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

The Swamp 349accustomed to the terrain in this border region as they were with theirstrongholds in central Colombia.Two and half weeks into our boat march, we had bedded down forthe night. Suddenly Lucho’s voice split the still night air, “¡Marc! ¡Marc!Pinchao esta vivo. ¡Está en Bogotá!”Marc was nearest to him, and he got up to listen. His face split intoa huge grin. He tilted his head back and pumped his fists. Everybodywas looking at him, and he told Ingrid, setting off a chain reaction ofgood news: Jhon had made it. According to the radio, he’d wanderedaround for seventeen days before running into a group of indigenousColombians who took him to the police jungle commandos who werein the area destroying labs and coca fields. Now Jhon was safely back inBogotá, dehydrated and malnourished but alive.I climbed out of my hammock and over some of the others, ignoringthe guards’ orders to stay where I was. Tom joined Marc and me, andwe sat there just relishing the moment. We pounded one another onthe back and whooped it up at the thought that Jhon was out of the shitand back home with family. We were sitting along the river, the breezewas fresh, and the air tasted of freedom. It didn’t matter that it wassecondhand freedom, it was the closest we’d come to savoring the realthing in four years. We figured that with Jhon free, he’d be able to givethe Colombian military solid ground truth about our location. The radiobroadcast had mentioned something about Jhon being discoveredin the Pachoa municipality near the Papurí River. Even though we’dbeen heading south ever since his escape, just having that little bit ofinformation gave us even more hope.As joyful as we were at the news of Jhon’s success, Enrique was justas angry. The next morning, he issued an order that we all be searched.We all hated requisas. It was a pain in the ass to take all the junk we’daccumulated over the years and dump it out so that we could show theFARC just how piss-poor we all were. To make matters worse, it wasraining, so we all had to put up with everything getting soaked and