Chapter 15: Mission Bound

February 1999

Our car meandered throughout the lush green Colombian countryside for several hours, taking us right straight through rebel-contested territory. Plaguing the traffic of the area were roadblocks, checkpoints and unannounced searches of cars by rebels and government forces alike. Surprisingly, there were few cars on the roads this day. Perhaps it was the intent of the searches to keep people at home and off the roads. The roads of Colombia are not like the roads of America. They do not always go in a straight line and they are not always as smooth to travel on as we are used to here in the states.

For a long while, no one really spoke much. We traveled the first few hours in relative silence. Rosalva was wearing jeans, a long sleeve white button shirt, with a red baseball cap. Her long dark hair was in a ponytail, pulled through the back of the cap. She wore hiking boots, a startling contrast to what most other girls from here were wearing. She had not gotten very much sleep the night before, so she rested with her head against the sidewall of the car, sleeping through all the bumps and potholes. I stared at her while she slept. I thought the hiking boots were unusual for the area. I just had not seen too many women in Colombia wearing such outdoor gear.

Lou was wearing a khaki, short-sleeve shirt with jeans also. He wore no hat, so his black hair shined in the sunlight. With sneakers on his feet, he kept them on the pedals, eager to get through this territory as fast as possible. He knew what the risks were and had agreed to take them on. Driving slowly was another risk he was not willing to take. Chain-smoking all the way there, he drove with his AKM across his lap, and the 9mm on the console.

I wore olive drab cargo pants, a black tank top, with an olive drab shirt over it, unbuttoned. The pants reminded me of the BDU pants soldiers wear. I liked having the pocket space. I also wore a photographer vest, the kind that had many pockets for film, and whatever else. I had high top sneakers and a boonie hat on my head. If I was going to go to the woods, at least I was going to dress the part. This was a close as I could get on this day.

The countryside was hilly, punctuated with green valleys, dotted with small farmhouses and barns. The site of abandoned or destroyed vehicles left along the side of the road frequently interrupted the view of lush forests and fields of crops. Lou slowed down just enough that I could make out bullet holes in several of them. That made me nervous. I had prayed at the beginning of this trip, that God would place a hedge of protection around all of us. Nonetheless, I was still nervous. To be complacent is to invite trouble.

After a while, Rosalva awoke from her peaceful nap. “Have a nice nap?” I asked.

“Well, if you don’t count the fact that your partner has hit every rock and hole in the road since we left Bogotá, and the fact that you’ve been staring at me a lot while I have been asleep, yes, I slept very well.”

She was abrupt to say the least.

Lou snickered to himself. “She is no fool, my friend. She is a woman. Moreover, a woman can always tell when a man is looking at her. They have a sense for these things.”