The Bright Continent

09/06/2026

‘Cabo Verde is like a painting and Morabeza is my new favourite word,’ is what photographer said about her pictures.

‘Morabeza’ is one of those words that resists clean translation, which is part of what makes it interesting.

It comes from Cape Verdean Creole  and at its most basic it describes the friendliness, casual and relaxed behaviour of Cape Verdean people and their culture. 

But Cape Verdeans themselves will tell you it goes much deeper than simple hospitality. It’s about gentleness and kindness, a softer way of living and looking at life.

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07/06/2026

Ceremonial Attire, Sacred Instruments and the Enchanted Beings 🪇

When Indigenous peoples in Brazil are discussed, the popular imagination often reduces them to images of the rainforest and symbols such as feathered headdresses. Yet this narrow representation overlooks the immense territorial, historical and cultural diversity of the country’s Indigenous nations.

Across the sertão of north-eastern Brazil live numerous Indigenous peoples from different ethnic groups, each with their own systems of social organisation, cosmologies, languages, rituals and relationships with the land. Recognising the indigenous presence in the sertão is essential to understanding the ethnic and cultural plurality that defines Brazil.

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When I asked Chief Toá about the attire worn by the Praiás of the Pankararu people, he explained that these are sacred ceremonial garments consisting of a mask-cloak (Tanam) and a skirt, both crafted from the fibres of the caroá plant.

These garments are worn during the Toré, a sacred ritual practised by several population groups in north-eastern Brazil. Covering the dancer’s entire body, the attire conceals the individual’s identity, allowing them to embody spiritual beings known as the Encantados (“Enchanted Ones”).

Here’s a reflection on the Encantados by the writer Luiz Antonio Simas:

“The enchanted being is one who has become embodied and yet is no longer merely a body; at the same time, the body is all they possess. It is one who has made themselves available to change, to alter the body, to transform experience, to cross thresholds and perceive life in different ways — as a path that rejects mortality and affirms the beauty of being, with freedom as the founding act of existence.”

Brazil is wonderfully surreal. 🤍

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05/06/2026

Ghana as seen through the eyes of .lartey 🇬🇭

The photographs of Ghanaian artist and filmmaker Jude Lartey hold something quiet beneath their surface. By his mid-twenties he has forged a distinct visual identity. His images reframe what it means to belong and clothing, in his hands, carries history more than it carries style.

Words for : “Since childhood, I’ve been fascinated by imagery and its power to freeze time,” he recalls. “My late grandad used to show me photos from when he worked as Kwame Nkrumah’s bodyguard. Those stories made me realise that, through images, you can keep history alive.”

03/06/2026

To cross it is to pass between continents in the time it takes to drain a çay 🫖

Istanbul is perhaps the only city on earth that can genuinly claim to straddle two continents. Not metaphorically, but physically. The Bosphorus strait, roughly 30 kilometres long and as narrow as 700 metres at its tightest point, divides the city between its European and Asian shores.

Lovely photos by

01/06/2026

The color and rhythms of Yoruba Vodun culture up close from Porto Novo, Ouidah, Grand Popo and villages inbetween, as captured by

Yoruba Vodun has its roots among the Yoruba people of present-day Nigeria and Benin, with strong overlaps with the Fon and Ewe peoples of Benin, Togo, and Ghana.

The spirits of Yoruba crossed the Atlantic in the bodies of the enslaved and found their way to, among others, Bahia, Havana, and Port-au-Prince.

Western popular culture has badly distorted Yoruba Vodun, yet there’s nothing to be caricatured as it is in fact one of humanity’s oldest and most influential living traditions.

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31/05/2026

Few countries carry the weight of the world quite like India. A civilisation that gave us mathematics, cotton, and chess is now building satellites and exporting software engineers to Silicon Valley.

Close to a fifth of humanity is quietly rewriting what a superpower looks like.

Beautifully captured by

29/05/2026

Glimpses of everyday Havana, 2022 🇨🇺

Nowadays, Havana looks like a city living in slow-motion crisis: endless blackouts, empty fuel reserves, spoiled food, stalled transport, and a population exhausted by years of scarcity now squeezed further by a US oil blockade.

It results in a strange mix of tension and routine. People are adapting because they have no choice, neighbors are learning to survive in darkness while political powers push their ideology above their heads.

It exposes that there still seems to exist a certain stubbornness in daily Cuban life, showing that even after years of hardship, people haven’t completely lost the ability to endure, improvise, and hope for something better.

Beautiful photography by

27/05/2026

Eid al-Adha, the Festival of Sacrifice 🌙✨

A day honouring faith, devotion, and generosity; marked with prayer, sharing bread with the less fortunate, and the warmth of community. Wishing all who are celebrating a blessed and joyful Eid. 🌙✨

1,2 - Indonesia,
3,4 - Ghana,
5,6 - Morocco,
7,8 - Mali,
9,10 - .jiri

25/05/2026

Happy Africa Day! Let’s move forward together 🎢

1 - Nigeria,
2 - Senegal,
3 - Morocco,
4 - Sierra Leone,
5 - Mauritania,
6 - DR Congo,
7 - Chad,
8 - Sudan,
9 - Morocco,
10 - Mauritania,
11 - Burundi,
12 - CAR,
13 - Côte d’Ivoire,

23/05/2026

If power is increasingly contested by force, it is also being quietly reinterpreted through culture by those who still believe another form of public life is possible.

So, in the absence of political certainty, Mali’s future is being imagined elsewhere: in the hills, in studios and in improvised theatres.

For this story I listened to the ideas of three young activists in Mali. Want to hear their story? Tap the link, subscribe (for free) and it lands in your inbox tomorrow 👇

In the absence of political certainty, Mali’s future is being imagined by its next generation.