Held Hostage

One of the shows I'm currently obsessed with is Locked Up Abroad on Discovery. It was produced by BBC and each show is a story of insane people looking to make a quick buck by smuggling drugs out of and into various countries and getting caught. Usually the Convicts tell their stories after they've done their time, but one episode is completely different. 3 U.S. tourists in Africa were taken hostage and forced to march for 9 hours in the jungle. 2 out of the 3 were hacked to death by their captors, the 3rd managed to stay alive and ultimately be released by promising to take a message from the captors to the US Ambassador.

I haven't been to Africa yet, but I have spent a lot of time in Asia and it made me think of all the times I traveled and how lucky I've been that nothing horrid has happened to me, nothing. I haven't been mugged, robbed, assaulted, my SCUBA boat was always there waiting for me...not that I have a deathwish and hope I'm not somehow jinxing myself, especially when I consider one of my former coworkers was mugged at gunpoint just down the block from my apartment in NYC when I lived there. Everyone I knew when I lived in NYC had been mugged at one time - one by hypodermic needle point! The guy said he had AIDS and would stab her with the needle if she didn't give him her bag.

When I traveled, I would meet tons of people, especially Europeans who would be "on holiday" for a year or more at a time. Usually traveling on their own. I have never liked traveling on my own - even for work. I would often think of how brave women were to be traveling on their own while on that type of holiday. I think it would be different to travel by myself to someplace like Hawaii and stay in a resort the entire time. That's different than trekking in Chang Mai, Thailand on your own.

I think I watch way too much television and read too many books...I can freak myself out faster than anyone else could. Coming up with all kinds of horrid scenarios. But I can't fathom what this guy went through in Africa - being captured by rebels and surviving simply out of sheer grit and luck.