Do you have any idea, when you mention Colombia in a conversation, how lucky you are to get, at best, an allusion to Pablo Escobar, the cartels and/or cocaine? Let’s take bets, drum roll, all bets are off: 99.99%, plain and simple.
Oh come on, that’s good! A little humor! It’s okay to laugh a little, damn it! We didn’t invent him, Pablo did exist, and cocaine production is no joke either, so what the hell!
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Necrophiliac tourists
Did you know that when you run a blog about Colombia, you get a lot of messages and comments from readers looking for help in preparing their next trip? Do you have any idea of the content of some of these messages – not all, of course, but some?
Hello, how much is a gram of cocaine these days? Hello, how easy is it to buy cocaine on the street? Hello, is it dangerous to buy cocaine in Colombia?
People are polite, even necrophiliac tourists can be polite, they say hello, they say please. Necrophiles, because when you know what cocaine represents in Colombia, you can say that by consuming it you fill your nostrils with death, the death of a country, the death of entire regions, the death of villages, neighborhoods, the death of families, the death of children, death, quite simply.
Necrophiles, how you go! It’s all right, if we take C it’s just to keep us going or have a good time! Can’t we party anymore? Don’t exaggerate!
The scourge of drug trafficking
And then regularly, you read the Colombian press, listen to Colombian radio at home – well, you just keep up to date – and you come across morbid stories about foreign pimps working as sex slaves on the Caribbean coast for wealthy tourists hungry for fresh meat, foreign tourists paying to rape children, boats offering jetsetters all-inclusive evenings, food, drink, prostitutes and cocaine… quite simply.
And then we meet people in regions affected by drug trafficking in Colombia, people who have seen, lived, lost… and you see death everywhere.
You see it all go by, and your stomach churns, your guts twist, the urge to vomit resurfaces, because you know very well who the victims of all this are, you see their faces, you see the women who are forced, the young people who are forced, the children who are abused, and those big pigs who get it up the nose, you can imagine them very well too, they’re big pigs, and your fists clench, quite simply.
Clichés die hard
So, as you’ll have gathered from this post, the ideas are all jumbled up, everything’s mixed up, it’s spewing out words with no head or tail, because the emotion’s too strong, because the cheeks are red, because the eyes are tearful, because the rage, the rage, is simply too strong.
We started this blog because we wanted to do our bit to change the image of a country we love with all our hearts. We wanted to show what was good and beautiful. We said to ourselves that things were changing, that stereotypes were fading, that clichés were on the wane… but in fact we simply had to admit that there was still a long way to go.
The opportunity was too good, the opportunity too good… I must say, I’d been tingling my knuckles for some time now, and the slaps had been waiting to come out..
So to all those who think that “morals are fine for two minutes”, that “we’re not here to be bothered by hooligans who want to prevent us from partying”, that “a bar, a gram of C, or a trip to Colombia won’t change the country’s situation”, we’ll just ask them to shut their P%$*& brainless mouths and think for two minutes.
Pablo Escobar is not a TV character
Pablo Escobar is NOT a fictional character! Pablo Escobar has the face of death, he represents terror, a violence that from abroad we can’t even imagine: torture, executions, massacres, rape, extortion, I’ll draw you a picture? He represents a terrible period in Colombia’s history.
And you, the Parisian, when you get excited playing narco in a bar, or you, the tourist, when you want to do a Pablo Escobar Tour in Medellín, you know what you’re doing? You’re looking at a drowning people and you’re propping their heads up so that they can’t lift their heads out of the water – you’re simply condemning them.
But what you have to understand is that cocaine and trafficking remain a contemporary scourge, but armed groups act like a mafia and hold in their hands the lives of thousands of peasants in the Colombian countryside, thousands of young people enrolled under their orders, we’re talking about men and women who live in fear and misery, so that you, the decerebrate Parisian, can shove it up your nostrils! Can you smell death in your nostrils? Can you smell it? Can you smell it? YOU FEEL IT!
46.000 dead and the need to remember
On February 22, 2019, the Mónaco building, former property of Pablo Escobar and a place of pilgrimage for tourists who are fans of TV series about drug traffickers, was demolished after consultation with the local population to make way for the Parque Memorial Inflexión, a tribute to the 46.612 victims of drug trafficking in Colombia. A paradigm shift.
A 70-metre-long wall of black stone, perforated with tiny holes: 46.612 holes, to be exact. This is the first message of the Parque Memorial Inflexión: holes that represent absences. At night, they are lit from within
On the other side of the wall, the timeline of horror, the pain etched on thousands of loved ones, 208 violent events attributed to drug trafficking that took place in Medellín and Bogotá.
“It wasn’t just a matter of demolishing the building, but of focusing on the victims’ problems and giving them a voice.” – Paula Jaramillo, director of Grupo Trébol, the company behind the initiative.
The wall recounting these horrific events asks visitors: how did we survive? The answer is finally found in the message placed next to one of the remaining trees of the former Mónaco building: “This carob tree has been a silent witness to the tragedy experienced by the city. It is one of the ways in which nature has overcome adversity, becoming an example of resilience.”
Change your outlook
If you’ve made it this far, it’s because you’re interested in the subject, and perhaps you’re ready to change your mind, your way of thinking, your paradigm!
Thank you very much!
There are many tourist initiatives to help you understand the history of Colombia, so be curious! So rather than trying to do your Escobar Tour, take a trip to the Inflexion Memorial or the Medellin Memory Museum. Take the “Construyendo Paz” tour in Bogotá to understand the history of the conflict in Colombia.
In short, leave the narco series and films behind and get on the bright side of the force. Become an ambassador for a Colombia that’s changing, a Colombia that wants to heal its wounds, a Colombia that wants peace on its territory.
Once you’ve traveled to Colombia, discovered its history and its people, seen its scars, you’ll be able to abandon your caricatured vision and your clichés, and you’ll be ready to talk about the country, to share your love of it, to tell about it, to sing about it to all your friends, so that one day we’ll stop putting monsters on a pedestal.
Get in touch with a local guide
Historic tour of Medellin
If you want to learn about Medellin and Colombia history, you should take a lokk at this tour that covers Medellín’s transformation from the dangerous city controlled by Pablo Escobar to a symbol of social change. You’ll visit the “Parque Conmemorativo Inflexión,” honoring Escobar’s victims, and the “Casa de la Memoria,” an urban conflict center. Gain insights into the city’s remarkable history and ongoing transformation.
Responsible tourism
Daniel and his team in Medellin are comitted to make a difference in Colombia through social and ethically responsible tourism by converting tourism into a sustainable income for local people and by contributing to the protection of Colombia’s environmental and cultural diversity.
