Hello friends and family,

We are honored you will share in our special day. Your presence is our gift!

Hello Family! 2019 has been very good to us. As we prepare for some BIG CHANGES, we would like to share some exciting news with the ones we love.

We are moving to Louisville, KY come end of July 2019. Kalasia accepted a position as a tenure-track faculty member in the department of Pan-African Studies at the University of Louisville. And Yes, Kalasia is graduating from her PhD program this August! Charles will transfer to the Louisville, KY Charles Schwab, while simultaneously studying for his series 66, as he fills the position of Associate Financial Consultant. Chi Chi will be starting school and her singing career. To say the least, we are truly blessed.

These big changes made us reconsider our engagement and wedding plans. We decided to postpone a larger wedding ceremony and just make our love for one another official! On Wednesday, June 19th, 2019,we will elope at the Staten Island Courthouse.

If you are familiar with the date, then you know we are getting married on a very special day Juneteenth: the day in which slaves were freed in Texas and other (but not all) confederate states during the Civil War. Although it did not free all slaves, it has become the day African descendants in the United States celebrate our freedom from bondage. We selected this date as our own commemoration of our love that is deeply rooted in unity, activism, resilience, and the spirituality of our ancestors. We also decided on Staten Island to demonstrate our adoration and loving bond to the Nigerian community who we respect dutifully. Staten Island represents kinship to us, and pays homage to the beauty, strength, and determination Charles’s parents made to provide the best life for their family.

Taking into account our location and date, we truly believe our union represents God’s goodness here on Earth. Through God, we embody one link within the African diaspora: where two very divergent paths can end up in the same place. For us, together is the best place to be.

We also would like to recognize the people who have loved us, listen to us, fought for us, and prayed for us. We could not ask for a stronger community than the one you all have provided. We could not be here without you, so we thank you and ask for your presence as we continue our journey together, with you, as a family.

Our greatest thanks and joy would be to have you present at our ceremony and we truly hope you’ll join us in celebrating our matrimony.

We also made a honeyfund to streamline any gifts you would like to give in commemoration of our union.

Our Honeyfund: https://www.honeyfund.com/wedding/JuiceandLaygetMar-rayed

Here is the Information

Date: Wednesday, June 19th, 2019

Time: 10:30am

Location: Staten Island Borough Hall Building

10 Richmond Terrace, Room 311, (please enter at the entrance located at the intersection of Hyatt Street and Stuyvesant Place).

Staten Island, NY 10301

FYI: Kalasia will take the Staten Island ferry over to S.I. at 10am (as a pseudo middle passage) from Manhattan. If you are coming from Manhattan, Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn, or outside of NY and need help getting to S.I., then you can meet Kalasia at the S.I. Ferry-Manhattan side, 4 Whitehall Street New York NY 10004, at 9:45am.

We will have lunch (date and time TBD) after the ceremony and we hope you join us.

Thanks for visiting and we can't wait to see you on our big day!

With Love,

Charles, Kalasia, and Kelechi