Sharia Washington, who is the older sister of Kobe Bryant, has unveiled a new tattoo to pay her tributes to her late brother and his 13-year-old daughter, Gianna.
Although Sharia Washington did not show her face in the photo of the new tattoo she shared on her Instagram page, it comes a few days after the memorial of Kobe Bryant and Gigi at the LA Lakers playing ground, the Staples Center.
To honour the memory of her lost loved ones, Sharia Washington, inked the tattoo on her shoulder, showing the numbers 2 and 24 which were the Jersey numbers of both Kobe and his daughter, Gigi. She also inked a giant mamba snake was drawn wrapped around the numbers. She thanked Peter Barrios who did the work for the beautiful artwork.
The snake represents Kobe’s famous ‘Black Mamba’ nickname, while the infinity symbol represents that Kobe and Gianna will be together forever in heaven.
Sharia shared the photo of her new ink on Instagram, and then Peter re-posted it with the message, “I didn’t take my own photo out of respect but today I had the honour of tattooing a memorial tattoo on @ShariaWash. Thank you for laughing with me today and letting me do this for you. I will never forget our conversations. Much love and respect to your family.”
In a previous post, Sharia Washington had taken to her Instagram to mourn the death of her brother, Kobe, where she made a post to the wife, Vanessa Bryant telling her how they are with her and also mouring as a family. She said:
“On behalf of our family, we join Vanessa, Natalia, Bianka and Capri in grieving the loss of Kobe and Gianna in such a tragic accident.
We are devastated by the loss of our brother, son, our niece and granddaughter, and our hearts go out to all the families who lost their loved ones on Sunday. Our lives are forever changed.
Thank you for your prayers, the numerous calls, texts, emails and cards.
Please visit MambaOnThree.org to support the families affected by Sunday’s tragedy and to honour Kobe and Gianna’s legacy, please visit: MambaSportsFoundation.org
#Mambacita #Mamba #Family #GirlDad – Sharia Washington and Shaya Tabb,” she said.
Kobe and Gianna were very tragically killed when the helicopter they were flying in crashed in Calabasas on Jan. 26. There were seven other people on the copter, who also all died in the horrific crash. The group was travelling to a middle school basketball game, which Gianna was supposed to play in, at Kobe’s Mamba Academy when the accident happened.