Engineer Colin MacRae got to know Chef Marcos Spaziani on the second episode of Below Deck: Sailing Yacht Season 3, and found out that Marcos has not seen his family in 20 years because he’s a refugee from Venezuela.
Marcos can travel anywhere in the world except for Venezuela, where he says he is a wanted man because he quit a chef job with the president.
“Back in Venezuela I used to cook for the president, who was a dictator,” Marcos explained in his talking head. “Whoever was working for him and then quit, you become a target.”
He says he left his home country because he realized that if he stayed, he would die. Just saying this out loud, he starts to break down.
Marcos told Colin that none of his family friends left the country with him. Colin asked him if he considered himself one of the lucky ones, to which he replied “yeah. Some of them didn’t make it.”
“Because they couldn’t get the visa?” Colin asked.
“No, because they got killed,” Marcos explained.
Marcos cries as he says he misses his mom, who he hasn’t been able to see in decades. He also hasn’t seen his siblings or his grandmother, despite trying to find a way to get back together.
“When I have issues or problems,” Marcos tells Colin. “I remember where I used to live.”
This harrowing life experience seems to have given Chef Marcos a different perspective on life and his work. Unlike many chefs, who freak out under pressure or get caught up in their own ego, Chef Marcos has remained extremely cool and professional in the face of inconvenience. He hasn’t complained much at all so far even though the Parsival III’s first charter guests continued to ask for more and more food. So far, even when he has a bit of a complaint, he saves it for his talking head interview. In the moment, he just quietly does his work.
