[EXPAT VOICE] Is someone watching me?

These new friends are of the feathered variety -- pigeons. When I first glimpsed them, there were only two and I was quite pleased. London is overrun with pigeons, so it felt kind of homey. I also thought that maybe I could feed them and later they would be my son’s first experience of nature (only the apartment manager is allowed a pet in our building). There is also something essentially endearing about pigeons -- who doesn’t love a bird who thinks the appropriate response to oncoming traffic is not to fly but to try to outrun it? Then I got up close to one as he sat on the window sill and discovered he was scrawny, mangy and generally had the “walking dead” look about him. I quickly carried my son away and tried to forget about the undesirable.

This turned out to be more difficult than I had imagined. Mangy Pigeon 1 and Average Pigeon 2, seemed to be infinitely curious about my daily life. They got into a habit of turning up at the sitting room window and staring. Which was odd, but nowhere near as weird as when I woke up to find them perched on my bedroom balcony, apparently intent on watching me sleep. It made my skin feel slightly itchy and my brain feel slightly paranoid. Perhaps they were some king of government watchdog to check up on foreign residents. My husband reassured me by telling me that he had sent them to keep tabs on me. Which I know was a joke, but for some reason they don’t come when he is home. In fact I think my husband is uncertain whether or not the pigeons really exist. My tales of spy birds, and my only evidence a few lame feathers fluttering about the balcony doesn’t seem to cut it. Still I know they are real and he knew I was slightly crazy when he married me, so we’re both happy.

I think that the arrival of two more pigeons might have seriously started to make me twitchy, had it not been for the timely arrival of something else: pigeon mating season. Suddenly I found myself in the midst of an extravagant battle for procreation. Pleased to no longer be the focus of their attention, I could comfortably watch the rom-com drama unfold.

As far as I could tell, the players consisted of two males, one woman and my original mangy-scruffy pigeon. Mangy-scruffy pigeon seemed to know he had no chance and just sat and watched looking (to my mind) a little wistful. Anyway, the drama began with Miss Lady-pigeon grooming herself, or biting off fleas (very similar actions). This pursuit was quickly abandoned when the first male, Mr. Average-pigeon arrived. He began the traditional “come back to my nest” dance that appears to be common to pigeons everywhere. The dance involves puffing up the neck feathers, standing tall whilst making “coo-coo” noises and running back and forth to the woman’s tail feathers as fast as his stubby legs could carry him. She responds by running away and nodding her head up and down. Mangy-pigeon and I watched the dance with the slight variation that as our balcony is very small they had to run in tight little circles. I thought that he was wearing her down and that we might be about to witness some pigeon magic, when like a referee calling time, pigeon number four arrived.

Even I (a non-pigeon) could see that he was a pristine specimen of feathery goodness. His “coo-coo” was strong and throaty, his neck ruff bristled with virility and he was so fat he was truly a pigeon and a half. I felt like I should shield my eyes from his blaze of glory. He looked at Lady-pigeon, drew himself up to show off his full manliness, let out one coo and off they flew together. If not into the sunset then at least up to the roof and the pigeon penthouse that is floor 13. Abandoned-pigeon hung his head and I think Mangy-pigeon stood a little taller and gloated that he wasn’t the only one alone.