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Years after the death of Pablo Escobar, a bizarre hype has arisen about his person. It started a few years ago with the Netflix series "Narcos" and continued with Hollywood movies like “American Made” in which Tom Cruise played the leading role or “Loving Pablo” with Javier Bardem and Penelope Cruz.
The famous Netflix Series Narcos with Pablo Escobar as its main character
In Medellín insiders, sometimes even old members of the cartel, now offer "Escobar-tours” for a lot of money that follow the footsteps of the megalomaniac cartel boss. Afterwards it is popular to buy cups and shirts with his name and face on it. It's almost as macabre as if a concentration camp commander would offer tours into the gas chambers for a fee.
To the annoyance of the politicians, 24 years after Escobar's death, Medellín is still the city of Escobar. It belongs to those places that immediately evoke an association - like Hiroshima, Stalingrad, Verdun.
To bring this man a little closer to you and reveal his true face, following a few events that can be attributed to him that show the nature of his personality.
He was responsible for numerous car and bus bombs in the big cities of Medellin, Cali and Bogota. He stole the lives of many innocent children, women and other civilians.
Car bombs were not uncommon during the time of Pablo Escobar
He paid for the execution of hundreds of police officers, whereby paying a bounty which increased with the rank of the killed.
Escobar was responsible for the deaths of several public officials, including the presidential candidate Luis Carlos Galan. He terrorized those he could neither bribe nor kill and threatened them for the rest of his time of power. He worked with the motto: money or bullet.
On September 2, 1989, he had a car bomb placed next to a well-known newspaper agency. He took the lives of several journalists and superiors. The reason: one of the employed journalists wrote "bad things" about Escobar and conducted enquiries about his machinations. Such incidents were not unique. In another case, he had the famous journalist Jorge Enrique Pulido executed because he disagreed with his articles.
From time to time he had politicians and journalists kidnapped and tortured before killing them, depending on his mood and daily form.
Escobar had a weakness for the female gender. He forced pretty young ladies, some of them still underaged, to follow him to one of his numerous properties where it came to agreed (or not) sex. Some of these women were less fortunate, they were tortured, killed and sometimes chopped in parts. Once he kidnapped a young beauty and tortured her with a nail clipper. Afterwards he fired 28 (!) bullets at her.
He pushed a generation of kids to become contract killers. Finally, he had an army of so-called "Sicarios" who would kill almost everyone for a few pesos.
He had the brilliant idea of monopolizing the power over crime. Therefore he created offices where before committing a crime, you first had to apply for permission. Of course for a small fee.
This “gentleman” built houses and football pitches for the poor to make people believe that he was a good man, and continued to destroy the country at his own will.
He was responsible for an exploding airplane from Avianca in which more than 100 people died.
The remains of the exploded Avianca plane
For a period of time he earned money as a political representative, the wage was provided by the tax-paying population (which he tyrannized at will). Besides, he was raking himself in a lot of money by selling illegal drugs.
He persuaded thousands to become criminals and commit murders by showing them that this is the only way to earn a living and to survive.
He exemplified that with money it was possible to buy anything and everybody and as well allowed you to stand above the law. This attitude is shown by his quote: “everybody has his price, you just have to find out what it is”.
The main reason that the cliché exists that Colombians are cokeheads and drug dealers is, who would have expected it, Mr Escobar.
This “hero” brought the state to its knees, achieved of course by the power of arms, with the aim of constructing the law for his benefit.
On the basis of this interpretation of laws, it was not denied to him having himself built a tailor-made prison in which he could continue with torture and murder and from where he fled without any obstacles.
Escobars “La Catedral” had looked more like a weekend finca than a prison
This man called on thousands of people to run after the drug money like pigeons pecking corns. Therefore he put the national economy into a washing machine to clean the dirty drug money.
This guy was no friend of the humans, he committed 623 attacks, left 1710 civilians in pain and killed 402.
This “gentleman” contributed to the people's fear of lonely suitcases on the street, their fear of unmanned cars, their fear of staying in the house, that nobody was trusting anyone and their reaction with violence. He was THE reason that the local population had to live in constant fear.
Escobar had a strong impact on the living quality of the inhabitants of Colombia
The facts and deeds are speaking for themselves, truly a “hero” this “noble gentleman”. But in the end everyone forms his own opinion, good would only be, if one knew the whole story behind.
After these rather negative comments about the providers of Escobar tours, why does IMPULSE Travel also offer a tour about this topic? We are aware that there exists an interest about his personality and history, to deny this would be wrong. Our responsibility is to show the interested people the unadulterated truth without glorification, since this person once shaped the everyday life of many Colombians and played a central role in the affairs of the country.
