Slay queen and actress Tebogo Thobejane on using the 'pretty card' to get ahead

Even though she's an Afda qualified actress, when she bagged a role on Muvhango, people accused Instagram model Tebogo Thobejane of getting the part because of her looks.

But Tebogo isn't mad at that, saying she knows her body and beauty work to her advantage.

In a candid interview with TshisaLIVE, Tebogo explained that for her, it was better to acknowledge her “pretty” privilege than pretend that it doesn't exist.

“Look, I don't wanna lie and say I don't appreciate what I've got .. .the truth is you can pull out the 'pretty card' any time and it does get you a little bit further and that's a fact.

“This is a 'woe is me' type of vibe. I don't go around pretending that I hate the fact that I have the body I have, the big bum and just how I look and how everyone loves my body. I don't hate it, I love it, because it does get me somewhere, but it's not the only thing that gets me somewhere, that's the important part people shouldn't miss,” she said.

The actress explained that after having been bullied as a teenager for her voluptuous body, it felt awesome to finally have people shower her with compliments. The businesswoman also explained that she now saw her body as an asset and loved herself unconditionally after having initially struggled with self-confidence.

“I remember when I was a teenager and boys used to laugh at me because I had a big bum. I went back home crying and told my dad that I wished I had a different body. I was like, 'Papa, they are laughing at me at school saying I have a big bum' and I was really hurt. My dad said, 'don't worry, when you get older you'll see that your body is a blessing, not a curse'. Obviously, at that age, I didn't even get it, but now I realise that what he was saying was the attention may be negative, but things would change in the future, and they did.”

A couple of years later, and after being further “popularised” by Instagram and the like of Kim Kardashian and Nicki Minaj, Tebogo's body became the “ideal” body type in popular culture.

All of a sudden, what used to make Tebogo the butt of the jokes was something that people were paying surgeons and applying heavy photo filters online to achieve.

“It took my people a while to appreciate bodies like mine, as compared to the rest of Africa and even the world, but once I learned how to appreciate myself first, the rest was history. All I had to do was love myself and the power in that is amazing!”

Check out some of Tebogo's snaps below: