Out of Captivity : Surviving 1,967 Days in the Colombian Jungle

178 OUT OF CAPTIVITYKEITHBefore my mother passed away, she taught me a lot of things about lifeand people. One of the expressions she used came back to me the firstday we were in with the politicians: “How you start is how you finish.”My mother meant that in terms of starting a task and being prepared tofollow through with it, but she also meant it in terms of relationships.You shouldn’t be quick to judge people, but in the end you often foundout that how people first presented themselves to you was pretty accurateand indicative of how you’d ultimately interact with them when allwas said and done.I’m no genius, and I claim no special skill when it comes to figuringpeople out, but even I could see what was up with Camp Caribe almostimmediately.I had to give Ingrid credit for being big enough to come to me themorning of our third day there and tell me that she had once againgone to the FARC, asking for us to be taken out of their section. I waspissed and told her so, but I was mostly upset because I had alreadylearned from one of the more reliable guards that Ingrid had sent notesto Sombra telling him that we were CIA agents and she wanted us outof there for that reason. Along with Lucho, she also sent another noteclaiming that we had microchips in our blood and the FARC needed tobe careful as a result of our being so closely tracked.I couldn’t believe that fellow prisoners would put us in such danger.They were both senators and in the eyes of the FARC extremely valuablebargaining chips. More than that, they were educated. The simpletonsholding us prisoner knew that Lucho and Ingrid were smart andcould easily have believed them. We could have been executed becauseshe wanted more space in the camp for herself. It was reckless andirresponsible and I was so angry I could hardly see straight. Thanksto Marc and Tom, who were both willing to listen to me rant and provideme with some perspective, I was able to contain my rage at thatmoment.