My clandestine night at the theatre
Kenya The poster for the Edinburgh University Shakespeare Company’s production of Much Ado About Nothing had a hippie design, with…
Are my cattle ready to compete?
Kenya My cattle sensei Mark revealed that my Boran bulls aren’t gaining enough masculine growth after weaning because they’re only…
In praise of camels
Laikipia, Kenya For decades now I have kept only cattle, goats and sheep on the farm, but for the first…
Remembering the horror of Rwanda’s genocide
Rwanda It had been more than 30 years, yet I recognised the church and its surroundings instantly. Superimposed on the…
I’m losing the will to hunt
Laikipia, Kenya When I was eight I used to go fishing in the Indian Ocean beyond Vasco da Gama’s pillar…
The farms that I’ve loved and lost
Laikipia, Kenya I am grateful to David, a reader of this column, who kindly sent me a packet of old…
How I found my way to my half-brother
Kenya In my dream my father is sitting next to me in the car as we drive around our hometown…
Like my father before me, I’ve found comfort in yoga
Malindi, Kenya In 1967, Tanzania’s socialist rulers seized all my parents’ property – their ranchland, their home and their cattle…
Retracing the steps of slaves in Benin
Ouidah, Benin On a free afternoon in Benin, I decide to walk the slave route in Ouidah, the port from…
The politics of glasses
Africa Orientale Italiana ‘Where did you get those glasses?’ a stylish Italian gentleman asked me, gesturing at the acetate L.G.R.…
What the Delameres did for Kenya
Kenya’s Rift Valley The story of Kenya’s Europeans such as the 5th Baron Delamere, who died recently, is one of…
Life lessons from a 2,000-year-old plant
Iona, Angola East of the gulps of cormorants along the Skeleton Coast by the Ilha da Baia dos Tigres, Atlantic…
My hopes for Africa
Lake Malawi As we speed southwards along the potholed road near Lake Malawi’s shores, I tell my colleague Helen that…
The joy of getting lost in the Congo
Republic of Congo I’m sending this to you from the rainforest in Congo, surrounded by vast trees and jungle noises…
Nairobi’s streets are fizzing with violence – and I’m glad to be home
Nairobi, Kenya Parliament and City Hall were burning under great columns of smoke and clouds of tear gas hung over…
My father vs the killer lion
Laikipia, Kenya This month, in broad daylight on our Kenyan farm, a lioness mauled one of my bull calves. Before…
My battle with the dreaded ‘black cotton’
Laikipia, Kenya By the time I set off from the farm before dawn we’d had 22in of rain in the…
Am I having a heart attack?
Nairobi Some of our medical practitioners in Kenya advertise their services on street corners. ‘Bad omens, lost lovers, broken marriage,…
