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From Darkness Into the Light. Marino Restrepo
Читать онлайн.Название From Darkness Into the Light
Год выпуска 0
isbn 9781456603830
Автор произведения Marino Restrepo
Жанр Биографии и Мемуары
Издательство Ingram
Seeing my sisters again after several years was rather difficult because of the situation we were going through. My mother who was still living at the time was so full of grief that it was almost impossible to look into her eyes. My brother’s funeral took place about four hours after I arrived. I was very surprised to see so many relatives in the church. I had not been exposed to such a gathering, or even to a funeral, since I was a child. I had forgotten that my family was so large. The days that followed were sad and full of grief for my sisters and me. Our mother was now terminally ill and there was nothing we could do for her but wait, since doctors had given up all hope of her recovering. I was so distant from God that the word miracle was neither part of my vocabulary, nor that of my sisters. People, including my own family, seemed to go very often to church. However, their spiritual qualities were not really evident. Religion did not seem to have changed in all those years. It seemed quite the same to me. Two months later, after enduring long nights of anguish, my mother died. I could still feel the smell of incense from the last funeral, and there we were again, attending another one even more painful and difficult than the last. After these two funerals, my sisters and I talked about who would be the next since we were heading toward death in a very close sequence. In less than four years, five members of my family had died.
In the year that followed, I adopted the food habits and easy-going, bohemian lifestyle that was common in Colombia. While experiencing this idealism that was no more than ancestral nostalgia, I flew between Los Angeles and Colombia three more times before my eventual kidnapping. My last trip before being kidnapped was in November of 1997. I wanted to spend Christmas with my sisters to share the sadness with them caused by the absence of so many relatives.
To be honest, now that I look back, I see that the biggest attraction for me in Colombia was the intensive party-life in small towns like mine. While driving along the busy highways of Los Angeles, the only thought that came to my mind was being in the arms of one of those beautiful and “easy-going” girls that abound in Colombia. Alcohol, drugs and women were still controlling my life. My only thoughts were in that direction and I felt I could easily satisfy them in Colombia.
I arrived in Colombia that Christmas full of enthusiasm for the upcoming Christmas carnival that would last until January 14th. I had to be back in Los Angeles on that day to begin a four-week U.S.A. tour with my band. For the past three years I had been experiencing financial difficulties due to my involvement in the film merchandising business. Hollywood produces all sorts of merchandise to promote films, and this industry has become gigantic worldwide. Thanks to the contacts I had made for so many years, I had managed to obtain exclusive deals. That Christmas I had particular commitments with many investors. Our business had serious problems with the IRS and the entire investment was in jeopardy. I was responsible for many people’s money. However, everything seemed to be under control. I did not know at the time that I would soon be kidnapped and held hostage for six months in the jungles of Colombia.
On December 11th I arrived in Pereira where my mother had died and three of my four sisters were still living. I began to plan great parties for those days. In the afternoon of December 25th, I left for my hometown, all the while feeling very tired and dizzy as a result of the party we had had on Christmas Eve which lasted until 7 a.m. After driving for less than an hour, I arrived in Anserma and went to visit friends and relatives until midnight. I was so tired that I had no energy to drink or dance anymore. In this region of the country, Christmas parties go on for several days. At midnight, I left to spend the night at an uncle’s farm located near the south entrance to the town, close to the urban area. When I arrived, I was surprised to find the gate closed, for my uncle would always leave it open when he knew I was coming. One of my nephews was with me and I asked him to get out of the car to open the gate. The moment he opened it, a group of men holding guns, with their heads covered, jumped out of the darkness. A few seconds later, they put my nephew in the rear seat of my car. They opened all the doors and, like hungry dogs, looked for anything they could find. They forced me out of the car, tied my hands, covered my head and took all my belongings.
At first, I thought I was being robbed, a crime very common in Colombia. Then the situation grew worse. The six men got into my car, made me sit in the back seat, and began driving down the road at high speed. Once we were out of town, they stopped the car; four of them got out and took me with them, while the other two left with the car, taking my nephew with them. Being left on the road and without knowing what was going on, I started to think that they were going to kill me and dispose of my body somewhere in the mountains. But that was not their plan. They tied a rope around my waist which two men held, one from the front and one from the back. Then they made me walk through the mountains all night long with the hood still covering my head.
We arrived at what seemed to be the main house of an abandoned farm in the countryside and they took me to what sounded like an empty room, judging by the echo. I was left there alone for the rest of the day; late at night they took me out, led me to a road and put me again in the rear part of a car in which we rode for a long time. I heard them saying that the police and the army were looking for me, and so they had to take me to another place. After a long trip at high speed on an unpaved and very bumpy road, my body was left in bad shape since I could not avoid banging and hitting myself against the car. As a result of this ordeal, my body was bleeding and bruised all over. Then we got out of the car and began to walk again for several hours; this time I could tell we were in the jungle because instead of hearing urban birds singing, I heard sounds that could only be heard deep in the jungle. Although I had been born in a small town and lived as a child in the countryside, walking tied up and blindfolded in the jungle at night made me very nervous and increased the panic caused by this terrible odyssey.
The humidity made it difficult for me to breathe through the acrylic hood that covered my head. This affected the circulation in my blood, causing my arms and back to hurt. The alcohol I had consumed for the last three days had sapped all my energy; each step made me feel closer to a heart attack. Many hours later that seemed like an eternity, we finally arrived at our destination. They removed my hood to show me my new surroundings. The situation seemed to get more and more complicated. The place they showed me was not exactly the Ritz Carlton Hotel. It was a house that had been abandoned a long time ago and was now overgrown with trees with branches coming out of what should have been windows and doors. It seemed more like a cave than a house. They covered my head again and steered me to the cave and threw me into it. Upon landing, I heard a lot of fluttering and realized that I was surrounded by thousands of bats. The floor on which I had fallen was rotten and covered with bat excrement. I did not know what was worse: the smell of the cave, the mixture of rotting substances or the constant rain of excrement that increased every time I moved. The threat of being attacked by all those winged creatures reminded me of Alfred Hitchcock’s film, “The Birds.”
At the same time, thousands of bugs came out of the excrement and crawled into my clothes, biting me from head to toe. Each bite produced a different itch. Some of them felt like electric shocks; others produced big skin inflammations all over my body, while still others caused intense itching. They all felt like separate attacks, injecting their own brand of poison. Soon, my whole body was completely covered with a variety of bites and inflammations. I could not scratch myself since my hands were still tied up. The lack of circulation in my arms made my body numb. I did not move because I was afraid to disturb the bats again. My situation could not have been worse. My first days transpired in this way: isolated, in much pain, in utter darkness, even unable to untie my hands; I did not want to receive the food I was offered once a day. All I desperately wanted was to finish this ordeal and die. On the third day, a small hope of being able to escape arose in me. I started to call for my captors, thinking that they might remove me from this cave and once outside I might have a chance to escape. I called for them. I had no energy and my voice was failing me. The idea of causing panic among the ‘dwellers’ of the cave with the least movement prevented me from further efforts.
After a while, one of the captors came. I don’t know whether it was to give me something to eat or if he had heard my voice. He pulled me out by my feet —