Hashtag Jacaranda Propaganda

The colonial history of one tree in Kenya being reclaimed as our own

Photo: Blanchi Costela/Moment Open/Getty Images

When the British left Kenya at the end of their colonial rule of the country, one of the things they left us was the gift of the jacaranda tree. Growing up in Kisumu, a city in the Western part of Kenya, we would see them, these jacarandas, blooming in hues of seismic purple every January, heralding…