This weekend Tumi Morake will perform at her first live show since the pandemic started. The performance will also be her first since returning back to SA after being in the US over lockdown.
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She joined Sumitra Nydoo to share her money lesson and how the experience of being stuck in the US became an eye-opener about being responsible with money.
Listen to the conversation here:
Money was a huge lesson in the states
Tumi initially went to the US for both work and pleasure and decided to take her family and kids with her. She spoke about how she had to have a serious sit-down with her husband because she realised that she had tone down the soft life.
From child care to food, to medical cost she shared how shocked she was by the cost of living there.
“As South Africans, we are really spoiled, there’s so much we can afford that’s unaffordable in first world countries. Child care, healthy food, because healthy food is expensive, and healthy food in the first world is ridiculous. You’d think there’s magic fairies and unicorns that grow this stuff.”
“Had been we not had rainy day money, we would have been in a very tight spot.” She says as she reflects on the cost of medicare in America.
On avoiding bad money habits
Morake has always been very aware of what happens when you are reckless with money, she shared a childhood experience she remembers to this day of how she would eat hospital food, how she would always have two months’ rent money even before the rent was due.
“I’ve seen what bad money habits look like and I promised myself I’d never go there. There was a time when my mother was a nurse and we were living on hospital food. She’d literally come home with Tupperware of hospital food.”
She spoke about her experiences with money and how she’s never liked having debt, and how important it is for her to always plan ahead as a mother in the entertainment industry.
