Cocaina: A Book on Those Who Make It (7 page)

What had begun as a movement to improve society ended in complete degeneration, as the militias became increasingly bogged down in precisely the same kind of criminality they had been established to combat. In 1993 Alonso ended up behind bars, while his comrades in the local armed group started to cooperate more and more with the police force and the military in order to run the guerrillas out of Medellín. The process ended with Don Berna taking complete control of the city. Weapons and drugs were now established as constituent parts of society, and from corporate and law-enforcement angles, all aspects of community organisation were, from this point on, synonymous with guerrilla activity.

This tendency towards violence goes back to the civil war of the 1950s and is deeply intertwined with religious dogma, in a way that has resulted in a completely warped sense of values among sections of Colombian youth. There are such quick changes in who is regarded as ‘the law’ — guerrillas, the state, the paramilitaries, the Church — that many young people have never had the chance to develop a sense of ethics. What is a life worth? Whose life? And how should respect for life be interpreted when those in power place little, if any, value on it themselves, as demonstrated by the murders they commit in public?

Sicarios
always make the sign of the cross before they kill as a way of assuring themselves that they are on the correct side of the powers that be. In particular, if what they are doing is in the interest of their biological family, other reflections and sentiments become superfluous. When asked what’s most ‘difficult’ about killing another human being, Alonso’s response has nothing to do with a moral dilemma but with what techniques will work best. ‘Dismembering. Stabbing,’ he says. ‘That’s the most difficult. Anyone can murder, but not just anyone can do it right, leaving no clues or footprints or incriminating evidence. Everything must be pristine afterwards. Knifing someone without leaving a trace of blood is an art form. It’s very difficult. I’m a much better hit man than a thief. Stealing makes me nervous because it’s more difficult cleaning up afterwards, and is just overall a lot riskier. The victim is still alive. Can report the crime. May have seen what you look like. Taken in your scent. Maybe even heard your voice.’

On the sidewalk outside, a couple of slot machines ring. The overall atmosphere in the street is reminiscent of an amusement park in the summertime: the scent of roasted nuts in the air, music blaring from competing loudspeakers, sweaty bodies, jolly people of all ages, and infectious laughter. Not a trace of violence.

‘He really knows how to run a barrio.’ The man Alonso refers to as ‘he’ is the paramilitary who governs the district. The ruptured system Don Berna left behind did not harm all districts equally, and Barrio Antioquia has managed quite well comparatively, even though Javier’s brother and others have lost their lives. Violence in Colombia over the past few years has been refined, or ‘professionalised’, as Alonso says; massacres and street fighting have all but vanished. It’s getting ‘cleaner’. The latest stats on violence look bad on paper, but the bloodshed is almost entirely concentrated in Comuna 13 and a few other poor areas. The rest of the city is flourishing under the ‘new climate’.

‘The mafia strictly prohibits robbery,’ says Alonso. ‘Anyone who commits theft is killed. They’re hard as nails about that. Every barrio has someone who rules over it, and the man who rules over this one does a really good job. It’s all about keeping everything running smoothly. Whoever wants to do or deal drugs should be able to do so, but not at the expense of others. Exposing children to drugs, robbing from the elderly, and raping women isn’t tolerated.’

Alonso rests his left elbow on his knee, letting his chin sink down into his palm, contemplative. His somewhat geeky outward appearance reflects, in a strange way, his double nature. While his clothes make him look like a gangster, his haircut and glasses give him an academic air. His fingernails are well manicured, and his nail polish glistens in the fluorescent shop lighting. The drawn-out silence and fixated expression give the impression of a man deep in thought, perhaps thinking about the strange society he’s just described, or of his life, his two children. Or of what the future has in store for someone like him.

But all of a sudden he snaps out of his pensive trance and reaches for his mobile phone. He punches numbers into it frantically, and it soon becomes clear that he was not at all lost in existential thought, but just in a panic over whether the money for the Llama Martial had been divided up correctly. The figures on the screen put his mind at ease.

‘
El futuro?
’ he says with surprise, looking up at the question. ‘I’ve never thought about the future.’

IT IS ALMOST
6.00 A.M.
outside Carnival, and the morning sun in Medellín has all the intensity of car headlights set suddenly on high beam. The club has no windows in order to ensure that those wanting to party into the wee hours can enjoy their inebriated state to the fullest, without the intrusion of sunlight. As the new day approaches the building continues to pulsate to techno music, to the delight of the clientele, which at this hour consists primarily of gringos
,
prepagos
, and
traquetos
— three social groups that play a key role in modern Medellín.

‘Mother’s Day! Fuck, it’s Mother’s Day today. I have to call Mum.’

Håkan exits the club. His t-shirt is stretched and sweat-stained from a night of dancing, and flaps around like a skirt over his jeans. Neither he nor his girlfriend is ready to call it a night. Street vendors from the shantytowns have descended from the hills and stand around outside the club, holding small wooden boxes at stomach level to entice coming and going clubbers with a range of goodies, from chewing gum, cigarettes, candy, and nuts to small, hidden pouches of psychoactive drugs. Every once in a while a voice coming from what sounds like a megaphone scares the humble vendors off with a warning that they are in the way; honking SUVs roll into the parking lot and the usual array of high-spirited
prepagos
and
traquetos
climb out. The
prepagos
are female escorts, a large and growing industry in Colombia since the nation became a fast-cash society;
traquetos
are the young sons of poor families who have made sudden fortunes from one or several missions in the cocaine industry.

Everywhere today — in remote villages as well as urban favelas — young men donning white Nikes, oiled Diesel jeans, glittering Dolce & Gabbana shirts, and heavy gold chains present a sharp contrast to the sort of drabness and poverty associated with their origins. The
traqueto
’s physical appearance is a direct reflection of financial success, and to those from well-to-do families his two most defining features are bad taste and frivolous spending. Though the tackily clad
traqueto
’s over-the-top and shortsighted behaviour may come across as irrational, it actually makes sense: he was poor yesterday, is rich today, and very well may be dead tomorrow, so his ‘live to the fullest today because tomorrow may never come’ philosophy is understandable. And one important aspect of living fully in today’s world is having sex: not with the impoverished, chubby girls he grew up with in the village, but with the kind of women he sees on television — tall, thin, and blonde — and can conquer with frivolous purchases and shows of wealth.

The term
traqueto
refers to a culture as much as to a certain type of person, and as dawn draws closer the more
traqueto
the atmosphere becomes, as silicone and gold pour out of stretched limos to mingle with the flashpackers. Most of the ordinary Colombians, who like their pot but are bored with coke, have left the scene, knowing that the early-morning hours are devoted to this strange ménage à trios: dressed-down travellers, dressed-up
traquetos
, and minimally dressed
prepagos
— a disparate combination to the eye, but all three happily united around the club’s white gold and its ability to provide total, instant gratification.

All of a sudden a police van rolls into the parking lot. Two officers step out. They just happen to stop in the middle of a line of people entering the club, right in front of a girl wearing high heels and a tight dress. The officers walk two laps around their vehicle, one stopping for a few seconds to rub his neck as he surveys the scene, pondering over his and his colleague’s institutionalised degradation. Once they are done, they climb back into their van and head off against the light.

Håkan is now rummaging through one of the vendor’s boxes, but does not find what he wants. Suddenly he remembers something and happily blurts out, ‘Right!’ He maneuvers the battery out of his mobile phone. Voila! Enclosed between the interworks, like a pressed white flower, is an ecstasy tablet. After a night of incessant cocaine use, his teeth rattle like a child in the morning cold as he sticks the pill in his mouth and mutters, ‘Mother’s Day, Mother’s Day … haaave to call.’ He snaps the battery back in. Switches the phone on. Finds his mother’s number and hits ‘call’.

Standing straight, his eyes fixated on the club entrance, where a stream of high-spirited
traquetos
and drab gringos enter and exit, Håkan rings his mother’s phone, on the other side of the world. He waits.

From the air, Medellín resembles a vulva: a river runs from north to south like a slit cutting the oval city into two halves. Over the past 50 years, this place has been the site of a vast number of recurrent cycles of violence, at the root of which lies all sorts of patriarchal desires, especially the desire for control. The ultimate guarantor of this has always been physical strength, and weapons in particular. And the vicious cycles seem ongoing. Given the subtle symbiotic relationship between the mafia and both the upper and lower stratas of society, it stands to reason that the city has not only become more attractive and a safer bet for a wide range of investors, but also a highlight on ‘the cocaine trail’. It is incredibly well suited to the avant-garde of postmodern backpacking; a thrilling but safe stop for gringos, in a setting surrounded by gangsters, whores, and cocaine — sometimes with Mum only a phone call away.

But not now. Håkan lowers the phone. ‘Damn it. She’s not answering.’

GREEN GOLD

the carousel of war

‘Just eight years ago there wasn’t a coca plant in the region. Today there’s nothing else.’

—
GRACIANO, COCA GROWER

SEVEN SMALL CANOES
dance around in the water like pieces of flotsam. The arrival of the morning sun does nothing to alter the appearance of the jungle, beach, town, cliffs, sky, or people, all of which remain dark. Coal-grey clouds block out the day and, as usual, a light rain falls over those living by the Pacific. But suddenly a beam of light breaks through the grey and meets Leo’s glance.

‘
Vamos!
’ he says.

Each fisherman has his own canoe, and Leo’s, a hollowed-out tree stump like all the others, has a number of deep gashes in its sides where fishing lines can be fastened permanently. The lines are used to exhaust the beasts, which are as big as men, by dragging them through the water so they can more easily be knocked out and pulled into the boat.

The canoes are now about a kilometre from shore, and the seven men have finally caught enough sardines to use for bait later that day. With their buckets full, they drift across the long groundswells, in the hopes of returning in a few hours with one of two things, preferably both. They paddle in a long, chain-like row, 20 metres between each of them. Leo stands up. The others sit. His canoe is a bit larger, allowing room for three fish rather than two, if luck prevails. ‘It’s also good to have a little extra space, just in case we get the “miracle catch”.’

Leo is 33 and one of the best fishermen in the village, but despite the fact that he grew up during the cocaine boom, he has never had his big break. His matchstick legs disappear into rubber boots, and the imitation Tommy Hilfiger label on his threadbare shorts flaps in the wind under his oversized football jersey. ‘It’s my turn now,’ he says. ‘Many people in the village have already gotten one, but not me.’

Pozón is just one of hundreds of fishing villages that have been turned upside-down since
el Pacifico
, the Colombian Pacific coast, became the highway for 90 per cent of all cocaine trafficking to the United States. As the Caribbean has become intensely guarded, and the Mexican cartels inherited control over the US market — once held by the Medellín and Cali Cartels — at the turn of the millennium, the poor provinces along Colombia’s west coast have become the hub of modern cocaine production. Today, two key things characterise the jungle regions of Nariño, Cauca, Valle del Cauca, and Chocó: cocaine and fish. The former is increasingly more important than the latter.

Besides two simple roads linking seaports Buenaventura and Tumaco to the inland, the 1300-kilometre coast consists exclusively of dense rainforest inhabited by the descendants of slaves and isolated American Indian tribes. The multitude of rivers — the sophisticated nervous system of the cocaine trade — flow from the western mountain range, down through the jungle, and then out to sea. At the far end, closest to the mountains, are the fields and the paste labs. Further out, usually just a few kilometres from the coast, are the refining laboratories:
las cocinas
, or ‘the kitchens’. In many of the thousands of estuaries, well-packed boats — simply called ‘go-fast boats’ by the Coast Guard and the US drug squad, the DEA — are hidden, ready for departure to Panama, El Salvador, Costa Rica, and Mexico.