Jacarandas in bloom, the Japanese heritage that beautifies Mexico City

10,000 km from Tokyo, the nine million inhabitants of the capital also celebrate in their own way the tradition of "hanami", the ritual of admiration of the blossoming of cherry trees in Japan.

The flowering of jacarandas marks "a festival of early spring, with the purple colors so intense in our city," says historian Sergio Hernandez Galindo.

Often unknowingly, the "Chilangos" (inhabitants of Mexico City) owe it to a Japanese landscaper, Tatsugoro Matsumoto, who planted jacarandas a century ago, he adds.

Matsumoto settled in Mexico in 1896, at the time of a first Asian migration (Japanese, Koreans, Chinese).

The Japanese landscape designer won the trust of dictator-president Porfirio Diaz (1884-1911), who also called on French and Italian architects to modernize the capital of a country opening up to industry with foreign capital.

Jacarandas bloom in Mexico City's Alameda Public Park, March 25, 2023 © Pedro PARDO / AFP

Surviving the overthrow of Diaz and the Mexican Revolution (1910-17), Matsumoto introduced jacarandas brought from Brazil.

These trees native to South America represented an alternative to cherry trees that struggled to flourish at 2,200 m altitude, in a climate shared between a dry and hot season from November to April, and the rainy season at temperate temperatures.

A century later, the blossoming and fall of the flowers, which cover sidewalks and parks with a lilac-colored carpet, is an appointment awaited under a sky often still blue at this time of year, before the greyness of the first rains.

The purple of flowers is the favorite color of Andreina Rondon, a Venezuelan psychologist met in Mexico City.

Jacarandas bloom in Mexico City's Alameda Public Park, March 25, 2023 © Pedro PARDO / AFP

Purple also reminds her of the colour of the feminist demonstrations of March 8. "It's perfect!" she exclaims as she admires the trees.

The jacaranda nevertheless remains "an invasive species" in competition with "native vegetation", explains a publication of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (Unam).

These "exotic species" are not bad in themselves "but prevent the reproduction of native trees such as strawberry tree, Mexican laurel or oaks," adds this online publication entitled "jacarandas, the purple invasion of a tree".

© 2023 AFP