“I was once homeless, now I’m opening my 2nd restaurant in UK,” says Nigerian Lady who Travelled Abroad to Study

Nigerian businesswoman and musician, Yetti Tabai has revealed she left Nigeria to further her education in the United Kingdom and she was once a homeless foreigner before making headway as an owner of two restaurants in Greater Manchester.

From being homeless and starting out in cooking by making meals in her kitchen and having them delivered via JustEat to having two Greater Manchester restaurants – it’s fair to say Yetti Tabai has been on something of a journey.

Tabai left Nigeria to further her education in the UK but met with challenges that paused her academic dreams, when she was told that she was not old enough but had to be enrolled in the UK school system, to do the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSEs) then her A levels.

According to Manchester World, Tabai got admission to study Law at Luton now the University of Bedfordshire but she was refused a student loan, which forced her into the streets to make ends meet.

Tabai said, “Within the first three months at Luton I was owing for student accommodation and had student fees to pay for. While studying for a full-time law degree I started working at Nandos. I ended up in a homeless shelter, but they kicked me out as well because they said that if I was going to university I wasn’t really homeless.”

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She was living in Milton Keynes when she started cooking for people. “When I got home from my job I would cook and then give it to the delivery drivers to send out through Just Eat. I did that until I moved to Manchester. I got great reviews on Just Eat and I thought this was a way forward.”

Talking about opening her second restaurant, she said, “In Manchester, we’ve got things like African burritos and lamb chops. Going into the Printworks is amazing, it’s a major thing for us. We will be in a position where the highflier clients are. You can get straight from the airports to the city centre, go into the Printworks and get some good African, Caribbean, or British food with our twist.”

Tabai also talked about the debut single Beautiful Liar, which was inspired by her cooking and restaurant business.

“Music is a major part of the restaurant, boring music affects your experience of one. I’m known as the ‘headphone chef’ because I always have a pair of headphones on. The restaurant environment can be very chaotic and you need good music to get your head in the right place,” she added.

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CREDIT: ALLSCHOOL, Vanguard