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

384 OUT OF CAPTIVITYhad a shot with the rest of the guys and then stopped. Tom and Marchad a couple more. I was a little worried about them because none ofus had eaten yet, and Marc, who had been under the weather, hadn’teaten much for a couple of days. Finally the FARC brought us our food.Instead of just setting a big pot out for us, the cooks served us. For theFARC, chicken was haute cuisine, so that was our special Christmasdinner. This was no succulent Sunday afternoon with the family bird;it was a bit dry and stringy, but better than anything we’d eaten in along time.It was then that Enrique came in looking pretty happy. He had onehand behind his back and he told the guard to unlock our chains so wecould sit on the ground comfortably to eat. We knew something wasup, and as we sat down he brought out a video camera he’d been hiding.We figured what the hell, if Enrique wanted to record us to showthe world how well we ate and that we were just chain-free happy campers,then so be it. Of course, it didn’t sit too well with any of us, but ifhe wanted the footage, he’d have to deal with the consequences. WithTom’s tongue a bit lubricated, he started in on Enrique.“You think you can bring us food and drink and expect us to just kissyour ass? What the hell happened to you, Enrique, to make you like youare? You must have been a normal kid, what happened? When did youget this corazón negro? When did you choose to follow the dark path?”Acting like he couldn’t hear what Tom was saying, Enrique just kepttaping. He was shooting the whole area while Tom narrated the storyof Enrique’s decline into being an abusive piece of shit. I was sittingback loving all this, when I saw Marc get up. He grabbed a few of thechains that were on the ground, and he wrapped them around his neck.He started walking around with them and rattling them like a ghostout of A Christmas Carol. He wanted to ruin Enrique’s little sorry-wecan’t-be-home-for-the-holidaysvideo. The rest of us were laughing andhooting. Tom continued to read Enrique the riot act while Marc keptinserting himself into the frame of the video. I could tell Enrique was