occurrence, Warui said. “Most of the adult Kenyans in Maricopa were born in Kenya, and a good number of the younger kids were born in America,” she said, adding the first Kenyan to move here was around 2006. According to data from the 2020 U.S. Census, as many as 1 in 10 foreign-born Maricopa residents could be from Kenya, compared to just 1 in 200 in the previous census. The growth in Maricopa’s Kenyan community has led to the formation of a local organization called Maricopa Family's Keeper. Warui said it’s a sort of message board that exists specifically for Kenyans to communicate. The local Kenyan culture is kept alive through many traditional activities, such as weddings and dowry payments, traditional music performances and maintaining the Swahili language at gatherings. That helps preserve the culture of the East African country, Warui said. “We also celebrate Holidays like Mashujaa Day, Swahili for Heroes Day,” she said. “Every year, Mashujaa Day is marked to pay tribute to individuals who significantly aided Kenya's fight for independence from colonial authority.” Kenyans in Maricopa also celebrate with worship gatherings in the city. While her native land is a world away, some things remind Warui of home. Take traffic on State Route 347, for example. “We encounter the same issue in certain Kenyan towns as well.” But you don’t drive on the lefthand side of the road as they do in Kenya, she said. It can be confusing. Upon moving to Maricopa, Warui said it was the heat that surprised her most. Located on the equator, the average temperature in Kenya’s capital city Nairobi is 63 to 70 degrees year-round, according to the World Climate Guide. She explains how you can recognize a Kenyan in Maricopa: ”It's a funny truth that practically every Kenyan we know wears a bracelet with the national flag's colors — black, white, red and green. This makes identifying a Kenyan easy,” Warui said. Recognizing the bracelet, she said you might greet a Kenyan with, “Jambo,” meaning “hello.” An oft-used Kenyan expression made more familiar in the U.S. thanks to Disney’s 1994 movie “Lion King” — hakuna matata. English translation: “No worries.”
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December 2023 | InMaricopa.com
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