and his dancers under the lights.

Derulo shared a video of the moment, writing: “Invited a fan on stage and she killed it.”

The video has attracted over 40 million views, with viewers praising Ta’e’iloa’s confidence and dance skills.

But she says she was not thinking about going viral while she was on stage.

“I was just thinking about the eight counts. Because I knew that everyone else on stage knows it so if I did one wrong move, everyone's going to see it. And there's heaps of eyes on me right now.” she says.

“‘Just don't stuff up the moves’. That was all that was going through my head.”

The Projekt Team at Jason Derulo. Photo/Instagram

As Projekt Team’s director, she works to support street dancers and young people while promoting Pacific culture.

Ta’e’iloa has completed and worked in freestyle and battle dance circles in Aotearoa and overseas, and mainly prefers to work behind the scenes as a producer, curator, and workshop leader.

But standing on that stage, she saw a chance to make Pacific people visible.

“When I was looking down, I couldn't see many of us. I was like, I'm going to use this opportunity to represent,” Ta’e’iloa says. “So I was really happy that my team encouraged me to get up and do that little dance.

“Having that moment to dance a little bit and express how I feel when I move and have a whole social media world love that moment, I think it's super special.

“It reminds me that the small things matter, whatever it is that you're doing in life…who knows what’s going to happen. We belong in every one of those little spaces and big spaces.”

The day after Derulo’s Auckland concert, Ta’e’iloa flew to South Korea to attend the Chenoan World Dance Festival this week.

She is supporting the winning New Zealand team that qualified through her dance battle competition earlier this year to the grand finals this weekend.