Dave Muller on Survival, PTSD, and Untying What Binds Us

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Welcome to Hecast, the official podcast of He Changed it.

As always, I am Mike Chisholm. As always, I am so excited to

have conversations around the world of men's mental Wellness.

We have all sorts of different types of guests on this show.

And, and, and, and some of my favorite are the ones where, you

know, yes, there are clinical people that come on the show and

we, we, we talk about clinical things when it comes to mental

health and, and, and the perspective from the, the, the

man side of things. But sometimes we have people on

here where they come and they tell their story.

Now this is one of the most special episodes that we've ever

done. 2 hours. Holy cow, Mike, what's going on?

Yeah, I love the long form, but I understand we try and shoot

for 45 to an hour. I get it.

This one here, everybody who is watching and listening, this is

a tale. I got to tell you the story

here, there is no embellishment. I mean, we go watch movies that

are based on true events and things like that.

And the idea that the writers, the talented writers out there

will embellish stories and, and, and make the story that much

better. This one here needs no

embellishment whatsoever. Dave Muller is my guest of

wonderful South African man and, and, and we really scratch the

surface of a story that is so vibrant and rich that that that

I don't believe a writer could necessarily even even I I don't

think you could write this. And he wrote a book based on

what happened to him and his family.

I'm going to tell you this. Everybody's happy.

Everybody has made it through. It's a happy ending.

OK, I'm going to tell you that straight up because as you're

listening to the story of what happened when his family found

themselves marooned on Mozambique and they were

approached by a small regiment of an army of, of child

soldiers. What happened?

And seven weeks they were they were there and, and, and

captured and, and, and being held.

And there's some horrific stuff in this, but we keep it talking

about some horrific things. We do keep it PG13.

It's not a it's not a radar. We don't go into it.

We don't, we don't, we don't, we certainly don't, you know, take

some of the hard things that, that, that, that Dave and his

family saw and, and, and make it a focal point.

We don't. It is a story of resilience.

It is an unbelievable story of, of, of there are no coincidences

in life and the perspective that it will bring all of us who hear

this about the things that we have going on in our lives, it

will give pause because my word, some of the things that somebody

can survive. He wrote a book called not

Child's Play. And I mean, you know, when

you're held by an army of children, you know, where the,

the oldest one there, you know, might be 20/21/22.

There might be a 30 year old there, but the vast majority our

our children with AK-40 sevens and what not.

And again, I'm not, I'm not trying to sensationalize this.

It is a heck of a story and I'm going to stop the intro right

now. Dave, Dave Muller, thank you

very much for coming on here and telling your story.

We're going to have you come back and talk about the things

that have you've experienced since then.

But I just want to say thank you very, very much not Child's Play

is the website you can look for. You can look for him as well.

Please enjoy this unbelievable story in which I was just in the

front seat for, for the most part and by by Dave Muller.

Dave, I, I, man alive, I, I, sometimes I have somebody

sitting across the digital table from me that I just, it gives me

perspective on the life that I have lived here in North

America, here in, you know, Western Canada and, and, and,

and the things that I sometimes get wrapped up in thinking that

are problems. Boy, sometimes it just takes the

perspective of, of, of, of some of the problems of other people

around the world to give pause to realize things aren't so bad,

You know, for me, Dave, I just First off want to say welcome to

he cast. And 2nd, I just want to say

thank you very much for giving the world really the story that

you went through. A lot of people would bury that

stuff and never ever talk about it.

You've gone and done the exactly the opposite.

I want to get into the book, not child's play.

I want to get into all of this stuff here.

But First off, I just want to say thank you for for your

vulnerability and thank you so much for joining us on he cast

today. That's my pleasure.

Thank you for having me. For those eagle eared or eagle

eyed people out there, they can hear, oh, this guy's got an

accent. Yeah.

And no, it's not Australian. No, it's not New Zealand.

No, it's not British, South African and from South Africa

and, and right there shows the international flavor and that,

that, that the story. We're not in Kansas anymore.

Everybody the story that's going to be told is, is is is is a

remarkable 1. I don't want to just focus on

the story itself. I know that that's out there and

there's a lot you've done lots of these, but I do want to talk

about the story a little bit. You went through what can only

be described as a situation that movies are made of, about

inspired by the true events. You know, you went through

something and I, I want to get into it.

Could you please talk about how you ended up in South Africa as

a boy and, and, and, and the things that transpired that that

that got you into sailing and the harrowing situation that

happened to you during that time?

Can we, can we, can we get to that place?

And then once we get to the place, the listener will

understand that's the place we want to get to.

And then we want to talk about what you did after that.

Is that, is that a good sum up? Is that a good sum up of things

right there? Yeah, yeah.

Well, I'll certainly try my best, you know, so it can be a

long story. I appreciate it.

Just cut me. Cut me short if I if I ramble

on, Yeah. Shall I?

Shall I begin at the beginning? How did you get to South Africa

and how old were you? Well.

No, I was I was born in South Africa, so I was I was born in

1951, which makes me a 70, nearly 75 year old.

I was born in Port Elizabeth, the city of Port Elizabeth.

Both my parents had had been involved in the Second World

War. My dad was a prisoner of war for

two years and one of them on the run in in Italy.

My mom was a Navy Wren. She she was from England.

So she actually, she actually witnessed the troops heading off

to for the the D-Day invasion, literally saw that happening.

So she, she came to South Africa, I think it was in 1948,

probably, probably searching for her husband and she found my dad

and, and I was the result of that.

So I grew up in Port Elizabeth, went to school there,

miraculously, somehow or other ended up falling into

architecture. So I studied architecture,

became an architect. But one of the problems growing

up in South Africa was that, well, my parents were, were,

were, I suppose they would be considered liberal minded now

they were they, they, they were both would be classed as sort of

blue collar workers. But I grew up in a very loving

family. But, but they certainly hadn't

had an issue with the sort of subplot that was going on in

South Africa at that time. So everybody knows about the

racism and apartheid, but there were still vestiges, believe it

or not, in the Anglo World War. If I could stop you there for

one second. Not everybody knows about

apartheid. You know, like you look at the

generation, like I remember growing up when I was in high

school, that's when Nelson Mandela was released from

prison. So growing up, I knew about, you

know, I ain't going to play Sun City artists who would be

boycotting. And I knew that there was there

was activism around apartheid. But it's funny how things dilute

as generations pass South Africa in, in many respects, when you

look at the development that it had and, and, and, and all of

the good things that it had. When you look at apartheid and

what it was back then and, and the way of life that it became

and, and, and, and how polarizing it was really at the

end of the day, what a change that that that you have seen in

your lifetime there. And, and, and so your parents,

as you were growing up, were you aware that there were

alternatives to apartheid around the world and that it wasn't

necessarily the norm? Or was that the world you grew

up in, and because you grew up in it, that's all you knew?

No, very much. That was all I knew.

You know, that was the media was very controlled.

I was aware of of the racial tensions because I grew up very,

very close to where it all started and in the place called

New Brighton in Port Elizabeth. And I can remember the army

trucks rushing past and going to to quill riots and things like

that. And in fact, we were even caught

up in it once we're mobbed tried to overturn our car.

But I think the to to sort of give a very, very brief

background and yeah, we've got to be careful not to to end up

in a in a history lesson. But in 1958 the the National

Party took over gained control of the government and that that

essentially was Afrikaans control, mainly made-up of

Afrikaans speakers. And my parents were both very

English. My mum was British.

My dad dad definitely affiliated with the with with the British

as well. He fought in the war.

So I was aware they were very anti this whole apartheid thing,

but more, it was more a case of the of, of a battle between

English speaking people and white and, and Afrikaans

speaking people. So it was, it was sort of like

stuck there within in the white, in, in the white segment of the,

of the, of the community. So yeah, I need to tell you,

just give you a little a very brief story.

In 1960, I was in grade, what would you call it, Grade 5, and

I had a teacher who was very Afrikaans orientated.

But the country held a referendum as to whether or not

we should should leave the union.

In other words, leave part of being of Britain and being under

the control of the Queen and should become a Republic.

And I knew my parents were very, very pro staying with the union,

very anti the Republic. Anyway, the day after the

referendum, my, my teacher, he, he said to us, OK, all of you

whose parents voted for the Queen, stick up your hands and

stupidly and naively, a whole bunch of us did that.

And he said, right, come forward and we were all made to bend

over and we got the the Union Jack emblazoned on our little

queen loving backsides for that, you know, which is an incredibly

brutal thing to have done. So that kind of so, so my issue

in those days was with, with more with Afrikaners, which,

which the way my life has developed is actually incredibly

funny in retrospect. And that was made worse by the

fact that we were then South Africa was also embroiled in, in

fighting a proxy war for the West between the West and, and

the East, basically between capitalism and socialism.

In that countries like Angola and Mozambique had been pretty

much taken over and run by the USSR.

And, and South Africa was drawn in by the West to actually fight

on their behalf to stop that spread of, of the Russian

influence down South into South Africa.

So I was constricted into the army and I really, I, I, I

objected to that. So anyway, where this is

relevant to the, to the main story that we, we talking about

is that I just realized I had to escape from this kind of crazy

madness that was developing. So one of the things that

happened when I was was very young was I was a Boy Scout and

our scout master, our scout master invited a man who just

sailed around the world in the yacht called Sandy Fjord to come

and give us a talk. This would probably have been in

about 1965 or so, I would guess. So in those days, things like

sailing around the world were very exotic.

Nobody, not many people did that.

And and this man had also made a film.

And this was the first time I sort of saw this outside world,

you know, this amazing world of, of the Caribbean and the Panama

Canal and the Marquis Islands. And I remember the the Hula hula

girls, the naked hula hula girls dancing made a big impression on

me and the Great Barrier Reef in Australia, you know, and I

decided then that I wanted to build a yacht and sail around

the world. It was literally was as simple

as that. And and that literally is what I

actually did. So that that whole drive became

reinforced by the need to escape from the madness that was South

Africa. How many years was it between

that scout, that experience with the Scouts, and before you set

sail? How, how, how many years was

that in between? It was you've got to, I've got

to kind of quickly do the sum in my head.

So sure. How do we start sailing?

Hey chick. So, so we started building, a

friend and I started building our yacht in 1975.

So well, that's 51 years ago, about 12 years after, after that

dream had been planted. And then we see 10 years

actually building the yacht and it was launched in 1985 and

that's it. That probably takes us up to the

real just to the story. Well, and, and, you know, the

idea of wanting to escape the stuff that was out there, you

know, 22 years later, you think about that like that's a, that's

a pretty remarkable thing, how you held on to that dream.

And we're going to talk about hope a lot in this podcast

today, You know, the hope of escaping the surroundings and,

and, and finding a bigger world, something that's a little bit

more compatible with how you feel and, and, and, and, and it

feels right with your soul. You know, imagine if you would

have let go of that. And it's so great that you

didn't. And you get to this place where

the boat gets built and, and, and like I said, hey, kids, he's

exactly right. Dave's exactly right.

Now is where the story gets crazy.

And let's, let's, let's talk about that.

So you start sailing. And how long were you sailing

before the before the trouble happened?

What? What I suppose what was going to

mention, of course, is that when you're a young man, life is

incredibly simple. So there's no, no complications

of, of relationships with children or, or having to care

for a family or anything like that.

And but in the midst of all of this building the yacht bang,

that thing happened. That happens to so many of us.

We fall in love. And I met Sandy, who became my

wife. So Sandy was a marine biologist

and and you know, I know it's corny and all these sorts of

things and you can have violence playing in the background, but I

literally fell in love with it. I knew that.

And here we are 46 years on, still married.

So in so while while the yacht was being booked, the yacht's

name was Owen, by the way, just to give it a name, our daughter

was born Tammy. And then in 1985, the year we

launched the yacht, our son Seth was born.

So that's just a bit of a, of a background.

Excuse me. So between 1985 and 1990, we, we

did a, we had to learn to sail the yacht.

So we did a whole lot of cruises up and down the coast of South

Africa. So this is not the easiest

waters to learn to sail in. So Owen Owen was like a Jeep or

Land Rover amongst yachts. That's the best way to describe

it. Pretty indestructible vessel,

very comfortable to sail in, but very slow.

So come 1990, things had started to change quite dramatically.

The most critical things in the world were changing that.

That began to impact our plans. So in 1989 the Berlin Wall fell.

Essentially the USSR collapsed. So this whole thing of this

threat from, from the, the, the red danger, as it was termed,

from Angola and Mozambique that to a large extent dissipated

and, and, and, and critically in 1990, just before we set sail on

our I'll fated voyage to Mozambique, which is where we're

heading, Nelson Mandela was released to, to come back to

your previous question, what did I know when Nelson Mandela was

released that day? That was the first time in my

life I actually ever saw the man.

I'd never even seen a picture of him up until that point.

And, and it was amazing. There was this lovely old

grandpa who was walking out of prison.

This is this terrible, terrible man that we'd imprisoned for so

many years. So that that set a whole dynamic

going in the country where where the purpose of building Irwin,

which was to escape pretty much fell away and and it was to some

extent replaced with just simple adventure.

So in 1990, Sandy he was working at the local museum at the time

as a as an expert in mollusks. The fancy name is a is is a

mallecologist. If you want to mallecologist.

An expert in. Mollecs.

OK, that's an expert in in mollusks.

Yeah, that looks. Yeah, everybody knows that a

oncologist collects shells. But.

But actually mallecology was quite an an undeveloped science

at the time because very few people had actually ever seen

the animals that lived in the shells.

So that's what she was studying too.

Anyway, she heard that that there were some ecologists

working at the Bazaroosa Islands in Mozambique.

So they islands about 20 kilometres offshore from

Mozambique within the tropics. And because there was a civil

war being fought in Mozambique, these islands were pretty much

untouched and pristine. So we obviously researched that

and then we knew that these people were working there.

And, and we were told that the, the civil war wasn't anywhere

near this area. It was way, way, about 3-4

hundred kilometers inland from it and, and to the north of the

islands. So we, we, we figured we would

do a quick sail up to the islands, basically one month's

trip there and back, just so that Sandy could do some

exploratory research and, and make contact with the people

there. And so, so that's what we did.

We set off. And so we had our children at

the time, Tammy was 8 years old and Seth was four years old when

we set sail. We set sail in April 1990.

We stopped over in Maputu. And that was an eye opener.

But because Maputu was completely controlled by the

Russians at that time, they were the first Russians I ever met.

But it was in ruins, a city in ruins.

You know, we carried on up the coast and, and, and to get to

the most critical part of the story, just the day before we

were due to reach the islands, we'd had headwinds all the time.

So there'd been a bit of a slog getting there.

Sorry, excuse me. So there'd been a bit of a slog

getting there, and I saw that there were some big Thunder

clouds developing in inland and starting to sort of roll out

towards the sea. We were, we generally were

sailing within sight of the land always.

And anyway, this storm hit us that afternoon and it was just a

storm of absolutely unbelievable velocity, unlike anything I'd

ever experienced. It was almost supernatural in

its intensity. It was so strong that it

actually bent 10 millimetre steel plates that are on the

yacht and it ripped out the the head so it just tore to pieces.

Sandy had to get to go up into the story in the book.

You had to read the story in the book, but Sandy had to crawl up

to the bows to bring down the sailor.

Incredibly brave act on her part and she was probably at the most

about 7 or 8 meters away from me and I could not actually even

see her The the sea had just been ripped up by the wind and

and there was all this spume blowing around in the air.

Anyway, that was all a little bit but that was pretty

exhausting and it did it the damage it the only damage it did

was to destroy ourselves steering gear.

So the next day we carried on up towards the island.

This was now really exciting because I'm now 38 years old at

this point and I'm finally now reaching the dream of crossing

into the tropics and getting to tropical island, which we did

the following day we and I worked out.

So this is now pre sat NAV, pre GPS days.

So I was using of course, dead reckoning to to navigate.

I worked that worked out that we would reach and in fact be north

of the islands around about 2:00 in the middle of the night.

And then the plan was to have two, which is a way of putting

the brakes on the yacht and wait until Daybreak and then enter

the channel to get to the island.

And that that's what happened. And then then I just made an

unmistakable unforgivable mistake in after I'd tidied up

the deck that that night and and sort of cleaned up everything,

put the yacht into the whole two position that we weren't, I

wasn't picking up any bottom, any depth below the yacht, which

meant we were far out to sea. I went down below and, and, and

with the intention of sticking my head up into the cockpit

every 30 minutes or so and and I fell asleep.

And about two hours later, Sandy woke me and said day, we're

touching bottom and bang, the next thing the yacht was

aground, waves were breaking over it.

And it was just, it was incredibly traumatic and

unbelievable. I, I couldn't believe it was

happening. I had no idea where we were and

why, why we'd hit something when we were supposed to be so far

away. Anyway, the we managed to, to

get anchors out and anchor out and to turn the yacht Sandy and

I, so that it was facing back out to sea.

There's a very huge tidal range there of four meters.

So as the sun came up, it became very apparent that that we

couldn't move the yacht any further.

So the, the kids jumped ashore and ran around and, and we set

about trying to work out how we were going to refloat the yacht

the next day. The, the yacht wasn't damaged in

any way at all by this. So we're waiting for the next

high tide. But Seth at this point realized

suddenly realized it was his 5th birthday, happened to be his 5th

birthday. And all he was interested in was

his presence and cake and things like that.

So we, we, we created it, put out a blanket under the yacht.

By that time it was completely high and dry.

That was the only shade. And we were opening Seth's

presence. And I took a photograph of this

and in fact, that's, that's you can see it there above my head.

And I was walking back towards the yacht and looked up and I

could see there was this little group of people approaching us

from the direction of the islands.

By then, by then, I'd worked out we were about 30 kilometers

South of the islands on the mainland of Mozambique.

And anyway, I sit to San Diego, great news.

We've got some help coming. And so the two of us got up and

we started walking towards, started walking towards this

little group. And as we neared them, we could

see that it was made-up of four boys and, and two adults.

But they behaved strangely. They, they stopped walking and

then the boys just started to walk through inland towards the,

the, the dunes, franking the beach.

And we carried on walking, completely oblivious to what was

happening and then suddenly realized these boys were all

kneeling down and pointing AK-40 sevens at us.

You know, that's one of those points when life just absolutely

changes 180°. It was it, it was, it was a

sight that was just completely beyond comprehension.

I, I couldn't believe that what I was seeing.

And I think conventional wisdom is that in those situations is

that you, your body sort of goes into a fight or flight mode,

fight or flight mode. If, if, if, if we'd done either

of those things, we would be dead.

We would not be here now, fortunately, and and maybe it

was part of the fight, the way fight was manifested in us with

we literally froze and that was the best thing we could ever

have done. So we froze and then tried to

appease. So we slowly walked back to the

children. The boys sort of followed us all

the time. They climbed onto the yacht,

started throwing things out and then they started screaming at

us. And the old couple that were

with them were actually they're burden bearers that captured

them. They were, we didn't know at the

time, but the these boys were from from Renorma and that the

old couple were from Frelima. Dave, Dave, did you understand

what they were saying? No, no, we couldn't understand

the word though they were. Shouting at you in a.

Language speaking Portuguese and Shangon, but but it was very

obvious that they wanted us to walk with them, walk S with them

and they, they, they might be old couple, bundle up some of

our stuff in in some sheets and, and and put them on their heads.

They were very rough. They started to beat up this old

couple with the butts of their rifles and and it was very clear

we had no choice but to walk off with them.

So at this point, the children, I think suddenly realised that

things weren't that good. Anyway.

We we walked away from from Irwin and the leader was a guy

who had only one eye and they were, they were about, he was

probably about 18-19 years old, old at the most.

The rest were all younger. They were from 13 onwards.

And you know, that's, that basically started prodding us

forward with it and it's made it make making us walk S with them.

And we, we, we this, this started around about 10 o'clock

10:30 in the morning. And we, we walked that whole day

S with them until we reached a point where where we stopped and

we could hear the the boys were arguing with this old couple

that they were shouting amongst themselves.

And, and I think what they were doing was actually dividing up

the stuff that they'd stolen from the yacht, right.

Anyway, I'm a speed up with the story because I'm getting into

detail. No, no, hold on, No, no.

No, no, you know. It's I, I, I get it, but the I,

I get the, the point that you want to speed up because you

want to get to some of the things that you learn from it.

But like, I mean, I got to ask you like in a million years, did

you or Sandy ever think that this was even a possibility of

something that could happen? Or was this something at that

point that was completely foreign to you that that this

was even a thing, that that children are being raised up in

this guerrilla type, militia, pirate type atmosphere?

Did you have any idea that even existed at this point?

No, no, it was. It was.

It was. Wow.

It was all it was. It was all unbelievable.

That's the only way to describe, you know, it, it sounds, it

sounds very trite to put it this way, but it was literally like

falling into ATV set into some kind of TV drama, like an

episode of NCIS or something. You know, it was, it was that

absurd. And, and we, we just, all we

knew was that we, we had to do everything in our power not to

inflamed the situation, not to aggravate these boys and and to

keep alive. Did they separate you from the

kids at all or or or were the kids with you the entire time at

this point now? The children were always with

us. So, yeah, to to, to jump ahead

because something particularly horrific is about to happen.

And the story, sorry, not trying to dangle that in front of

people, but the worst is yet to come.

But we, we, we took a decision, Sandy and I, that we had to do

everything in our power to protect our own children, to

never be separated from them. I don't think at that, at that

point we didn't realise how dangerous the situation actually

was and how much our lives were were under threat.

But we also took a decision that we would downplay what was

happening and say, you know, this is just a an unexpected

variation to the holiday. You know, that we, we, we, we,

we as a family had done some pretty weird things up to that

point. Nothing quite as extreme as

that. But, but, but just pretended

that this was normal. And, you know, look at all these

lovely seashells on the beach and all these fascinating

things. And, you know, those are

interesting guns and sort of thing, you know, So just

downplay and defuse the situation.

Yeah. So yeah, I think to just sort of

carry on, Lucas. What happens next is something

that I find quite difficult to talk about.

But anyway, I'll persevere through it.

I. Appreciate it so we they they

then by then it was it was starting to get dark stars were

coming out and they forced us to climb up this huge big dune that

was flanking the beach. So we, we tunneled up to the top

and and when we got to the trop, you could see stretching far

inland was almost like flat marshland.

But on the other side of the dune, the land was side of the

dune with thick forest. And and that was really

terrifying. We, we entered that forest.

So bear in mind that we, we are now in shorts and T-shirts.

We haven't even got shoes on. And and we at at this point, we

carrying sis all the time. Tammy, this eight years old,

walked every step of the way. Incredible strengths that she

showed. Wow.

So when we entered that dune, we crossed over the Crest.

The, there was this incredible deathly silence because up to

that point we had the reference of the sea next to us.

So we, we kind of, at least we knew where we were.

We were on the on the coastline Once we were in that forest and

it was pitch black and we weren't following a path.

We were just blundering our way through the trees.

We, we knew that we were lost and there was this terrible

feeling of, of being lost because if we vanished at that

point, nobody would ever have found us anyway.

We, we carried on walking through this forest, absolutely

exhausted at this point. And it's, it's also very warm

because it's a Tropic. So we we absolutely sodden as

well from sweat. So one, one of the boys, the,

the youngest one was sort of behind us and he kept on

prodding us forward saying bumbush, bumbush.

And the, the other boys were in front and the old couple that

that were with them carrying the stuff.

And after, I suppose about two hours of walking through this

forest, we reached the point where we were told to sit down

in a sort of little blade. We could see that we're in a

little bit of a valley base because there's, there's quite

a, you can see the star glow sort of defines the horizon.

Sorry. And so we were, we were told to

sit down and one boy stayed with us and, but then the others all

sort of carried on. And we could hear them starting

to shout and, and, and, and it sounded like they were sort of

cutting their way through the Bush, sort of like slushy Bush.

And, and I said to Sandy, it sounds like they've lost, they

don't know where they're going now.

Anyway, soon after that, they, they, the leader came back.

We, we were calling him Cyclops by that time, by the way.

So this habit of calling being names, because we had to

identify who they were amongst ourselves.

He came back and and he was, I could see he was exceptionally

agitated. So he brushed past me and as he,

as he walked past me, he shoved the jugger like a little plastic

jug with a handle on it into my hand.

And, and I knew the old man had been carrying this and the, the

handle was, was sticky. And I involuntarily, I licked my

fingers and, and I tasted metal. And I, you know, at that point,

I just kind of knew that they'd actually just bane it that old

couple to death. And that was, you know, at that

point, you can't really, you can't really explain how you

feel. You know, it's we, we, we

literally thought we were The Walking Dead, but we reinforced

this feeling of Sandy and myself that we had to protect the

children. And, and fortunately, the

children were oblivious to what had happened because it was all

dark. We never saw it.

We only heard it the next day, we saw the evidence of it.

So we weren't, we weren't what we were imagining definitely

happened. But so we, we, we just carried

on trying to downplay the whole thing.

And soon after that we reached a, a sort of a temporary camp,

outlying camp of this Ronama terrorist group.

And then the so anyway, we, we spent the night there,

absolutely terrifying night amongst these youngsters.

We we, the leader of that camp. How many, how many, how many

people do you think were in that camp?

Once you got to the camp, how many people do you think were

there? In terms of, of, of, let's call

them soldiers. Well, I, I don't know to be

honest, but I would guess in terms of soldiers, boys and men,

but they were mainly boys, probably about 20 at the most.

But there were, there were, there was this, this was

actually, we discovered afterwards that this was an

outlying camp of Renorma. And it was actually they, they,

they were growing maize and things like that there.

So it was actually like a little agricultural outpost.

So there were quite a lot of women and girls there as well,

kind of like we, we finally ended up.

And yeah, so anyway, the next, the next morning, we, we knew

they'd sent back a, a bunch of, of other troops to go and, and

raid the yacht. And I think I must, I must

really, I must move forward because we use up all the time

telling the story. No, I know it's, it's, it's an

unbelievable story. And and I mean, yeah, like,

like, how long are you at that camp before the next major event

happens? Now we only spent a night there,

so the next morning they a very frightening thing happened

because Cyclops was called before.

So the commander of that camp was a guy that we called Paul

Patrick. I think we misunderstood his

name. We gave him the name Paul

Patrick, this commander, he seemed to have modelled himself

on Chez Guevara. In fact, that's what he looked

like. He, he brought Cyclops before it

was brought before him. And clearly Cyclops was being

accused of something. And, and we witnessed this, this

really terrifying scene where Cyclops was, was being forced to

admit that he obviously it's stolen stuff from the yacht that

should have gone to the commander of this camp.

So 22 little boys were made to go and cut some sticks and they

started to beat Cyclops on his back and on his, the backs of

his legs and, and he started screaming and shouting.

Before long, this kid who'd actually the day before had

killed people was, was himself just lying on the ground

whimpering and screaming like a little child.

It, it was a, it was, it was a terrible thing to actually

witness anyway. Then, then.

So he, he was, he was sort of made to lie there with his arms

spread out on, on his stomach and arms and legs spread out.

And Paul Patrick grabbed an AK47 and held it to his head.

And you know, oh, you know, can things possibly get any worse

than this? But anyway, he, he made, made

Cyclops shout out what was obviously an admission and, and

mercifully, it never went any further than that.

And Cyclops was allowed to just to skulk off.

Soon after that we were taken to the top of a sand dune nearby.

We were about two kilometers from the sea and we spent the

morning waiting there and and that afternoon Paul Patrick came

back and gave us back essentially 2 shopping bags full

of our stuff. And and then a different group

of boys were were told us a different group of boys were

going to accompany us to the road to villain Kulis, which was

great news to us because that's what we wanted to get back to

civilization. So here above my shoulder, which

which side I'm on here, this this photo, that's the group of

boys that then walked with us down that section.

And how did you? Get a picture of them.

Yeah, so in their shopping bags, believe it or not, incredibly,

was my camera. Of all unlikely things that they

should return, There was nothing, it was absolutely

nothing, nothing. But the two critical things I

returned was our camera and anti malaria tablets just by

incredible good fortune. And yeah, so that's why I've got

photographs behind me of the event.

We we were, we were told not to take any photographs, but I was,

I wasn't entirely honest about that.

But yeah, it is quite a unique record of the, of what happened.

You know, we spent the next two days walking S down the beach.

We in total we covered about 70 kilometres and we ended up in

the Yanomo headquarters and we spent, they built a Hut for us

there and, and we spent seven weeks living with them. 7 And it

was during, during, during that time we had to just accept that,

you know, things weren't going to get any better.

We, they weren't, we tried to get them to take us back to the

yacht. We tried to get them to take us

to the road and they always kept on saying it was too dangerous.

Maybe at this point I must just give a little bit of context as

well as to what you forded into. So how did?

You also communicate. I also want to know how you

communicated. Like did anybody there speak a

common language or was it all just a matter of feel by this

point and trying to understand what each other was saying?

No, the, the communication was, was a source of, of endless

trauma to us because nobody could speak any, we couldn't

communicate with them. So for one man, Patricia,

Gerald, Patricia, he was about 40 years old.

So he was, he, he became our official interpreter and

protector in fact. And we, we, we owe our lives to

many people, but one of them was Patricia.

Unfortunately, Patricia, he'd, he'd learnt a little bit of

English while working on the mines in South Africa.

And unfortunately he, he didn't have a particularly good grasp

of English. And he'd also obviously been

threatened with death if he'd divulged anything.

You, you would never, you wouldn't tell us what was

happening, but but it was really clear that on many occasions we

were questioned by the the commander of the camp, the guy

we called the commander, he was a 21 year old.

We knew they were asking questions about oil exploration

and fishing and things like that.

So we, you kind of know that your life depends on these

answers that you're giving. But the problem was we had no

idea what was what, Patricia was saying back to the commander.

Right? Well, you know, we, we, we

couldn't, we didn't understand the questions we were asked, and

we had no idea whether our answers were being relayed

correctly. Maybe.

Were your kids with you? Again, I got I got asked, I got

asked a question to get about the kids.

Were your kids with you the whole time?

Were they ever used as as, as leverage, you know, to try and

find these things out? And, and we're at this point,

are you telling them just go with the flow, Just do

everything that they say to do? And, and, and, you know, I know

that's the number one thing people ask.

I get it. There's a reason for that.

You know, while you're in this part of the story here, what

were you telling the kids? Basically carrying on the story

that, you know, this was just an incredibly exciting adventure

that we we were in, you know, and there were all these strange

things happening, all these amazing spiders and scorpions

and, and, and things living in the Bush.

So we were living in a Bush camp.

This is not. So I think that there's a

photograph of Tammies. This is this is a photograph

sneaked through a hole in, in the Hut that they built for us.

So that's a little context. So that's Tammy over there

anyway. Yeah.

So we, we, we, we set up, we set up games for the children.

But it became quite clear that they weren't going to harm us.

In fact, they, to be honest, they treated us as best they

could. We had the, as good a food as

the, the leaders had, we had warm water to bath in every

every morning and every evening. And they really loved the kids.

So 1, you see, this is, this is where the story gets complicated

in terms of trying to make it very brief, because the, the,

the, the first contact we had with the leadership was that

those boys had accompanied us down to down after the 70

kilometre walk. And then we walked inland.

We didn't know where we were heading at that point.

And then they suddenly left us on the path.

The, the boys that were accompanying us, they just

abandoned us. And the next thing this, this

man, he was about 50 years old, but with his, his arm, his left

arm amputated just above the elbow.

He suddenly appears very well dressed in, in sort of slacks

and, and, and an iron shirt. And he he sees us and he sees

Seth, who at that point happened to be playing with a big giant

locust. So yeah, for Sith, it was like

living. It was like a paradise.

It was like living in a sand pit to just digress, you know, it

was like a he never had to wash or bath or anything like that.

So that that's. Effective is everything.

By the way, so anyway, this this guy who we immediately gave the

name Captain Hook and he became a very important character in,

in during our time there. He was sort of like the liaison

guy. He saw Seth and he just like,

whoa, he just, he grabbed Seth with his one arm, stuck him on

his, stuck him on his, his arm and started running off down the

path, which which didn't make Seth very happy.

But but then all all this guy did was he like giggled it, it

was very disturbing. You know, he was we, we

discovered afterwards that he was drunk all the time.

You know, they were all drunk all the time, so.

Oh my God. Anyway, yeah.

So they, they actually really loved the children.

They they put up a spring for them.

They provided bicycle wheels for them to wheel around and, and

they gave them a constant supply of, of sugar cane to Manchon so

and, and nuts and things like that.

So the, the children were actually, you know, I mean, when

I say well treated in the context, they were incredibly

well treated. And it became very apparent that

these people were actually looking after us.

So this is this is where now it becomes important before I get

into too much detail to explain the context.

Now that's, that's the incredible thing about this

context is that it was only, it was only 32 years after 1990,

just a few years ago, after I'd written the book that I was

approached by some men who said they had information that I

might find interesting. And, and for the first time, I

discovered what the background was, what, what was actually

happening. And the, and the context which

is which is which is slightly bizarre.

So can I just start listening to that quickly to explain that

context? So we, we could never understand

why they were held that kept us captured, you know, why they

didn't just take us to the road. So twice while we were there,

the camp was attacked. The first time was with missiles

in the middle of the night. And that was the most terrifying

thing I've ever experienced in my life.

You know, these things fell out of the sky and they had

proximity fuses. So they exploded above your head

and and I I literally could feel my brain disintegrating at that

point. It was very difficult to keep up

the charade of this is just normal.

Anyway, that and that was followed up by an infantry

attack. But the these children were that

made-up the the Army were incredibly well trained and

disciplined. Wherein perhaps lies a story.

And they repelled the, the forces that were attacking the

camp. Straight after that the

commander came to us and through Patrick said the reason for that

attack was to kill you. And he said that's crazy.

Why would, why would they want to come and kill us?

We, we were, we were trying to work out how to run into them to

escape. And then a few weeks later there

was another attack which started with a mortal bomb, mortal bomb

attack in the camp early one morning.

That was a very serious event. There were 500 troops attacked

the camp and we, we were to run and, and flee for our lives.

There was literally with bullets flying around and, and there

were a lot of injuries that resulted that.

And we were told after that again that the reason for that

attack was to kill you. And we, we didn't really believe

that. So, but in fact, that was true.

That was actually the the situation.

So what what I discovered from these men was that's just sorry,

just to go back a little bit further because I haven't

explained who the Norma and Lima were.

So Norma was a, let me sort of start with Fredima.

Fredima were the government forces.

So they were the Russian trains sort of Soviet forces army for

Mozambique, the sort of official governmental army and they were

fighting a civil war against this group called Renamo who was

originally they were originally formed by the Southern Rhodesian

government to as a counter terrorist measure on on the

eastern border. After after Southern Rhodesia

became Zimbabwe, South Africa took over in the interest in

looking after the Norma. So they, they were sort of in

inverted comments like the good guys, as far as we were

concerned, they were the Western bet.

So America and America and Portugal and to a lesser extent

Britain were, were supporting them as well as South Africa.

Then in in 1985, I think South Africa realized the writing was

on the wall in terms of apartheid and, and, and having

to relinquish power to the ANC. The the President of South

Africa and the President of Mozambique met on at the at the

Incommati River and they signed what is called the Incommati

Accord. And that basically was a non

aggression pact between the two countries.

So Forlemo undertook the Forlemo government, the Mozambique

government undertook to no longer support the ANC because

overhead we're giving them a safe base there right on the

border of South Africa. And in return South Africa

undertook to not support Renama. I don't think either side really

actually abided by that, but South Africa was certainly

caught out two years later when it was discovered they were

still supporting them. Now anyway, this is this is very

important in terms of the context.

So yes, what I discovered from these men was the the names were

John Culley and Marius. So the first guy who contacted

me was Marius and he put me in contact with John.

So John John, it turns out, was actually the South African link

with Renorma through the through.

Not, not that. So he was like a link between

the military and the southern government and he had to look

after the president of Renoma, a guy called Alfonso de Calma.

And I've met him and he was also one of the original Ricky's, the

equivalent of the Navy Seals in South Africa and an amazing,

amazing man. So in 19, at the time of the

incommunge accord been signed, he was, he was instructed to

keep liaising with Renomo. And this happened until 1987

when he was suddenly one day told to get Alfonso Drakkarma,

the president of Ronama to Pretoria for a meeting and with

with Pukbuerter who is the Minister of Foreign Affairs for

South Africa. And at this meeting Pukbuerter

said that Saudi was now going to abide by the Unkamati Accord and

was cutting off all support for Ronoma.

The karma was incensed by that. That is the reason why we were

captured and held by them as as hostages to force South Africa

back to supporting the Nana, because at that time, right

after that, sorry. No, in the background then, were

you guys being used as pawns and, and, and these these people

were saying, OK, guess what we've got.

Yeah, hostages, including children, and they were trying

to use you as leverage to further their agenda.

Is that happening in the background without you even

knowing it was happening? Yeah, we, we had no idea that

that was happening. Yeah.

And and that, I mean, I've seen, I've, I've seen factual proof of

that. So that's exactly the situation.

All as a result of the book. All as a result of the book

coming out. And now pieces have come back

into to give you a bigger picture.

Yeah, so wow, wow. Yeah.

So we, we, we with the story. Sorry I've I've lost my.

No, hold on, hold on. Before we get back to the story,

Dave, I got to know before you back to the story, who's going

to play you in the movie? Who's going to play you in the

movie? Because like, I mean, Mike.

Everybody who's in the books and there used to be a movie, I I

no, nobody's put calculus be a publisher for the book.

So anyway, but that's another story.

OK, So anyway, so, So what the problem was that Renamo, I think

everybody knew that the USSR was collapsing and that things were

changing in South Africa and the ANC would be unbanned and Rama

critically was losing the propaganda war.

They, they Ronald Reagan and the American CIA called him second

only to the Khmer Rouge in terms of viciousness.

Margaret Thatcher started saying kind things about them.

So for Lima then realized that any atrocity that was

perpetrated in Mozambique would be blamed on Renama, regardless

of who, who, who, who did it so suddenly.

So Renama captured us, But but for Lima suddenly realized all

they had to do was kill us and Renama would be blamed.

And this would put Renama in an incredibly disadvantageous

situation when it came to negotiating peace, which was

which was an inevitability because they couldn't carry on

fighting the war forever. So.

And that's what happened in in Yeah.

So now to get back to John, I'm, I'm, I'm just going to use his

their first names and, and their names are mentioned in the book,

but, but just to protect them. So, so John, John now is aware

that, that, you know, he's been told to cut all contact with

Renomo and he, he basically said to foreign affairs.

Look, that's not a very wise thing to do because what

happens, what happens if, for example, a South African

aeroplane crashed in Mozambique? You know, that country to the

what the message that's out there that Renomo are only

operating in Golongoza area. They actually control the entire

country only for Lima only control the cities.

How? How would you, how would you

negotiate with them? And he was told no, you cut all

contact, which which he did. Then in 1990, what happens?

Not in aeroplane crashes, but this crazy family running around

in some peak and they get captured.

Exactly what he predicted would happen.

Soon after we were captured, the South African government

realized that they had to come and rescue us.

And the only way they could do that would be to send a Navy

naval task force up into the waters.

And that so this now precipitated extraordinary

cooperation between the countries.

So South Africa had to get permission for South Africa to

land in on Mozambique, realized that the countries were thawing

tents and purposes at war at this time, that they had to stop

fighting. Everybody had to stop fighting.

South Africa had to come ashore. There had to be observers and

all this sort of thing. So this task force is now put

together 33 naval ships and I'll come in to rescue, rescue us.

I'm deeply. And how long?

Are you there at this point, at this point here when they're

when they're getting the exercises ready to come and get

you, How long are you there at this point?

We've been there. We were there in total seven

weeks, but this was about this is all happening after about 5

weeks and you have. No idea.

Like, like, like I want to ask about hope.

I want to ask about hope because you and Sandy are putting on the

bravest faces as you can. Seth and Tammy are, are are are,

are, are OK, which is unbelievable when you think

about like the fear and whatnot. And I mean, how grateful you

must have been that they were OK, but you were burdening the,

the, the responsibility of having to fake it till you make

it. You were burdening the

responsibility of, of, of, of showing.

The kids that you were OK and that there wasn't fear.

You were putting on the brave face for them.

Was there any hope? Did you guys have any hope at

all? No, you know, we, we kind of,

you know, you go through a very weird cycle of, of hope.

So you, you begin to read hope into all sorts of crazy,

unrealistic gestures and, and situations.

So we, we, we'd learned from Patricia through, over a long

period of time that helicopters had landed in that area.

And we've, we've no idea whose helicopters they were or where

they were from. But clearly he described it so,

so much that helicopters had landed there.

And we've learned that they landed there at night.

And we thought, oh, OK, this means they've got to land at the

full moon. So, you know, so then the hope

becomes the next full moon. This is when we're going to be

rescued. Wow.

Completely, completely unrealistic, I think to to

believe under the circumstances. So you you climb up.

Yeah, but it. Helps you get through the day

though, right? Yeah, you climb.

Oh, the day is dragged by unbelievably.

But anyway, we use various techniques together.

So you climb up this this little hill of hope and, and comes the

full moon and nothing happens. And then you sit down the next

side and the, the problem is, is that so then, then, then we

discovered no Patricios, are you stupid?

Of course the helicopters don't fly.

And then when there's a full moon, they fly.

I mean, there's no moon and they make a big Ring of Fire that the

helicopters land in the middle of.

So now, now you now you climb up the next one.

But, but you, you never get as high as you were.

And so by the time we were rescued, we were pretty

catatonic. I mean, we, we actually thought

we were, we were, thought we were actually mentally very

strong. It was only once we were rescued

that we discovered how incredibly mentally ill we were,

mainly because of this ever decreasing hope that we

experienced. It's it's quite interesting to

perhaps just comment about how differently Sandy and I reacted

because there's there's so much one could talk about on this, on

these subjects. Sandy remained.

Initially, Sandy was had no hope.

I was the strong one with hope. I was in, oh, we get out of

this. Don't worry, you know, I'm being

into beating my chest. I'm the man.

You got to get it all. You know, we'll survive this

sort of thing. But then I slid into incredible

despair. But Sandy then grew out of out

of. I think she then realized that

she wasn't as quite as much she was, She developed quite a lot

of respect in the camp because she had some medical training.

So she was seen as the doctor. So, you know, there's a whole,

we could go off for 1520 minutes on that subject.

So, so Sandy kept on saying to me, no, Dave, why don't you make

something, you know, ask them for a knife and, and build a

chair? Or is it because there was, I

mean, there were, you can see the pictures behind me.

That literally is what we had a table and a few broken chairs.

And I, I don't think they ever would have given me a knife.

They would never let me touch anything that was vaguely a

weapon. But I couldn't bring myself to

do anything constructive because that would be an admission on my

part that this was going to carry on and there was no end to

it. I see.

And so so I was sort of becoming more and more hopeless, I

suppose you could say. So Sandy was actually the strong

one in this whole thing. She's got to have all the credit

for for it. So, yeah, that's that's that's

sort of, I mean, you know, if you think about it, there we are

sitting in the Bush completely cut off both.

I mean, none of us were jumping around full with joy.

I can tell you it's but but me in particular was I was feeling

very depressed. And there were times when, I

mean, here's another funny little story to tell that might,

that might ring, ring with some men.

There were times when I actually felt very suicidal.

I don't know if one should talk about these things, you know,

where you just feel. I just just can't carry on any

longer. You know, this is and, and, and

there are all these AK-40 sevens leading up against trees all

over the place. You know, every day they were

shooting in the camp and all you had to do was grab one of them.

You know, I, I'd, I'd even discovered how to get it off

safety and, and simply just start shooting and within,

within a minute we would all be dead.

And it would be seen as a very heroic gesture on my part.

But that would have been the most incredibly cowardly thing I

think I could ever have done. So, But but nonetheless, that's

how I'm feeling. And you know, and you're sitting

there and, and, and so the, the book is based on my diary.

So, yeah, sorry, just to, I don't know if you can see this,

this is, this is, this is the actual diary.

I clicked it while I was there. So every day I wrote up this,

this little minute little, this minute little print.

I don't know if that's really clear what was happening.

And that's what the book is based on.

So 1 morning, I was feeling very down and I, but I was sitting in

the Hut and I, I was writing up this little bit of this diary

and suddenly bang a mortar. That second attack occurs.

The mortar lands just on the outskirts and the next thing

they're shooting all around. And I mean, like, you know, just

like that from, from feeling, oh, I want to die.

It's incredible. I've got to survive, you know, I

mean, I've never in my life felt more alive than running away

with a bullets flying. It's, it's a terrible admission,

in fact, but, but it is, it's, and, and that's why people love

adventure sports and, and paintball and things like that.

And you get a kind of a big adrenaline rush to suddenly find

your life at risk. And, and, and the same applied

to the, the, the boys and who were, who were our captors.

You know, they, they, they, we thought they would run away, but

they were fierce, fierce, disciplined fighters.

And they whoop with joy both occasions when the when the camp

was attacked, because now suddenly this was their self

worth being, you know, being made manifest.

Wow. So yeah.

So anyway, perhaps just to get back to to explain the context

of the story, so. I'm fascinated by the way.

I'm fascinated by every word. I'm hanging on every word.

And I'm sorry, I'm waiting to. Dive into the book.

I'm taking too long to tell the story, but we're.

Good. No, no, no.

We're good. Let's keep it going here.

The second. Attack.

Happens where time's marching on and, and, and, and, and you're

going through, you know, these ups and these downs of, of, of,

of how you're feeling. And I mean well.

I think, I think the critical thing to, to, to note about that

is we had no idea that so much was happening in the background.

We had no idea that the Navy was literally steaming up the coast

towards us. I mean, that would have raised

our hopes immensely if we'd known that.

But but then there was a problem because Renamo refused to

release us. So, so Frelimo had agreed to

release us, but Renamo said, no, we're going to, we'll hold this

family for as long as we need to.

And, and that was that then was creating a very embarrassing

situation because the the task force was already assembled in

one's way. And these are not easy things to

put together, I've discovered as, as I think America's

discovering right now. So I shouldn't have said that,

should I? No, what are you talking about?

It's it's it's it's the observance.

The observance of everything is is absolutely.

Yeah, so, so, so everybody is now in the awkward situation.

So they and and they can't they, they twice tried to talk to La

Calma and meet up with him, and on both occasions he refused.

So they had to then call John back in and say, look, please,

can you somehow make contact with this man?

You know, you've had a long relationship with him.

And John did. John managed to organise a

secret meeting with him in Blantyre in Malawi.

And. And he pleaded for our release

and argued for our release. And incredibly, John recorded

that. And he's giving me a transcript

of that. And I can tell you it's an

amazing thing to read. Yeah.

It's in this file here right next to me.

So. And eventually, eventually the

comma says, OK, you can have your family.

I mean, just like that, you know, after about an hour and a

half of talking. But in the, in the discussion,

he pointed out to South Africa that, you know, you, you, you,

you are being deceived by, by Mozambique.

We, we've got people planted in for limo and we know that in

fact, far from them with drawing the troops in the area where the

family's been held captive, they're increasing the troops

and they plan to attack it and they plan to annihilate that

crowd, including the family. And in fact, a bounty had been

put on our heads for anybody who could kill us.

So. So John now comes back to South

Africa, says great news, they've agreed to release the family.

But bad news, you're walking into a trap.

You know, you could, can you, Can you imagine?

South Africa's now just started to negotiate with the ANC,

starting to talk to Nelson Mandela and suddenly it now gets

trapped into the middle of a, of a gunfight in Mozambique.

The world would have said South Africa's attacking Mozambique.

You know, it would have been an absolute disaster.

So this, so this is where Marius now comes into the scene.

So Marius then gets told, look, you better get to the to the

border, the Kruger National Park where there's a military base

and start intercepting the radio messages that are coming from

Philima and find out whether this is true.

So that's what he does. He has to 1st decode, decipher

the the messages. This is all still classified

stuff, but that these guys don't see.

I think so much time has passed by that they don't mind talking

about it now. So I think it's a little bit of

a embarrassment to them. That would be an embarrassment

to Mozambique to know that South Africa cracked their codes.

And anyway, he does. He starts to create what they

call situation maps and within two days he discovers that, yes,

it's true. There's about 1000 troops

assembling around the area where we are held captive and they're

all converging on it. So this, this then gets ferried

back to foreign affairs and then the powers that be and say,

well, we, we better we, we, we do, we simply can't go.

And, and you know, this is too dangerous the situation.

So, so a meeting is in a range. This is where Culley, who was

head of head of, of military intelligence, Marius worked for

military intelligence and Culley was his boss, basically

responsible military intelligence for the East, East

Africa. He, he gets told he must go and

meet with Chasana and present him with with Maurice's maps and

this evidence, which he does in Maputo.

This is all pretty amazing stuff going on in the background,

which you know, nobody would even dream about or imagine

happening. So Chasana, President Chasana

says, OK, all right, we've been caught out and, and I don't

necessarily know exactly what my commanders on the ground are

planning. So the only way to be certain is

you'd better fly up there. I'll give permission for you to

fly there up to Verm Kulis, which is where the the nearest

Fredemo base is. And, and you can meet the

commander there. I'll give you all the letters

required and you can check for yourself that the troops are

withdrawing. And so that so Kali does that.

And so these these three men, John, Marius and Kali literally

saved our lives. I've had the great children

you're meeting, every one of them, incredible men and I so

proud of what they do you. Know what it is, Dave, Dave, I

gotta you know what it is. It's like a Tom Clancy novel,

you know, and, and you think about.

I don't know if that I don't know if you're familiar with Tom

Clancy or not, but but like, you know, his novels, they, they,

they, they have all these characters that are all over the

place and, and, and you don't really know what's happening.

And then almost in every single novel that I've read of his,

they all converge in one in one way or another, or they link up

in one way or another with when, when, when, whatever the action

is or whatever the the resolution is, it's, it's all

like a Tom Clancy novel. The, the difference being the

fact that you have so many of the details from so many of the

different pieces of the board at this point here is astonishing.

Like you talk about the universe or God or whatever you want to

call it, saying, OK, this family is going through this ordeal,

but they're gonna be OK. Remarkably, the kids are gonna

be OK. I mean, you're talking to me

about it today. We know it's a happy ending.

At this point, I'm gonna put in the intro that it's a happy

ending in that regard. I don't know.

Maybe happy is not the right word, but there's a resolution

to it. And, and, and and yet you get to

see all of the different pieces on the board moving in

retrospect. And that is an unbelievable, I,

I don't know if you call it a gift.

It's an unbelievable fact that, that that's the case.

I, I, I'm astounded by the fact that you have so many of these

details on, on what's going on behind the scenes.

Yeah, as a family, we, we realize we are just beyond

measure. Can maybe I'll just quickly try

and sum up everything because we we're getting into, I'm getting

into a lot of detail. So we were rescued.

So the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the ceasefire came into

being. It was the first ever between

the Norma and Flima, and we were rescued in a you know, if you

want a whole nother little subsect to the dramatic thing,

the most incredibly dramatic risk you're imaginable.

Yeah. No, no, no, we need to hear the

rescue, Dave. We need to hear the we got to

hear the rescue buddy. Like what the heck?

How did it happen? And and what was?

Yeah, no, we got to hear the rescue brother.

OK, well, I want to tell you about the greatest miracle of

mystery of all is that I ended up going back to the place from

from where these attacks had been launched.

But that's that's jumping ahead 8 years of.

Course you have. Oh, my gosh.

OK, Yeah, yeah. So.

So we, we, we of course know nothing about this.

We, we are completely oblivious to, to any of this happening.

And but we, let me just say on the Saturday, I can't remember

the exact date on the Saturday, lots of airplanes flew over the

camp and, and, and unusually, when any aeroplane flew anywhere

vaguely near the camp where we were held, if you want to look

it up on a map, it's near Promeni in Mozambique.

They would, they would shoot at these aeroplanes with everything

that they had. I mean, it was crazy, but they

never shot at any of these aeroplanes on this day.

So we asked Patricia that evening, you know, why?

And he said, because those people are going to go and talk

about you. What now?

Why? Why are they doing that sort of

thing? You know, like, can that be

possible? That was the first glimmer that

we had that something was happening.

In fact, in fact, he got a little bit screwed up.

They were actually, that was probably Kali flying up to Bill

and Kulas. And and it wasn't they weren't

talking about peace or anything like that.

There was simply that situation, right the the next day, the

Sunday, the commander came along to, to us.

And when I say speaks to us, it's obviously all through

Patricia. He said, pack, you're going to

be going get ready. I mean, just like that, you

know, after after seven weeks, like with no warning whatsoever,

suddenly this message gets dumped on us.

So we didn't have much to pack. Within 5 minutes we were packed

and and Monday came and nothing happened.

Tuesday came and nothing happened.

Wednesday came and nothing happened.

So this whole drama in the background was unfolding of or

is the camp. Little do we know that there

were 1000 troops approaching the camp.

Thank goodness we never knew that.

Sometimes it's best not to know what's happening.

Anyway, on the on the Wednesday night the commander comes across

and says tomorrow you leave and and at lunchtime at on on the

Thursday, which just happened to be my birthday, amazingly my

39th birthday. So we ran aground on Sis's

birthday and released on mine. But did you know it?

Did you know it was your birthday?

Sorry, did you know when was your?

Birthday like had you been keeping?

Track of the date you didn't know.

OK, so. No, no, they would have had.

No, that's coincidental. Yeah.

So, yeah. So they assembled the numero Uno

group, the the number one fighting group, which was led by

a guy that we'd actually grown had a lot of affection for

called pretty face. And he had this extraordinary

girl like face, but he was their number one fighter.

He was probably about 16-17 years old.

He got he has another funny side of the story.

This I'm kind of like sound like I'm dropping little tidbits in

for people to buy the book to find the back story.

But but he got shot during that second attack and he had a

bullet lodged in his backside and he asked Sandy to please

remove it to operate on him and remove it.

Mercifully she she there's a funny story about that.

But anyway, he. Good thing she knew how to, you

know, handle. Mollusks that never happened,

that never happened, thank goodness.

She as, as Sandy said, she, she she studies mollusks and they

don't have spines, so she doesn't just now the nerves get

from the spine into the legs. So I think, I think a sense of

humor is an important thing to get you through these things as

well. So.

So, yeah. So anyway, we set off and that

night, the night before, Sandy and I asked her, you know, which

way do you think we're going to go?

So we, we assume we would go to the nearest headland, which is

near Khomeini. That's Cape battered the Falsa,

which has got a lighthouse on it, which, which needs to save

what's not working. And but to our amazement, we

ended up walking north back towards where the yacht is.

And we, we spend the, the whole afternoon.

We walk up along the beach or just inland from the beach sort

of. So the, the beach has got,

you've got the beach a little primary June, small low June,

and then a probably about a 500 meter wide flay behind it, then

an escarpment with forests on it.

And then the area where we lived.

That's sort of like the topography there.

So around about 4:00 that afternoon, we found ourselves

standing on the primary dune and they'd set up a radio under,

under some trees nearby. We we knew they had a radio and

and every time they spoke about the radio, Patricia always did

this with his hands. And we assumed it was some old

Second World War thing, but it actually turns out it was a

state-of-the-art British scrambling radio that

automatically mixed messages. I don't know who they were

talking to, but indirectly they would.

They must have been talking to Kali or linked up with Kali in

Voluntoulos. So we're standing there, but now

and still nobody's talking to us.

Nobody's saying anything. We, we knew we'd walk through a

minefield because we were following a path that was marked

with, with, with grass tied in, in knots.

And we're looking out the sea. And you think, you know what,

what on earth is going to happen next?

You know, I don't know. We, I don't think we were

thinking rationally. We were sort of like half

expecting a submarine to appear out of the sea to be honest.

You. Know I looked out to sea and I

could see there was I could see the derricks of a ship going by

way just on the horizon. You know, when, when you have

very cold water, sometimes the, the, the, the, the, the ship, it

causes a lensing effect and it elongates it above the horizon.

And, and I could see the ship was hitting S we and after about

50 minutes looked again and it was hitting N It turned around

and I said said, you're not going to believe it, but I think

that's the South African Navy out there.

Can't be. I mean, that's actually really

frightening to think that your Navy's come into this.

So, you know, we, we were an incredibly private family and,

and we were absolutely terrified at the thought of, of, of

suddenly becoming sort of exposed publicly.

I mean, apart from the fact that we, we felt very humbled and,

and, and guilty for what, what we caused to happen.

Yes. Anyway, soon after that we, we

then by then it was evening the, the we, we that we went down

into actually onto the beach and walked along in the water.

I still remember the beautiful scent of the, of the, of the

dampness flowing off the land and the warm sea water that we

waded through. It's an extraordinary beautiful

area of the, I mean, like you talk about making a film, it's

the most beautiful area that you can make a film in.

You know, he walked probably about another 5 or 6 kilometers

into a place where they'd built three huge piles of timber.

And Patricia took us behind the sort of primary dune and and he

made a fire and and he roasted some coconut for us because he

knew this was a treat that we really enjoyed.

And but then it was dark and we could see the fires had been

lit. And the next thing Captain Hook

would say, Hey, Patricia, Patricia.

So Patricia went running off and soon he came running back and

said, come, you must come. Quick, quick, quick, quick, man.

Come out to sea. Come quick, quick, quick.

And he grabs our, our stuff, the, the little few bags that we

had. And, and we sort of entered this

like a wild scene of this party, these three giant fires, you

know, about each about the size almost of a house burning and

everybody sort of milling around and, and, and, and we were just

left there. Patricia disappeared and we just

literally left standing. And the next thing, a guy with a

big beard in in a wetsuit comes out and and he he pushes out,

puts out his hand to shake mine. And he says, Oh, you, Mr.

Muller, I said, I said. Yes.

He's just bored. We're glad to see you.

This is that. We know that was Gavin.

Gavin, one of the Rickies at the Swamishore.

Anyway, they then brought a big, big ski boat.

A big high-powered ski boat came screaming out of the darkness up

the beach. This is all very spectacular

stuff because this is all happening with blazes of

phosphorescent spray and things we were put into into sort of

flirtation jackets and had had chemical light sticks tied to us

and. OK, I got, I got, I got, I got a

bunch of questions I got to ask here, like I got a just a bunch.

First off, as you're taking the journey, you had been there for

weeks. Were you happy for the change of

scenery? I, I, I'm curious about that.

The other thing I'm curious about is did you with all the

imaginations and all of the things of of of hope that we're

still there as you're on this journey, are you optimistic that

it's gonna turn out OK? Or by that point was there, you

know, it's like all bets are off.

You have no idea what's about to happen.

And in all of the imaginings that you had, did you think that

there was even a chance it would work out that way?

And were the three fires basically a signal as to where

the drop off was going to be? Yeah.

Well, well, it was, it was really obvious that the three

fires were the signal for the drop off where we, we, we had no

idea of the magnitude of of, of what it had taken to get to that

point, what was happening behind the scenes.

Yes, we, we were catatonic at that point.

We, we, we, we, we, we knew that if we showed any emotion, if we,

if we let go in any way of our emotion, we would just

absolutely burst and, and disintegrate.

And in fact, that happened the next day.

But that's that's. Yeah, magic testing.

Ahead and the story. So, so, yeah, so we, we so we,

we on the ski boat and then we just go blasting out to sea, you

know, on this, on this bed of, of phosphorescent spray.

If you've seen the if you've seen the whale in in the in the

story of π what's it that that film about π the.

Life of Pi, the Life of. Π it's just that whole whale

jumping out. I mean it was, it literally was

like that. And, and we were facing

backwards OFT. And so there was this

phosphorescent wake and, and at the far in the distance, slowly

this receding 3 glimmers of light.

I can't tell you how sad I felt at that moment because there is

such a thing, you know, these, these people had really

protected us. And I know there's a thing

called Stockholm syndrome. There's also a thing called

syndrome where the, where, where the opposite happens as well.

Now, I think, I think we all had a pretty big dose of Stockholm

syndrome and lemur syndrome and and we were absolutely

traumatized at the thought that these guys were going back into

the war because we'd actually had grown to love them and they

had actually literally protected us with their lives.

In fact, some of them lost their lives.

I'm, I'm sad to say, because of our presence there.

So that was probably one of the saddest moments of my life was

that image And I, I can still, I can still see it before me now.

Anyway, we did the kids. Feel that way too.

Did the kids feel that way too, Dave?

No, I mean the. Tents of this is all just a

great big adventure carried on. Yeah, no, but so like, but it's

an adventure every everybody always worries about adventures.

So. The the the children.

No, I I'm more, I'm more curious about the children like like

were these friends? Now that they're like, oh, we're

never going to see our friends again.

That's. Not, that's not.

Like like do they feel the same way?

No, no, no, no. Now I think you know, we, we,

we, we, we arrived at the, at the Toffenburg, which is a South

African navy's replenishment and hospital ship and, and, and we

dramatically welcomed on board the ship.

I, it's, it's blacked out. We get raised up next to it,

come up blue and boom, suddenly all the lights come on and

there's this whole crew cheering and, and we just, we just no

emotion at all. I, I, I feel very bad about that

to this day. We were almost instantly then

taken into the into the hospital portion of the ship where two

subtitles had been psychologists rather had been were on the ship

because they knew we would be in a state of trauma and and and

yeah. And they basically protected us

and and over the next three days we sailed back to South Africa.

The they they checked out the children as well and they

declared the children to be fine.

We, we weren't. So, yeah, so that's what's

what's relevant about, about the next day or so, which which

maybe some men, you know, we we kind of pretend to be very, very

strong and brave and stoic and all this sort of thing.

So the next day we sit down with the the two psychologists and,

and they say to us now these are specialists in in military

trauma. One of them, interestingly, is

now in Canada in your part of the world.

And there's a story to tell about that, which you might find

interesting. Yeah, they, they say to us, just

start telling the story. What happened, you know, from

the beginning, just start. And so we, Sandy and I, both

start telling the story. And we get to the point where

that old couple were, were were killed.

And, and to my absolute amazement, words won't come out

of my mouth. Just absolutely nothing that I

could do could make me say what had actually happened.

And and we just collapse in tears, both of us, you know, we

just, like melt inwardly. And I think that was the point

where we realized, whoa, we actually are quite sick.

And Henry, the guy said, OK, just skip it.

Carry on, you know, and, and we came to a few of these like

roadblocks along the way. Absolutely.

But yeah, they spoke to us and they, they essentially gave us,

you know, told us what would happen and, and you know how we

would feel. I would, I wouldn't have thought

it possible that your body could take control or your mind could

take control of your body to the extent that it did.

You know where you can't stand anymore?

You just, you just collapse on the ground.

You can't talk, you can't say anything.

You're just so utterly overwhelmed.

I must be careful because I can feel it, you know, off the city

some years. I, I, I, I can feel the, I can

feel, you know, within me, the things coming up.

So that was kind of difficult to get through.

And then a particularly horrific thing happened once we got to

East London where some well meaning person showed me

photographs of, of the yacht, which had been burnt out up at

that point. I still had this crazy notion

we'd go back and say, say they got back.

You know, I couldn't believe that the yacht was going to.

I couldn't, you know, this is 10 years of my life and.

Geographically, I, I, I, I got asked the question

geographically because I feel like you're going to know the

answer. The, the, the zone of where you

got picked up, the drop zone is in the, you know, where, where

you got picked up geographically.

How far away would that have been?

Is that on the same beach just, you know, a number of kilometers

away? Is it a different beach?

How far away was that from where the yacht or the burnt husk of

the yacht would would have been? It it was probably about 50

kilometers away from it. Yeah.

To the South, yeah. Really.

Yeah, not that far. No, not that far.

Half. Hour.

Not even a half hour drive. Yeah, no, you could drive up the

road. No, but I'm, I'm saying I'm just

giving context for the audience. Like, you know, there's, there's

a lot of Americans who listen to this and from a mile stand and

mile standpoint. So we, we, we kind of, we, we,

we gleaned from Patricia that it's somewhere in the midst of

all of this. So we, we would in the evenings,

in the cool of the evenings, we would sit around the kitchen

fire so that the cooking was just done on open fires.

And, and it was sort of, it was a warm convivial.

It was an open thing where people could, where Patricia

felt he could talk to us, I think without, without people

being suspicious that he was passing on secrets, right.

And, and one evening he said to us, there's some bad news.

People came and, and there were Renama soldiers looking after

the yacht. They shot them, killed them and

they took the yacht. And we, we kind of thought, you

know, maybe somebody salvage the yacht or someone's grabbed the

yacht, maybe the people from the island or some, or something

like this. The fact that we, we don't

actually know people who go around shooting people in war

didn't, didn't strike. It didn't, didn't, we didn't

realize that at the time. What, what had actually happened

is that I think Freddemo must have attacked them to try and

get hold of the yacht themselves.

And anyway, I don't know what happened.

They, it, it looks from photos I've seen, it looks as though

they, I've either fired an RPG into, into the yacht or, or, or

a hand grenade or whatever. But it, it completely burnt out

and it's, it's just disappeared beneath the, the sand.

It's not there anymore, but this, this, this well meaning

person had shown me a photograph of the yacht burnt out on the

beach. And and that night we were still

on the on we were still sleeping on the on the toffer Berg the

the ship because I wanted to keep an eye on us.

And in the middle of the night, I woke up and, and I just, I had

to, I don't know, I woke up and I knew I had to get to that

photograph because I had it, it was on the table next to me.

And Sandy was there as well. And, and I tried to stand up and

I just, I just fell down. I literally became this like

little molten person on the floor.

Sandy was extremely traumatized by that because she didn't know

what was happening. I couldn't talk or anything.

It was all. Oh yeah.

But the, the, the funniest thing is that while this was

happening, I was, I was very aware of, I was sort of like

outside of my body and I was sort of like looking at myself

on the floor. You know, this is like stupid

behaviour. You know, David, get up.

You know, are you doing this sort of thing?

You know, then so, so it was like literally almost like an

out of body experience. And very, very melodramatically,

I crawled my way up the cupboard and and grabbed hold of the

photograph and showed it to Sandy and, and she understood.

And we just hugged each other and basically cried ourselves to

sleep. And the next day we told the the

guys treating us about this. And I said, yeah, they should

have warned us that that would happen and that that that has

happened a couple of times since very unexpectedly on on various

occasions. It's been 30 something.

Years since the Internet, because you're sort of coming to

some of the healing process now. I I, I, I really do want to talk

about the healing process. I don't care that we're over.

This is one of the most astounding stories I've ever

heard. And I knew it coming in, but

hearing you tell it, Dave, is just, it's astounding to me.

I, I, I want to know over the years, you say if it's happened

a few times over the years, It's been 30 something years since,

you know, clearly a giant part of your life, not just because

of the book, but because it, it, it affects your life.

It changes the trajectory of your life.

How many times maybe, but but more importantly, when was the

last time it happened? Because I mean, when guys are

healing from stuff, you know, there's not necessarily a

timetable and, and, and also sometimes you don't really know

when the body is going to do something that either jumps it

towards healing or perhaps baggage shows up that you didn't

realize was there. I'm curious, you know, we're 30

something years later. Are you still healing?

And and when was the last time kind of you had one of these

sort of insights? You know, I'm definitely still

healing. I mean, I might be talking to

you with a :) and that, but that that hides a fair amount of pain

as well. So the the last time it happened

was OK. So again, really difficult to

give a simple answer to some of these questions.

So one of one of the things that so we, we just set about

rebuilding our lives and you know, but but you also realize

that you have been blessed by being alive.

You, you, you know, you, you're in this absolutely unique

situation that nobody, nobody who's not been in it could

understand how blessed you are when you actually know you

should be dead and your family should be dead.

So you have this. So gratefulness comes easy.

Sorry. Yeah, gratefulness comes easy.

Sorry, I didn't catch what you were saying.

Oh, I, I said. I said so, so, so.

You're in a place where gratefulness many times can come

easy. Oh, yes.

Oh, I think we, we, we are aware of that every day.

We've been so blessed. Yeah.

I mean, I mean, extraordinary things have happened to us since

then. And so one of the things you

want is you want to give back. And so one of the ways that I

wanted to give back was I felt this need to get back to

Mozambique. So Sandy Sandy's handled the

whole thing by by simply pretending it didn't happen.

So once we got back, she just just came down and she won't

talk about it at all. I'm more than happy to talk

about it. And, you know, bugger the

consequences of of me bursting into tears in front of hundreds

of people or whatever. So we've.

Has she read the book? No.

Has she read the book? She hasn't read the book.

This is fascinating to me. OK, Yeah.

Never, never read the book. Yeah.

So the, I mean, we can talk the things we can talk about there

as well. Sorry.

Yeah, sorry. I can't.

You know, there's so much one could say about that particular

subject anyway. So one of the things is I felt I

needed to get back to Mozambique.

So we, we were very, we were very strong Christians.

So the whole impact of our Christian faith during this is

also now a fascinating subject. You know, how that that's, that

in many ways didn't make it easier that we, because you're

saying to yourself, God, why did this happen?

You know, if you're loving God, why are these terrible things

happen? And that, that's a whole

different subject. But one.

One Sunday a guy pictures up at our church organizing a missions

trip to Mozambique to check out how the Protestant church has

done doing there. And I just think I've got to go

on this thing. So I sign up for it.

I managed to convince 6 other people and the church leadership

to loan us the church minibus. Which is, which is a miracle, I

can tell you, you know, church politics and, and, and off we

go. I mean, it's a, it's a, it's a

three day drive to get there. So we don't actually even know

what we're going into now. Only the leader of that group.

I wasn't the leader of that first group.

The, he was the only person who knew my background story and

involvement with Mozambique. So we, we stopped over in

Swaziland and then, then, then there's a short hop to the

border to Mozambique. And I was feeling like I was so

happy and I was, I really looking forward.

I had no idea where we were going because that that hadn't

been revealed at all. We were just, we, there was a

like big group of about 50 people that we were part of.

And at that time Mozambique was still quite dangerous to visit.

There was still banditry and stuff happening.

So we crossover the border, we go through the customs and, and,

and get into Mozambique and you just instantly know you're in a

different country. And we've gone probably 500

meters and bang, this happened. Just this, I just collapsed

completely onto the floor of the minibus, you know, and I

couldn't talk. I was in tears.

It was, it was such a weird experience again, you know, that

it just absolutely came flooding back like you couldn't believe.

So that was the first time it happened, the 2nd and that whole

trip. Oh, perhaps let me just finish

that whole trip. So believe it or not, we ended

up, we, we get up to a place near, near Mamba, near Mashishi.

And now I'm getting quite nervous because this is very

close to where we were held captive.

And, and the, the, the, the organizers there in Mozambique,

they say, OK, Sterling Baptist Church, which is the church I

was part of. You're going to go with Thomas.

He'll take it to where you're going to be ministering and and

working. I say to Thomas, you know, where

are we going? And he said, if we go into a

place called Augustina Nettu, that's a funny name.

He says, yeah, it was the MN Bond headquarters for Frelimo.

So the I've got to be careful now because I could actually

burst into tears at this point. I mean, Can you believe it?

Nobody knew my story. Nobody knew my story.

That was absolute chance, if you want to put it that way.

So we end up ministering at this place that used to be the

military headquarters, almost certainly from where those are

texts that had been launched because this was closer than

than than villain Kulis the, the, the, the mains of

headquarters. And you know, that was the big

healing experience. I want to stop you right there

for a second here and maybe we can take you away from the

emotion and the bursting into tears by observing something,

something that I've always been convinced in my life and I've

not gone through anything even remotely close to what you're

taught what, what you have gone through here.

OK, But there's one thing that I have always understood, even

going through my version of hardships, my, my definition of

hardships. And, and, and it's just to me,

I've always said this, there are no coincidences.

And, and, and to me, like looking at that alone, there's

no way whether or not it made you emotional at that time, it

made you however it was, it made you feel.

I can imagine that there's nothing about this existence in

your life, be it your faith, be it all the things that you must

feel that way. There are no coincidences

because I, I, I, you can't write this.

You cannot, you get, you get the best scriptwriter in the world.

I mean, you wrote it autobiographically because it

happened, but you can't write this stuff, man.

Like like this is. This is astounding.

Yeah, you know, I mean, I, I when I tell the story, people

react like you reacting now. And, and and that's and, and the

people who read the book all say lovely things about it.

It what, what to me is a start is, is I think, I think I, I,

I've only do, I suffer from PTSD, but I suffer from PTWD,

post traumatic writer's disorder.

I think if you, if you want to really, if you really want to go

through an ordeal, write a book and try and get it published.

That, that, that's a hilarious thing.

I have my wife and I published a book.

We we did well done and and I know what you're talking about.

I know exactly. What you're talking about?

Yep. Yep.

Yeah. Anyway, yeah.

So that that was an amazing healing process of being there.

I mean. And then to the, to my

amazement, the people there had put the wall completely behind

them. I was the one sitting with the

problem, you know, So it was A and, and, and, and maybe a, a

little story. That's, that's, that's I kind

of, I, I, I start the book and end the book with a similar

story. But clearly it really did

happen. So, and it was, it was lovely to

be there amongst those people. They were so happy.

And it was such a beautiful environment.

It was just like, exactly like where we were held captive.

All those memories came back. But yeah, I, I, I was often in

tears during that visit. And on the last evening I just

felt I wanted to be alone. So I went walking off, left

everybody and I went walking off amongst the mainly palm trees.

And it was beautiful. It was like like a warm evening

and the the smoke was sort of lying horizontally in wisp

between the trees and this lovely smell of, of roasting

coconut and and, and the ladies are chomping, chomping money

York and the food and stuff. And a whole bunch of kids come

along and they start walking with me now because you see, we

were like entertainment while we were there.

So this suddenly, this group of about 10 kids are now following

me as I'm walking along and, and, and suddenly this thought

comes to me of the whole story started, as I mentioned with,

with that man telling the story when I was a little boy.

And one of the things he taught us to do was to tie a bowline

knot. And, and that, that's, that's

the most critical yacht to know how to tie on a, on a yacht.

And he said, you know, why is, why is this not important?

Why, why can't you just tie any old knot?

What's, what's special about a bow line knot?

And, and what is special about it is that no matter how tight

it's been bound, you can always undo it.

There's always a way of making it loose.

So you can always undo a bow line knot.

And this sort of image suddenly came to me.

I've got to be careful not to get too emotional about this

because it was a very touching moment.

So the only thing I had, I thought, well, I'll show these

kids how to tie a bow line like a nice sort of literally tying a

knot at the end of it all, because this is what I've got to

do. I've got to, I've got to untie

these things that are binding me.

And the only thing I had was I had my glasses.

It's got sunglasses around my neck on a, on a cord.

And I sat down and showed them out of time.

They all, they were, they were running, they were flying.

They, they, they were singing this beautiful song.

That's how they would mount up on eagle's wings and, and run

and never get weary, which is from the book of Isaiah, a very

beautiful song, a very happy song.

So there was like fluttering around me and I, I squatted down

and I started to tie this knot and they all clustered around me

as children do. And that was that.

That was an amazing experience. I think that must have been

really puzzled by my tears because I just wept and wept and

wept because you know that that really was like for me literally

undoing all this thing that was binding me.

You know that that you, if you're going to tie yourself to

things in life, do it in a way where you can always, but you

never know what's going to happen.

Do you know a way where you can undo it?

You don't have to Cut the Rope and destroy the rope.

So it was it was just a nice analogy for me to use.

Anyway, the second time this happened that I can remember was

I while when I was on those trips, we always had doctors

with us. And I always thought you had

these lucky doctors. I'm I'm an architect.

Who the hell needs an architect? I mean, they're building using

farmies. Actually.

I'm actually useless in this environment.

So nobody ever needs an architect.

So I was feeling a little bit sort of lonely in, in terms of

this envious of doctors. But about when it was in 2013,

another guy pictures up at our church and he's, he's a member

of a of a mission organization called Engineering Missions

International. And what they do is they, they,

they assemble groups of volunteer professionals to go

and, and design projects that Christian groups are wanting to

build. And, and usually the Christian

groups have no idea of the complexity of building, you

know, the the TV program's made about all the, all the pitfalls.

Yeah. They don't know what they're.

Getting in, they haven't got the money to employ people, they

just don't have the skills at all.

So I I signed up for a trip to Burundi and yeah, so I've done 3

trips with them and they've all been amazing experiences as

well. That first one was to Burundi

and it was to help rebuild a, a, a hospital in near the, it was a

Kabui hospital near Gatiga in Burundi, Burundi.

Burundi was, everybody knows about the Rwandan genocide, but

at exactly the same time the genocide was occurring in

Burundi as well. And so this hospital was in

absolute ruins and the people had murdered each other.

So they'd, they'd suffered through that whole genocide

thing as well. And, and these people had this

mission of recreating this hospital and it just so happened

that so we ran aground on the 28th of April and on the 28th

away. We've been there about 3 or 4

three days. I think the the leader of the

group, you always got somebody in the group.

So these are people from all around the world who've now come

together to tell their story. And, and, and on the of all

nights, that night he chooses me the anniversary of, of, of

everything that had happened and literally to the hour when the

old couple were murdered. And I start telling the story

and I'm feeling very happy about it.

And bang again, the same thing happened.

And, and that's the story I actually start the book with

because a few days later, you know, of course, they were very

disturbed. I thought I was having a heart

attack or some of these poor people were traumatized by my

behaviour. So one of them said, you know,

when I get back to South Africa, I need to see a psychologist.

And, and he, he probably was probably, probably right.

But that's when I decided now I really needed to write the book.

And so when I got back, I started to write the book.

And that was a Tigger for that. Yeah, Mike, we could carry on.

You know, and, and, and, and I, and I, and I want to, I, I want

to, I want to, I want to do a Part 2 to this.

I, I, I, I, I'm so captivated by you, by your insights, by the

melodic, poetic way that you're able to articulate this story.

It's, it's, it's astounding. I also want to make a joke.

No, that's not a joke. It's, you know, they had the

doctors and they had the architect.

Well, they also had, you know, a mallecologist.

So they got that in their corner too.

That's always a good thing. But, but, but really, I, I go

back and, and we're going to finish it here.

We're going to finish it on this one.

And we're going to call this Part 1 and we're going to figure

out a way to get you back on here, Dave, because I, I,

there's so much more that I want to get into.

But for the guys who are listening to this that are not

just captivated by your story, but also, I know for me

personally, the perspective of the big problems that I have.

And I've got some big, I got some things that I would say

that are, are, are, are big, are big things.

I got shoulders that I'm that I'm that I'm being heavy on

that, that are heavy on for my family and stuff right now.

But every man does and and and and and and everyone who's

listening to this is in that regard.

But the perspective is amazing and I appreciate you for that.

I appreciate you being able to give every single guy who's

listening to this and the women who listen to this, who have a

guy that they love that listen to this.

And you're, you're giving perspective.

You know, the big, the big things, the gratefulness stuff,

the blessed stuff, the, the, the, my goodness, we're going

through this. But boy, other people have gone

through things and that perspective is beautiful.

But I want to go back and I want to finish this because the bow

knot has really, really captivated me.

And, and, and, and the idea that there are people listening to

this right now, that they think that they're not as so tight

that it could never be loosened. And, and, and you have a

perspective on that both a literal 1 and a figurative 1.

And so before we, before we go on, I want you to, that's what I

want you to talk about. So you got a second to think

about it. The book is not child's play,

not child's play. And, and, and, and find it, grab

it if you like this story. And by the way, if anybody in

our in our circle is a has has connections to anybody in the

entertainment business, you know, we've got the outline for

a heck of a movie in this conversation that we have here.

And and I mean, to me, you know, again, the confluence of events,

my word. So not child's play.

Dave Mueller is around. You can find him.

You can, you can, you can you can, you know, search if you

have social media, I'd like you to talk about that right now.

But then I just want to finish off by talking about the idea of

how many people think that their knots are so tight, but they

don't even realize that they have a bow knot and that that

knot can be loosened and, and, and you certainly are proof

positive of that. So how do people find you other

than researching the book Not Child's Play?

How do people find you, Dave? Well, I think probably if they

want to hear more, I've got a web page which is not child, not

child's play.co.uk that'll give you a link and you can contact

me directly at I think it's david.muller@notcharlesplay.co

dot ZA. That's a South Africa one, but

that's in that's in the same web, that's in that same website

and we'll. Put that in the description

here, too. We're going to put that in our

channels too as we release the episode.

But but good. I'm glad you talked about it.

Yeah, and then the bone knot. The bone knot man like like like

let's bring us home because I. I you have a perspective.

But, but, but how many of us, how many of us men are in a you

know, we think that the knot is not able to be loosened when in

fact it can. Yes, well, it depends what knot

you use you see in in your life. So, you know, and if you, if

you, you don't, you don't want to end up cutting all the ropes

in your life. Yeah, the, the way to expect,

you know, analogies are, are there's a limit to how far you

can push an analogy. But but this is how I see it in

my life because I've I've often thought about this whole bowline

thing and it, it's it, it is quite weird how nicely it

bracketed the book in in the end, it almost felt like

somebody else was writing the book.

Literally, literally the storyline, the arc of the

storyline was just so amazing. And we haven't even touched what

happened afterwards in the years.

The amazing things that my family have experienced and

where they are now, this is going.

To be Part 2. But anyway, keep going.

Yeah, but the. The bowline.

Yeah. I think you know you as you go

through life. So we imagine that you've got

this rope, You know, I wish I had a rope in front of me.

Now with two NS, you're holding with two NS and you, you, you as

a young person, you're going through life and you're going to

tie this around something. Now, you know, unless you're

going to go up to a tree or whatever and you're going to

tie, tie something around, this is going to be one of your

anchors in life. So those those things are all

sorts of things. They could, they're massively

your friends when you're young, massively your friends and, and,

and for goodness sake, tie bow lines around and lesser good

friends don't grab bad friends. People are going to have

terrible influence upon you, you know, and if you do undo the

bloody not and go find somebody else, you know, and then, and

then also you can take it further.

So if I look at my life, I, I, I was, I certainly wasn't a

Christian in my younger days. I, I became a Christian.

So when, when this was happened, I was a Christian.

We haven't spoken about that whole side of things, which is a

quite a complicated story, but yeah.

So I, I tie my, my bowline is tied around the biblical God.

That's, that's and, and I, I understand other people who've

got religions that they do the same sort of thing.

So that that becomes sort of like my, my foundation.

And then around that rope, I then tie other ropes that are

my, with bowlines that are my family, my work, my recreation,

you know, all all these sorts of things.

And, and they then have other little knots loops tied.

So you create this whole matrix of, of knots.

See if I can put it like this of, of, but everything is goes

central to this one middle thing, which in my case happens

to be God. And, and then certainly a

massive 1 would be family. Massive 1 was my work, my

profession and, and so on. So, and, and if you find as

you're going through life and, and you will, because we, we, we

don't have foresight, you know, yet.

And often when you're young, you do stupid things.

I mean, I'm, I'm talking to you now.

I, I would hate to give the impression that I'm some kind of

hero. I'm, I'm a very weak, scared,

scary kind of guy, you know, I mean, I watch guys playing rugby

here in South Africa or American football, right?

I see bloody crazy, you know, do that.

I'm way too scared to do that sort of thing.

So, you know, so, so, so you see heroes in all sorts of different

situations. Men, men come in all with shapes

and sizes and manifestations. We've all got skills.

We all make up a community. But yeah, if you find that

you've tired, you're not around something that's bad, like an

addiction, you know, find somebody who'll help you

untired. They they, I think, I think in

your notes you've got lots of aids, references to AIDS.

So, you know, and maybe if I could just get in one lost final

plug because I I would love to come back and talk, but just one

final plug. So yeah, I think.

I think in terms of giving back, that that is one of the most

important things that you can do.

So my family have realized that we don't really own the story.

We can't take down the story. We should be dead.

It's as simple as that. The story belongs to even to

those who are normal people, even to President Josana, even

to the politicians in South Africa, certainly to the men

who, who, who came and rescued us and those extraordinary guys

who came ashore, the Gavins of the world.

We owe an immense debt to them. So how do you repay them?

And so there are many things that you can do in terms of

social work and and helping in the community.

But one of them is that we've taken a decision to donate all

the proceeds from the, the sale of Not Child's Play to a charity

called Hostage International. They, they UK based is an

American derivative of it as well.

And they don't get involved in hostage negotiations.

They, they, they realize as the psychiatrist who treated us

that, that people who come out of that situation are wounded

and, and weak and confused. You don't know who you are

anymore. And they need help and their

family need help. And so, and that's what they do.

They, they step in at that point, very confidential work

that they do, very difficult to raise funds for because they

can't go out and say what they do.

And, and it's a need that's increasing all the time.

You know, I mean, right now, as we're talking, I can see a

situations developing in the world where taking hostages is

such a simple thing to do, you know, to extort a, a, a

response. So yeah, if you buy the book, I

assure you that the vast majority of the funds are going

to be going to hostage international.

You can, you can contact them. There's a Lincoln link on that

web page that I gave you. You can contact them and check

it out with them if you want to. Because I'm I'm just, this is

just a scam on my part to try and get rich quickly.

But anybody, anybody thinks they're going to get rich out of

stealing books living in. Yeah.

You sure don't. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah. It's it's for the love of the

project. And, and, and I can't you're,

you know, again, I appreciate the fact that I'm not going to

put you on a pedestal, you know, and I appreciate the humbleness

there when it comes to that. You know, but, but, but, but at

the end of the day, I know a little bit of Bible.

I can speak a little bit of Bible and I I know that that

that one thing that we're called to be is be a light.

Be the light in the darkness. You are very much that.

And I'm not going to say that you don't stumble.

I'm not going to say that you're going on the straight path of

light. As you know, none of us are

perfect. None of us are perfect.

But Dave, you are a bright light and, and, and you don't have to

be and, and, and there's no one on this planet that would ever

blame. You.

For not wanting to be having gone through what you've gone

through. But you are a light.

And, and I just want to say from the bottom of my heart, I want

to express the gratefulness that you have, have, have gone

through this and have used it in so many positive ways and strive

to use it in so many positive ways.

This is literally why we do the show.

It's, it's, it's, it, it's why he changed.

It exists. It's, it's, it's a place where

guys can, you know, share their story, whatever that looks like

or an experience. And sometimes it's a, it's a,

it's a, it's a long tail or sometimes it's a short ordeal

that they go through, but we share it so then others can hear

it and take the perspective as to what we're going through.

This is why he changed. It exists.

And, and, and I mean, you know, this is our longest episode

ever. And I'm really grateful that

it's you. I'm really grateful that it's,

it's, it's, it's this story because I mean, as, as we like

to say on the show, so much good food for so much good thought.

Plus it's a heck of a yarn. It's a heck of a story.

It's a heck of a, a narrative. My gosh, it's one of those

things. And, and I just, I can't, I

can't thank you enough for, for, for your humility and being that

light. And you really, truly are, you

know, you know, we, we're the, the idea of Christian, the idea

of Christian is literally the word little Christ and, and,

and, and I feel him beaming from you.

I really, really do. And it's all the good stuff.

It's all the good stuff. And don't worry about that.

I don't worry about the dogma. I, I, I, it's the light that I

love. And, and, and to me, there's a

lot of people flailing around in the dark and listening to you

today. Thank you, thank you for being

on the show. Thank you for being vulnerable.

Thank you for, you know, exposing yourself to the risk

that you might burst into tears even though you didn't hear you

were remarkably composed. And I just want to say thank

you, Dave, for for everything that you've done to give back to

the world in the small ways and in the big ways.

So thank you for that, brother. Yeah, Well, certainly from my

side, Mike, thank you. And you, of course, do realize

that people like me have. No like to shine unless we have

somebody like you to broadcast it out into the world.

So we we desperately need people like you.

You know, I appreciate the the opportunity.

Thank you. Well, you did the heavy lifting,

my friend. That's that's not a problem.

But you did the heavy lifting here.

Everybody, thank you so much for being part of this very special

episode of He Cast. If you haven't downloaded the He

Changed It app, what the heck are you waiting for?

Go to hechangedit.com. See what everything is all about

as we scale this thing and have a heck of a lot of fun doing it

and help a lot of people as we do it.

This has been another episode of He Cast the official podcast of

He Changed It. My name is Mike Chisholm.

Go change something.