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“Return home,” said the African diaspora. Now some black Americans are taking citizenship

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Accra, Ghana (AP) – browsing the family album, Keachia Bowers stopped in her photo as a toddler on her father’s knees, when from 1978 he organized the album “Africa Stand Sam” from 1978 by the culture of reggae.

“When I was 10, I was supposed to come to Ghana with him,” she said. The day before she was 10 years old from her father’s death. Although he was a Panfrycanist who dreamed of visiting Ghana, he never found himself here.

However, Bowers and her husband, Damon Smith, belong to 524 diaspora members, mainly Black Americans, who received Ghana’s citizenship during the ceremony in November.

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Bowers and Smith moved to Ghana from Florida in 2023. After a visit to the region for several times since the Nineteen Nineties everlasting movement.

The November Group was the best citizenship since Ghana launched the “Year of Return” program, geared toward attracting a black diaspora in 2019. This meant 400 years from the first African slaves in Virginia in 1619.

The Ghana Tourism Office and the Diaspory Office prolonged the program to “Beyond the Return”, which promotes relationships with the diasporants. Hundreds received citizenship, including people from Canada, Great Britain and Jamaica.

Bowers said that moving to Ghana gave the family a sense of ease that they didn’t have in the USA

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“When we see Trayvon MartinSandra Bland, all these stories about people murdered at home, living at home and murdered at the hands of police brutality, hearing about it causes trauma, “she said.

She was also apprehensive about her son Tsadik, 14 years old.

Tsadik towers over family members in a way that lean teenage boys often do. He is shy, but opens around his younger sister Tselah, 11 years old and family dog, Apollo.

“In America, being a black man from LOCs, who is very high for his age, is treated as a threat,” said Bowers.

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Americans encounter several obstacles in life in Ghana, and most of the people pay an annual fee for his or her stay. But Bowers said that citizenship meant greater than atypical life in Ghana.

“I didn’t need (citizenship) to inform me that I used to be an African. Wherever I am going to the world and someone looks at me, I’m melated – she said.

“But my ancestors who wanted to come back and come back home, those ancestors who have never returned him,” she said – For me, the passport is for them. “

From 10 to fifteen million people were forced from Africa to America during transatlantic trade in slaves, most of West and Central Africa.

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Ghana, then the British colony often known as Gold Coast, was the foremost point of the trip.

Because slave trade monuments grow to be tourist places in West Africa, painful reminders of its brutality are easily accessible. From Ghana to Senegal to BeninYou can visit the varieties of “door without returning”, haunting doors opening to the Atlantic Ocean, where the slaves left Africa and their families for the last time.

The joy that individuals feel to find connections that were destroyed an extended time ago is tangible. Movies from a recent citizenship ceremony show men and ladies of all ages, waving the flags and cheers of Ghana.

33 -year -old Deijha Gordon was certainly one of them.

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“I visited Ghana for the first time in 2015. From now on, I knew that this was a place where I wanted to be, and a place where I wanted to show other diasporas, African Americans, that we had a place where we belonged, “she said.

In 2019, she moved from Brooklyn to Ghana and opened a truck with food, Jerk Hut Deijha Vu, selling Jamaican food.

Between the orders of the bag and talks with the Black American tourist couple, she explained how she built an organization from scratch.

Gordon was dizzying, remembering the moment when she received citizenship.

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“It is nice to be related to the African country as an African American, as a black American. Because in America we now have nothing to trace our roots except Africa. To have this connection here, I feel that I did something right – she said.

Like Bowers, Gordon had a stream of individuals reaching out and questions on the citizenship process.

The path shouldn’t be clearly defined. Citizenship must come from a concession from the presidency of Ghana, the trial is legal in accordance with the Act on citizenship of 2000. This is granted to people living in Ghana who told the Diaspory office that they are considering citizenship.

The Ghana government partly describes the program as a bonus for the economy and focuses on investment capabilities for individuals who wish to move.

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Jimmy Butler, asked if he could again find joy on the pitch in Miami:

Festus, with the local Non -profit spokesmake center, said that although the government emphasizes the economic angle, the real advantages of citizenship are intangible.

“I do not think that (recipients) cry because they landed with a gold mine, or found oil or a business opportunity. But this is something so relieving that the value or price cannot be set, “he said.

The administration of President Nana Akufo-Addo, who began the “year of return” is on the way. Ghana’s foremost opposition party won the presidential election on December 7.

But this -man said that black Americans and other diaspora residents would probably still receive citizenship of the presidential concession.

Citizenship may also pass on the next generation. Bowers and Smith’s children received him robotically after their parents’ ceremony.

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Bowers’s father, like her husband and youngsters, was a follower of Rastafari’s faith. “Repatrination is an element of the rastafarian tradition. We see repatriation as the final experience you could have on this land – she said.

She thinks her father is happy with her. “I really feel that he is smiling where he is. He wanted to experience it for himself, so he experiences it through me. “

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From the plantation to black heritage: like Shadel Nyack Compton, he transformed Estate Belmont Grenada to the destination for a visit

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When Shadel Compton Nyack left her native country Grenada at Howard University a many years ago, her life plan was quite clearly touched – graduation in HBCu, go to law school and continues his profession as a lawyer.

But life has a fun way to shake the best -developed plans.

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She grew up on a farm named Belmont Estate it was dark past-Earlier he served as a profitable plantation on the island of Grenada-as long as its ancestors Indo-Grenadan didn’t buy it. Despite their positive intention, they might allow the terrain to fall into ruins through old age. Compton Nyack saw the opportunity.

“I had a passion and I knew that I wanted to keep this business that has been so important in Grenada for many decades. And this ensured economic stability that provided jobs. “

Compton Nyack saw areas that when produced chocolate and other products and thought that they might be grown again for tourist purposes. She began to transform the property into a university environment, which trained local residents of the production process for crops, together with the activities of the points of business and tourism of the Earth.

Visitors to Belmont Estate can then visit a delicious fragrant production room, wherein the paste is transformed into chocolate bars, trying the final product and buying gifts for the home.

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In addition to the chocolate trip, guests can try goat cheese produced on the farm and eat lunch on the table farm.

The wealthy history and current transformation of the Earth Grenadan is something that Compton Nyack wants more African -American travelers to enjoy.

“I am glad that African Americans spend their dollars in the Caribbean, recognizing our history and culture, as well as for many areas in which we have similarities … and simply develop a greater sense of pride,” reflects Compton Nyack.

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Black leadership in business is a common thread that goes beyond the borders of the Black Diaspora. This one Shadel Compton Nyack Hopes inspires latest generations of entrepreneurs, especially black people, especially women, derive hope from tourist industries, which sometimes seem exploiting.

“They come here and see that we are a black country, that we have black leadership, that there are black in business,” he says. “So many … local entrepreneurs, especially here in Grenada. I think the dynamics here in Grenada is different than on many other islands. And African Americans appreciate it. “

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For anyone who wants to go to the unknown, Compton Nyack offers this encouragement:

“I’m saying, go for it. You know when you’ve got this inspiration, this vision and this passion – you have to have it first – for it. Enjoy the process. It needs to be fun. It should make you are feeling glad. And if possible, ensure your project, what you are promoting makes a difference in the lives of others.

For me it’s the biggest joy – that I develop people here. We support the community. We try to help people maintain the environment higher. So all this stuff provide you with a great sense of goal and satisfaction, and you’ll be able to change your world. “

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohumproxl64

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This black yoga studio is the perfect travel escape in Grenada

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Hidden on the hills of the Grenada island, in the community of St. George’s, sits yoga Spice Harmony, a black yoga studio that seems to escape from the world. Founded by Dr. Kecia Brooks-Smith-LoweHer husband Ferron C. Lowe ESQ.and their daughter, Malaika Brooks-Smith-LoweSpice Harmony Yoga is positioned on the third floor of the Brooks-Lowe-Smith family home. With a fruit and vegetable garden in the yard and medical practice, Dr. Brooks-Smith-Lowe on the second floor, in this house, purpose, passion and repair.

Visitors recognize Harmony Spice as a comfortable space with purple with yoga mats, bands and pillows. It has all the vital elements of a typical studio with unpretentious sense and stands out from one other space on the island as the only non-hotel yoga studio in Grenada.

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The story of Spice Harmony actually began in Montclair, New Jersey, in the 90s, when Dr. Brooks-Smith-Lowee made a medical residence-a stressful and demanding phase becoming a physician. Her husband, Ferron, from Grenada, went to local walks and discovered yoga as a strategy to de -stress, after which brought his family, including Malaika. Soon, the whole family was trained and licensed, in 2011, all three members of the Brooks-Smith-Low family officially launched Spice Harmony yoga on a gorgeous island.

Malaika Brooks-Lowe-Smith co-founder Spice Harmony Yoga along with her parents in Grenada. He stands in front of their great wall to clarify the advantages of yoga for mental and physical health. (Photo: Natasha S. Alfford/Thegrio)
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Malaika says that although people often see yoga as a hobby or fitness trend, Harmony Spice serves a deeper goal in the community by changing the possibilities.

“People often feel that yoga is not for them,” he explains. “For any reason: they are too old. They are not flexible. It’s a man. They have a medical problem. And yoga therapy taught me that you can meet someone anywhere. “

The studio offers private classes, with non -standard experience for couples in honey months or holidays, in addition to classes for kids, seniors, future pregnant moms and others.

“Great Yoga Wall” Spice Harmony is also a special feature that leaves guests suspended in the air, with ropes attached to wall hooks, which make them feel weightless. It helps with flexibility and customary problems.

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Malaika, who is also a trained doula and mother for a six -year -old boy, notes that a lot of her clients also use yoga for medical and therapeutic reasons.

“Some of my parents, my patients had impacts, paralysis, all kinds of things. And there are so many aspects of this practice that go beyond physical. Breath, mindfulness that we still need, especially when our body is not, you know what it was once or passed through something traumatic. So for me the opportunity to have this space and offer something so high quality, which our people deserve. “

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To support this effort, he is working on raising funds for a brand new project called The Wild Seed Sanctuary-Trzy and a half Akra of a social enterprise designed to create a comprehensive, intergenerational yoga space, social events and healing.

Wild seeds will gather all guests and residents in Grenada with the “Pay-What-You-Can” model, creating black coworking and yoga space, which means that you can create organic connections.

The youngest Brooks-Smith-Lowee received numerous support and enthusiasm for the project and hopes that he’ll replace it by the end of the 12 months.

The presence of Spice Harmony in Grenada is in the landscape of many black firms, and it is one among the Brooke-Smith-Lowe malaika, from which it attracts strength.

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“Many people move to Grenada. And this is great, especially since there are more – they are not only white people who move here and call themselves expatt. We also have younger black and brown people who are trying to get out of the USA and Great Britain … I think it is still important that we have companies that we also really run in Grenada, that we also use it. “

Watch Black Travel Diary: Why should you visit the island of Antigua

(Tagstotransate) grenada

This article was originally published on : thegrio.com
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What’s with all the random accidents of the aircraft?

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The plane directed from Minneapolis to the Toronto the wrong way up on the airport’s catwalk in the Canadian city.

The film material that appeared on the web shows that the plane slipped in a catastrophe on snowy asphalt before it lights up and completely falls over. The disaster means the fourth large plane crash in North America since the starting of the yr.

The world stopped when a military helicopter collided with a passenger aircraft on January 29, before they each plunged into the Potomac River, leaving the survivors and ultimately claiming that a complete of 67 lives. Just just a few days later, a pneumatic jet ambulance wearing a minor patient hit a district in Philadelphia, demanding life on the plane. Then, just a few days before the failure to Toronto, a plane was lost with 10 on board before he was crashed on Alaska without survivors.

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The latest disaster associated with a plane in Toronto only increased the growing fear and concerns about flying safety in today’s airspace. In Washington, news about President Donald Trump’s plans regarding the federal aviation administration in uncertain times in his administration for presidency staff was increasingly nervous. Last week, the Trump administration began to shoot almost 400 test employees when the agency was already short for about 800 employees.

“These are positions that are necessary to support public security,” said the spokeswoman of the Union Reuters.

It is difficult to point whether the planes are breaking more, and if that’s the case, why. Naming this until the time is not going to be completely secure until the yr shouldn’t be further. According to data collected by National Transport Security CouncilTechnically, we had no more accidents related to the aircraft than at the moment last yr. With the exception of the American Eagle disaster in the Potomac River, smaller aircraft and personal jet are more at risk of accidents. What happened in Toronto, accident, landing or start in the runway is taken into account the most typical phenomenon.

However, the aircraft fully turned over, like a automobile, apparently it’s “very rare”, in keeping with John Cox, the general director of the Consulting Company for Safety Safety in St. St. Petersburg in Florida.

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Cox said NBC 5 Chicago“We saw several start cases in which the aircraft ended inverted, but it’s quite rare.”

Truth and value the anxiety that the January disaster in Pogomak meant the most threatening place in the American airspace from attacks of September 11. But it also stays true that the likelihood of death in a plane crash It continues to be too rare to even count.

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(Tagstotransate) lifestyle

This article was originally published on : thegrio.com
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