Imagine how you would live with only animals and the jungle surrounding you.
This is a story of how a young girl managed to live with monkeys for years.
She didn’t just live with them, though.
She was raised by them.
Marina Chapman was 4 years old.
That was her age when she was abducted from her home in a rural village in Colombia.
She was unable to break free from her captors because she didn’t have the strength to fight them off.
How could she, after all? She was little more than a toddler.
Grabbing her from behind, they hoisted her up, put her in their car, and sped off with her.
The road was rough.
It was a long drive, Marina recalled. Then the car stopped and they left her in the middle of nowhere.
It was dark.
Marina shared that during the long drive, she might have slept.
She then noticed that she was being taken again by two men and then left somewhere. She was very worried.
She did not want her abductors to leave her in the middle of nowhere.
Then, the morning sun had risen.
She saw that she was in a jungle. “I sat and cried, and I just didn’t do very much,” said Marina. “I was really confused, nowhere to go.”
Then she heard screeches not far from her.
In the tree, she saw a monkey going down. Then other monkeys followed. They were checking on her.
Marina said one of the monkeys poked her to test, but she wasn’t bothered by it. In fact, she just didn’t want to move.
More monkeys came.
When the crowd of monkeys got larger, she felt a little better. Not long after, she felt she was already part of the family of monkeys.
Marina taught herself to climb trees and eat what the monkeys were eating. But one time, she got a bad stomach when she ate a berry the monkeys weren’t fond of.
It made her incredibly sick. When one of the older monkeys saw that she was in pain, it pushed her to a pond of water. Then she felt relieved after vomiting.
After a few more years of living with the monkeys, she saw people come and go in the jungle.
She wasn’t seen or caught until she saw a young woman she thought was trustworthy.
It was a mistake.
She was captured and brought to a nearby town where she was held captive at an “orphanage” that turned out to be a brothel.
When a man came to “meet” Marina, she hid from him and the headmistress until they went looking for her. Then, she ran.
Marina managed to escape and was helped by an older woman at a house nearby. She was then brought to the UK which changed her life significantly.
Marina became a nanny for this woman’s sister, who happened to be part of a rich family that treated Marina as their own.
Marina searched for the monkeys.
Marina tried to look for the jungle where the monkeys were and where she was left, but sadly, she could no longer remember where it was.
Marina longed to see her jungle family. She thought of going back many times when things got rough in the city, but now she has her children.
She remembered how to love people from her kids.
Learn more about Marina’s incredible life journey in the video below!
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