The garden in Nairobi

I am munching on a mango in the Nairobi garden and recovering from a full-on lunchtime. What? Why? Because the garden is already peopled with tortoises, rabbits and chickens, then an invasion of Sykes monkeys arrived and tore down the little Sunbird's nest. We had to call on Samson the gardener and James one of the guards to help us chase away these aggressive intruders. I dashed to close the door to the house lest they took it into their heads to look for Sunbirds inside.

The tortoises, rabbits and chickens all have their own stories. The tortoises: TeeTee, Artemis, Lola and Gypsy were gifts from a family who ended their time in Kenya and couldn't take them home however much they might have liked to. The rabbits were originally named Cleopatra and Napoleon. It quite surprised the family that there was no offspring, until one of the guards picked them both up, turned them upside down and they both had the same undercarriage. Cleopatra became Nelson.

The chickens have had a varied career. One young male called Mohawk was taken by a hawk - was it destiny? One rooster ended up on the dining room table because he pecked the neck of his admirer until her neck bled. There have been two groups of happy arrivals: balls of yellow fluff that the two hens spoiled and doted on until one day - doubtless when they became teenagers – Theodora and Geronima would have nothing more to do with them. The teenagers had to find their own food from that day on.

The cacophony of five crowing roosters at 6.00 a.m. has proved too much to bear. Samson is selling three at the market today. Lancelot the alpha male will remain to look after the hens.

As I write, the staff are eating Pwet Pwet or Penguini - not sure which one and not sure of the spelling - but am sure we will wake up each morning to just one cock-a-doodle-doo.