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Lagos is a city with a rich multicultural history as the return of the Afro-Brazilians in the 19th century can still be felt today in the Brazilian Quarter in Lagos. The returning slaves’ presence is seen through the architecture on the Quarter as they designed and built most of the buildings although most of the original structures have deteriorated.

According to a study conducted in the 19th Century, it is estimated that between 3,000 and 8,000 former slaves returned to Africa from Salvador da Bahia, Brazil. Those who took part in the Malé Revolt of 1835, described as the most significant slave rebellion in Brazil, resided in Nigeria, Ghana, Benin, and Togo.

Those who settled in Nigeria were in an area of Lagos Island known as Popo Aguda and the Afro-Brazilian population, known as “Aguda” meaning “Catholic” in Yoruba were the largest group of the returnee slaves in the 1850s.

It was Benjamin Campbell, the consul of Lagos from 1853 to 1859 who persuaded these freed Africans to emigrate from Brazil and offered the protection in exchange for their assistance with the colonial administration.

Their return to West Africa is noticeable through their contributions to the early architectural design of their settlements. Which is one form of cultural exchange that is deemed a part of the larger global black narrative on black Africa’s architectural heritage.

Speaking of cultural exchange, architecture is one of the subtle forms of the exchange that ensued between the Afro-Brazilians who returned to Lagos and other parts of West Africa.

Lagos’ architectural landscape was influenced immensely by the returning Afro-Brazilian slaves and these astonishing buildings are important indicators of a rich history.

Today, these historical landmarks are losing its value as they are threatened mostly by urbanisation and the lack of conversations about preserving the history of the Quarter, thus most of the buildings lie in ruins.

It is best to forget the horrific nature of the transatlantic slave trade but it is also important to educate the new generation on their past and the best way the Brazilian Quarter does so is seen through the integration of cultures. A trip to Lagos Island offers a unique glance into the amazing architecture and the indelible legacy of the transatlantic slave trade.

There is an outcry to save the last remaining Afro-Brazilian buildings in the Quarter because the area is experiencing swift gentrification and pervasive demolition. Local communities, activists and conversation groups have taken up the mantle to rekindle essential discussions on the preservation of the history of Afro -Brazilians in Lagos City.

Oluremi Dacosta, a conservationist, activist and a local resident of Afro-Brazilian descent is a key figure whose role to save the architecture of the Brazilian Quarter has not gone unnoticed.

Some may not understand the need to preserve the Brazilian Quarter and its architectural heritage but Dacosta sees it differently. According to him, people are curious about the Afro-Brazilian influence in Lagos and the tourism in the area has seen a major boost as all his daily tours are constantly sold-out.

He views the conservation of the area as very important to “Nigerian-Brazilian cultural heritage and […] one of the unique architectural histories on the African continent.”

Another means of preserving the heritage is the Tiwa N’ Tiwa’s Street Art Festival. An initiative that celebrates the culture of Afro-Brazilians in a three-day annual street art and community festival.

Past celebrations took place on the streets of the Brazilian Quarter where there was tour to highlight the architectural masterpieces in the Quarter led by Dacosta in collaboration with the festival organisers.

The tour included the exploration of 12 historic sites, mosques, schools, local family homes in the quarter and the churches of which the highlight was the Cathedral Church of Christ. Other activities included a block party and interactive workshop sessions.

A real glimpse of the Brazilian Quarter of Lagos can be experienced in areas around Tinubu Square Upper Campos Square, Campos Street, Igbosere Road, Broad Street Marina Road and Campbell Street.

A startup in East Africa has created a digital service that appeals to thousands of small shopkeepers across the region while finding innovative ways to lend to the traditionally risky sector. Tom Collins reports. 

While most of Africa’s well-known ventures into e-commerce have been designed to appeal to the continent’s burgeoning middle class, Sokowatch is aiming to bring goods and services to the millions of informal shop owners across the East African region. 

Much of the population live on less than two dollars per day, meaning that many are unable to benefit from the ever-expanding range of online delivery and shopping platforms that market higher-end goods and charge fees.

Raising $14m in Series A funding in February, the fast-growing tech company delivers essential goods like oil, rice, and soap to over 16,000 informal shops across Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and Rwanda. 

Making the bulk of its money on the margins between the wholesale purchase of items and the sale of those goods to each individual business, the delivery service is free and functions through an app or SMS. 

Running a fleet of over 200 delivery tuktuks, the service also reduces costs for small business owners who typically spend money when sourcing goods. 

“Shopkeepers no longer have to physically go themselves to wholesale markets, paying for transport to go there and back,” says Daniel Yu, Global CEO. 

“In addition to being costly, wholesale shopping in crowded markets is not safe with the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.” 

Throughout the health crisis, most of the region’s lower-income families continue to rely on local shops to buy basic necessities – something those with higher wages can prevent through the use of home delivery services. 

Offering an e-commerce service to this segment of local shops, Sokowatch – along with many other online services – has seen “a significant uptake in new customers” over the Covid-19 period, according to Yu. 

Finding another use for its platform during the pandemic, the startup has partnered with KCB Bank and several foundations to distribute digital food vouchers worth between $7 and $15 via SMS to thousands of families in need of assistance. 

The vouchers can be redeemed at Sokowatch-affiliated outlets, helping support local stores while reducing food insecurity for over 10,000 people.  

Building on another aspect of its business, the East African firm has continued extending credit lines to its small business customers where most other lenders in the marketplace have dramatically reduced lending as a result of Covid-19. 

Having lent more than $1m over the last year, Sokowatch’s CEO believes their unique model allows them to capably de-risk lending without resorting to charging interest rates or requiring collateral. 

Shopkeepers have the option to pay when goods are delivered or up to a week later for a small fee. 

“We realized that embedding these financial services on top of the existing e-commerce relationship we have with our customers is actually something fundamentally different from a digital lending type of model,” says Yu. 

“We are a significant counterexample to what is going on with lending in the market. By continuing to supply stores with essential goods we provide a solid foundation for providing credit services.” 

Around 15% of Sokowatch’s order book is supported by credit, and although it began as a value-added service alongside its core business the startup is beginning to focus more of its attention on creating various financial products for its customers, Yu says. 

Most of the money raised at the beginning of the year will be used to increase the profitability of its core business and to invest in financial services. 

Though its presence in multiple countries allowed Sokowatch to offset the loss of revenue in some areas due to quickly changing lockdown regulations, Yu cautions against using the funds to expand into different markets during a pandemic. 

That said, securing a relatively large ticket size in only several years the next round of post-COVID funding will probably see the firm looking to scale across the wider region and to even greater potential beyond.  

In East Africa alone, the size of the essential goods market in the informal sector is around $180bn increasing to $600bn throughout the rest of Africa, Yu estimates. 

Kohl’s has teamed up with a Black-owned print shop on a line of tees with messages such as “Together We Can Create Change,” “Enough Is Enough,” and “Black Culture is Not a Trend.” They’re available for a limited time in select stores across the country and at Kohls.com.

The retailer is also making a financial commitment to racial equality, adding in a tweet, “With this launch, Kohl’s is proud to donate $100,000 to @NatUrbanLeague which strengthens economic empowerment, equity and civil rights.”

“We’re working to offer culturally-relevant products, designs, and storytelling that are meaningful to diverse customers,” Kohl’s said in a statement to Spectrum News 1 in Milwaukee. “This is one example of T-shirt assortments Kohl’s has introduced to support the many customers and communities we serve.”

“When we celebrate diverse people, customers, and communities, including Black, Hispanic, and historically underrepresented communities, it’s not a political statement, but rather a purposeful affirmation of every individual and family we serve,” Jen Johnson, Kohl’s senior vice president of communication, added in an interview with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

Cream City Print Lounge, based in Milwaukee, is a Black-owned print shop that does custom printing and “print and sip” parties. It was founded last year by Rachaad Howard, who’s been printing for 11 years and had a dream of designing for large corporations, according to WTMJ-TV.

“When I got the call I was so excited for the opportunity to provide shirts to anyone who wants to speak their mind about social injustice or social change,” Howard said to OnMilwaukee.

“We need to educate more people. We need to wake people up [about the fact] that equality is not here,” he said, as reported by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

The entrepreneur also told Fox 6 that the death of George Floyd triggered him to want to help people express themselves and raise their voices even more. “This is how I can do more, by helping people put their message on their shirt and show it to the world.”

Ananda Lewis, 47, took to Instagram on Thursday to share that she has been battling stage 3 breast cancer for the past two years.

With October being Breast Cancer Awareness Month, the former MTV veejay and host of BET’s “Teen Summit” who at one point hosted her own daytime talk show, decided to open up about her cancer diagnosis. She hopes that by sharing her story, women will be inspired to go get screened for cancer.

“This is tough for me to share, but if just ONE woman decides to get her mammogram after watching this, what I’m going through will be worth it,” she captioned her post.

She began her video message by apologizing to friends and family who may not have been aware of her diagnosis and are finding out about it on social media.

“For a really long time, I have refused mammograms, and that was a mistake,” she continued. “I watched my mom get mammograms for almost 30 years almost, and at the end of that, she had breast cancer, and I said, ‘Huh. Radiation exposure for years equals breast cancer. Yeah, I’m going to pass. Thanks anyway.’”

Lewis stands by her belief in the research showing that exposure to radiation causes cancer and admits she made a mistake in not getting mammograms when they were recommended to her, beginning at age 40. If she had gotten the mammograms, she would’ve been exposed to less radiation.

“What I didn’t understand, and what I need you to understand, the reason why I’m here telling you my business is because I would have had three or four mammograms by the time they caught it. Instead, I’ve had to have 2 PET scans so far. Guess how many mammograms worth of radiation a PET scan is. Anyone? 30! 30! So 60 mammograms! You do the math.”

“If I had done the mammograms from the time they were recommended, when I turned 40, they would have caught the tumor in my breast years before I caught it through my own breast exam (self-exam) and thermography,” the former host said. “And they would have caught it at a place where it was more manageable. Where the treatment of it would have been a little easier. It’s never easier, but I use that word in comparison to what I’m going through now. Instead, what I’m dealing with is stage 3 breast cancer that is in my lymphs. I need you to get your mammograms.”

Since being diagnosed, Lewis has pursued a natural and alternative treatment that has helped stop the cancer from “spreading like wildfire.” She revealed that although the cancer has not spread, it’s not gone either, and she has a long road ahead. She tearfully talked about not wanting to leave her 9-year-old son, her family, or her friends.

“I have a nine-year-old I need to be here for, and I have no intention on leaving him,” she said. “I don’t want to leave any of my kids. And I don’t want to leave my friends or my family. Hell, I don’t want to leave myself. I like being here!”

Lewis asked her followers to share the video with women they know who may be as “stubborn” as her. To share it with women who may be avoiding getting a mammogram done. She cautions that the consequences of not getting a mammogram can be severe, and getting one could save your life.

Kenya has introduced its first licensed investment fund for citizens living overseas, in a move that is expected to channel more of the diaspora’s money into development projects across the country.

Almost three million Kenyans living in mostly North America and Europe sent an estimated $3bn in remittances to Kenya last year, representing the largest source of foreign exchange for the country.

While remittances are usually sent to families, direct investment is also common though studies have shown that difficult procedures, lack of information and informal channels often lead to unsuccessful ventures.  

Kenya’s diaspora can now make investments through the African Diaspora Asset Managers (ADAM), an investment firm that has been granted the first licence of its kind for a diaspora fund by the Kenyan Capital Markets Authority.

The fund is expected to provide a safe and regulated investing body for Kenyans living overseas.

It also allows payments to be made using Kenya’s popular mobile money platform M-Pesa, enabling Kenyans to make investments from as little as five dollars.

Susan Muigai, ADAM’s head of global business development, said: “The use of technology will be the hallmark of the five diaspora funds, available to investors from all over the world as well as Kenyans. Using the ADAM mobile app, they are able to invest, check their investment balances and even sell their units in real time using VISA cards, bank accounts and MPESA.”

Abubakar Hassan, director of market operations at the Capital Markets Authority, added: “Kenyans living in the diaspora send billions home every year, but mostly for consumption and social support. A few have tried their hand in investments including real estate and farming, but without a way to establish what is happening on the ground, it has in numerous instances ended up with them losing their hard-earned money. We are delighted with this development, as all this will now be a thing of the past, as those investing through these licensed diaspora Funds will have the recourse and protection of the CMA as a regulator.”

Like most kids around the world last spring, João Pedro Mattos Pinto found himself on lockdown because of the raging coronavirus. Unable to go to school on May 18, the 14-year-old Black Brazilian joined his cousins at their house in a favela outside of Rio de Janeiro. When gunfire erupted in the neighborhood, he sent his mother a WhatsApp message: “I’m inside the house. Don’t worry.”

Suddenly, 10 police officers burst into the house, searching for a purported drug trafficker and firing off more than 70 shots. João Pedro was hit in the back. His relatives bundled the bleeding boy into a police helicopter, and he was airlifted away. The police barred family members from accompanying the minor and refused to provide the family with any more information. Police arrested no one in the operation.

João Pedro’s cousin, Daniel, put out a desperate message on Twitter, begging people for help locating him. The #procurasejoaopedro (find João Pedro) hashtag trended on Brazilian Twitter overnight. While more than 1,400 young Black men are killed by police every year in Rio, João Pedro’s disappearance grabbed the headlines. It took his family 17 hours to locate his body in a public morgue.

That was seven days before the world would see the haunting video of a Minneapolis police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd; before Black Lives Matter uprisings erupted across the United States, spreading quickly around the world. These two events helped to spark #VidasNegrasImportam (#BlackLivesMatter in Portuguese) protests in Rio de Janeiro and across Brazil, the South American country with the largest population of Black people outside Africa, just ahead of the United States. And in an ironic confluence of events—Joao Pedro’s death combined with the coronavirus—police in Rio were forced to stop almost all operations, at least temporarily, leading to a stark decline in fatal police encounters.

In a world without coronavirus, João Pedro’s death wouldn’t have trended on Twitter, nor would it have been front-page news. But the pandemic and subsequent protests forced Brazilians to focus on anti-Black police violence, which they had long ignored or normalized. Rio activists and lawyers, who had been working against such violence for years, filed an emergency petition asking Brazil’s Supreme Court to stop police operations during the pandemic. And one Supreme Court justice temporarily ruled in favor—with startling results.

One month after Supreme Court Justice Edson Fachin’s June 5 order barring police operations in Rio—except in extreme circumstances—killings by police had dropped 70% compared to the previous 12 years. A study revealed that the suspension of police operations in Rio’s favelas could save more than 400 lives this year alone.

On August 3, a majority of justices on Brazil’s Supreme Court voted to uphold Fachin’s temporary ban on police operations in Rio—a decision that could have broader implications for addressing police violence across the country. The Supreme Court must still determine whether Rio’s state security policing needs to be aligned with national and international human rights standards.

“It is possible that if COVID hadn’t happened, we would not have had a [judicial] decision like we had,” said Wallace Corbo, a lawyer who works pro bono on behalf of the Educafro, an education and social justice nonprofit in Brazil. He started working on the Supreme Court case to stop Rio police operations last year.

“COVID and João Pedro changed everything,” Corbo explained.

The COVID-19 pandemic further unmasked the extent of racial inequities. Although it was the White and wealthy who brought the coronavirus to Brazil from their European holidays, the workers who live in favelas and periphery communities—the Black and poor—were dying at the highest rates. A recent study revealed that 80% of Rio’s coronavirus deaths were registered in the city’s most impoverished areas. And the hardest hit demographic group is older, Black, impoverished men. As of August 27, the country of more than 211 million people had registered more than 117,000 coronavirus deaths.

In many ways, Brazil has emerged as an almost mirror image of the United States, even down to the racial uprising that resulted from a police killing. It is second only to the United States in the number of confirmed cases of coronavirus. And like U.S. President Donald Trump, Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro downplayed the virus from the beginning of the pandemic, calling it a “little flu.” Between March and May, two health ministers resigned; their posts remain vacant. The country has yet to implement a national coronavirus plan.

Such lack of coordination and planning leaves favela activists such as Fernanda Viana Araujo, 40, scrambling to provide food and other basic necessities to people quarantined in tight quarters in these neighborhoods. Mothers who supported their families as domestic servants had to stay home. Fathers who earned a living as parking lot attendants had no work. Grocery store attendants continued to work, potentially exposing their families to the virus.

Araujo said her focus recently has shifted to providing COVID-19 testing to residents of Maré, a favela with the highest number of both COVID cases and deaths overall in Rio.

“We normally focus on building our community through culture, art, public policy, and education,” said Araujo, who works with the nonprofit Rede da Maré, which is in the Maré favela. “But we realized we needed to do something to help our people stay alive. And that means giving them food for their table.”

Recent research has suggested that Neanderthal genes may be responsible for severe cases of COVID-19 in some people. The paper which has been accepted for publication by Nature Research involved a team of experts on Neanderthal genetics which examined a strand of DNA that has been associated with some of the more serious cases of coronavirus. The team compared the DNA strands, found on chromosome 3, to sequences that are known to have been passed down to Europeans and Asians from Neanderthal ancestors.

The team of researchers in Europe has linked certain variations in this sequence with the risk of being more severely affected by the virus. The research showed that the genes are carried by 50% of people in South Asia and 16% of people in Europe today.

Svante Paabo and Hugo Zeberg of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology who worked on the research said that this gene variant was inherited by modern humans from the Neanderthals when they interbred some 60,000 years ago.

"Today, the people who inherited this gene variant are three times more likely to need artificial ventilation if they are infected by the novel coronavirus Sars-CoV-2," said Zeberg. The two scientists also found similar variations in the DNA from a 50,000 year old Neanderthal skeleton found in Croatia and a few of them from skeletons found in Siberia also.

Modern humans interbred with Neanderthals and another species of Denisovans, tens of thousands of years ago according to studies.

It is estimated that about 2% of DNA in people of European and Asian descent can be traced back to Neanderthals.

However, researchers do not know currently what feature in the Neanderthal-derived region confers risk for severe COVID-19 and if the effects of any such feature are specific to SARS-CoV-2, to other coronaviruses, or to other pathogens.

The Omo bones were discovered between 1967 and 1974 at the Omo Kibish sites near the Omo River, in Omo National Park in south-western Ethiopia. First, anatomically modern humans are found in the Omo Valley region Africa and are dated at 195,000 years old.

The bones were recovered by a scientific team from the Kenya National Museums. The remains from Kamoya's Hominid Site (KHS) were called Omo I and those from Paul I. Abell's Hominid Site (PHS) Omo II. The bones include two partial skulls, four jaws, a legbone, around two hundred teeth, and several other parts.
Omo I and Omo II differ in morphological traits. The Omo II fossils indicate more archaic traits. In 2008, new bone remains were discovered from Awoke's Hominid Site (AHS). The AHS fossil's tibia and fibula were unearthed from Member I, the same layer from which the other Omo remains derive. About 30 years after the original finds, a detailed stratigraphic analysis of the area surrounding the fossils was done. The Member I layer was argon-dated to 195,000 years ago, and the (higher layer) Member III was dated to 105,000 years ago. Numerous recent lithic records verify the tool technology from Members I and III to the Middle Stone Age.

The lower layer, Member I, is considerably older than the 160,000-year-old Herto remains designated as Homo sapiens idaltu. The rainy conditions at that time—which are known from isotopic ages on the Kibish Formation corresponding to the ages of Mediterranean sapropels—suggest the increased flow of the Nile River and, therefore, increased flow of the Omo River. But the climates changed such that after 185,000 years ago conditions were so dry as to not allow speleothems to grow in the caverns in the Levantine land-bridge region, the vital inroad for migration to Eurasia.
Parts of the fossils are the earliest to have been classified by Leakey as Homo sapiens. In 2004, the geological layers around the fossils were dated, with the age of the "Kibish hominids" estimated at 195,000 years ago.

Governor Kay Ivey Ivey offered a "sincere, heartfelt apology" for the "racist, segregationist rhetoric used by some of our leaders during that time." Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey apologized to Sarah Collins Rudolph, a survivor of a Ku Klux Klan bombing that left her severely injured and killed four Black girls, including her sister, in 1963.

In a letter sent to Collins Rudolph's lawyers, Ivey offered a "sincere, heartfelt apology" for the "racist, segregationist rhetoric used by some of our leaders during that time."

Ivey said there should be no question that Collins Rudolph, who was 12 when Klan members bombed 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham 57 years ago, and the four other girls "suffered an egregious injustice that has yielded untold pain and suffering over the ensuing decades."

Lawyers for Collins Rudolph had said in a letter to Ivey this month that, while hard-line segregationist officials like Gov. George Wallace didn't place the bomb next to the building, they played an "undisputed role in encouraging its citizens to engage in racial violence."

Collins Rudolph lost her right eye in the bombing. Glass fragments remained in her left eye, her abdomen and her chest for years after, according to The Associated Press.

Her sister, Addie Mae Collins, 14, was killed. So were Cynthia Wesley and Carole Robertson, also 14, and Denise McNair, 11.

"She has born the burdens of the bombing for virtually her entire life, and we believe her story presents an especially meritorious and unique opportunity for the State of Alabama to right the wrongs that its past leaders encouraged and incited," the letter to Ivey said.

The lawyers, who are from the Washington, D.C., firm Jenner & Block and are representing Collins Rudolph pro bono, had asked for an official apology as well as compensation.

Ivey's letter doesn't specifically address compensation, noting that the Legislature would have to be involved, and it says "other questions" raised by the lawyers will need to be reviewed.

"It would seem to me that beginning these conversations — without prejudice for what any final outcome might produce but with a goal of finding mutual accord — would be a natural extension of my administration's ongoing efforts to foster fruitful conversations" about race, Ivey said.

Rudolph Collins' lawyers, Ishan Bhabha and Alison Stein, said in a statement that they were "gratified" by the apology and that they looked forward to future talks about compensation.

Kenya’s president Uhuru Kenyatta has eased a range of Covid-19 restrictions, but reminds citizens that a return to one of Africa’s strictest lockdowns is possible in the event of a second wave.

Bars and eateries will be allowed to resume the sale of alcohol and remain open until 10pm while religious gatherings and funerals have seen capacity restrictions partially lifted.

The nationwide dawn-to-dusk curfew will continue for another 60 days, though the window has been reduced from 11pm to 4am.

Explaining the move, Kenyatta said the percentage of positive tests had fallen from 13% in June to 4.4% in September, which is less than the World Health Organization’s 5% threshold for lifting restrictions.

The president attributed the slow decline in cases to the “civic duty” displayed by Kenyan citizens and quick advances in health infrastructure.

Kenya now has over 300 intensive care beds throughout the whole of the country, compared to just eight at the start of the pandemic.

“In this period, we have installed more medical equipment than has ever happened since independence,” he says.

He also paid tribute to nationwide efforts to observe Covid-19 protocols, calling Kenyans the “first line of defense” against the virus.

At the same time, the president warned of cautionary tales elsewhere and made it clear that his government would continue its strict approach.

“The greatest danger is at the moment of victory,” he says.

“If we have won the battle against Covid-19, we have not yet won the war. The possibility of a second wave is real.”

Despite expectations to ease measures, Kenyatta has continued with school closures until possibly 2021.

Businesses, however, have welcomed the news due to the increase in operating hours.

“Bars, churches, taxi businesses and other informal sector jobs are set to boost liquidity in the Kenyan economy unlike during the old 9pm to 4am curfew,” says Sam Wakoba, CEO of Moran Media.

The government is also continuing with regulation changes to boost the economy, like reductions in VAT and income tax.

The Central Bank of Kenya expects the country to grow at a revised rate of 2.3% this year, driven by increased agricultural exports due to favourable rains.

This World Bank projects a lower growth of 1.5% as a result of the massive disruption to the aviation and tourism sectors.

While the lifting of most restrictions will breathe life into the damaged economy, a return to a more severe lockdown is still possible.

“As far as I give these directives, I underscore the need to adhere to the protocols, to keep the gains we have made,” Kenyatta says.

“I will not hesitate to escalate any measures in the event cases rise again.”

At the age of 16, Paris McKenzie has opened her own beauty supply shop called Paris Beauty Supplyz in Brooklyn, New York, making her the youngest person to ever do so. Already equipped with a lot of business experience, she has so far been running the business smoothly.

Despite her young age, she also earned the respect of her relatively older staff including 22-year old Giselle Ashby who said, “Paris, she’s like a little sister to me. I respect her. It’s fun.”

Aside from being an entrepreneur, Paris, who is a straight-A student, also plans to major in pre-med to achieve her dream of being an orthopedic pediatric surgeon. She is an incoming junior year high school student and is already taking college courses. She is a busy teenager but she doesn’t forget to enjoy from time to time.

“I don’t really have any more free time, but when I do, I try to go out with my friends,” said Paris. “Walking in here every morning, it makes me feel awesome.

Miracle J. Reese is the founder of one of very few Black-owned tea companies based in Birmingham, Ala. Her company, TasTea Wellness Blends (pronounced “taste tea”), is a premium loose-leaf tea company. Made of natural herbs and fruits, her blends are handcrafted with wellness in mind.

TasTea’s four flavor blends each have unique recipes to create a positive tea experience. Customers get to choose their mood while enjoying drinkable wellness. Miracle says her goal is to bring enjoyable solutions to health that are delicious. Her wellness teas deliver a clean and travel-friendly tea experience nationally with great tea benefits including skin rejuvenation, immunity boost and health.