Jacaranda trees are found all over Harare and Zimbabwe’s other towns and cities, as well as widely scattered across the countryside. People in Zimbabwe with whom I spoke said that they always look forward to the blossom which, apart from simply being pretty, is seen as marking the change of seasons – the end of the dry ‘winter’ and the hope that ‘summer’ rains will bring. Just as cherry blossom is a Japanese icon, so too is jacaranda an icon of Harare. Except jacaranda isn’t Zimbabwean. It’s an invader.