A new mother has revealed how after she moved to Kenya to marry a Maasai warrior she went on to have a baby with his teenage son - who remains in Africa, while she is back in Britain.
Rebekah O'Brien, 26, fell for butcher Rempesa Ole Kirkoya, 40 when he and his Maasai warrior troupe came and performed in the Maddermarket Theatre in Norwich in 2012.
Rebekah, a gym receptionist from Kent, was so entranced with his culture and the connection that she felt that she uprooted her life to move 7,000 miles to be with him - even though he was already married to his wife Joyce.
But three years on and her fate has been less than straightforward. She and Rempesa are no longer together and instead she is romantically involved with his eldest son, a teenager still at school who is unable to help her support their week-old son Kito.
Rebekah's love affair with Kenya - and two of its citizens - began in October 2012 when she was on a filming course and volunteered as a steward at the Norwich theatre.
Rempesa and his Osiligi warrior troupe came to put on a performance of their songs and dances and she was so fascinated by them that when one of the women she met invited her to visit Kenya.
Then, as she waited for her friend by a shop, she ran into Rempesa, then 37, and even though he couldn’t speak a word of English and she knew no Swahili, they managed to converse with hand movements and facial expressions.
Rebekah recalled: 'When my friend came out, she gave me a knowing look, and now, looking back, that was the moment I started falling for him.
She decided to go to Kenya for a nine week trip in January 2013. She flew out to stay in a tin hut in Kisames, an hour's drive from Nairobi, where there was no running water or electricity.
It was there that Rebekah and Rempesa, the village butcher, started a relationship.
'On that first trip I saw him a number of times, sometimes with his wife, and she would even translate for me so we could chat,' she said.
And despite Rempesa having a wife and five kids in the village, the two began a relationship – with the butcher’s current wife Joyce even translating so the pair could converse.
Rebekah said: “As a Western woman in Kenya people were suspicious of me, but Rempesa was so kind, buying me food and drinks and always had time for me and made me feel welcome and special.”
Rebekah returned to the UK after her trip and Rempesa followed shortly after.
The pair had sex in a hotel room and agreed to return to Kenya and get married, with Rebekah saying his existing marriage was over despite him still living with his previous wife.
According to the Mail, she said: “My friends said I was mad to be running off with a Kenyan man, living in a tin hut with him and his first wife and five children.
“But there is hardly a huge sea of great guys here in the UK. And I decided when I was there that I didn’t want to be like women here, working all the time.”
But the situation eventually soured.
First Joyce, who had given her husband’s new relationship her blessing, suddenly died – causing the villagers to blame Rebekah.
Then after their traditional wedding she fell pregnant, but broke up with Rempesa before the child’s birth, leading her to return to England.
After the baby also tragically died six weeks after being born, she once again returned to Kenya.
But instead of a reunion with her husband, she ended up having a fling with the warrior's 19-year-old son Lawrence, who was still at school.
Her relationship with him went the same way as her marriage to his father, and she came back to the UK again to give birth to their baby.
And she said she hopes Lawrence will come to Britain to visit his son Kito, despite the fact he has no money for child support.
Rebekah told the Mirror: “I want Lawrence to be in his life, but I fear he sees me more as his mother than his girlfriend.”
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