Loving Pablo, Hating Escobar

by Virginia Vallejo

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  I HAVE FALLEN ASLEEP with my head resting on Aníbal’s shoulder, and I’m woken by that double jump that light aircraft give when they touch ground. He caresses my cheek, and when I try to stand up, he tugs gently at my arm, as if to say I should stay sitting down. He points out the window, and I can’t believe my eyes: on both sides of the landing strip, two dozen young men, some with dark glasses and others with their brows furrowed in the afternoon sun, have the small plane surrounded and are pointing their machine guns at us; their expressions say they are used to shooting first and asking questions later. More of them seem to be half-hidden in the brush, and two are even playing with their mini-Uzis the way any of us would play with car keys; I can only imagine what would happen if one of those guns hit the ground, spraying six hundred bullets a minute. The boys, all very young, are wearing comfortable, modern clothes: colorful polo shirts, imported jeans and sneakers. None of them is wearing a uniform or camouflage.

  As the small plane careens down the runway, I calculate how much we would be worth to a rebel group. My fiancé is the nephew of the previous president, Julio César Turbay, whose government (1978–1982) was characterized by a violent military repression of insurgent groups, especially the M-19, throwing a large number of their upper leadership in jail. But Belisario Betancur, the new president, has promised to free and give amnesty to all fighters willing to participate in his peace process. I look at Aníbal’s children, and my heart sinks: Juan Pablo, eleven years old, and Adriana, nine, are now the stepchildren of the second-richest man in Colombia, Carlos Ardila Lülle, owner of all the soda companies in the country. As for the friends who are with us, Olguita Suárez—who in a few weeks will marry the friendly Spanish singer-songwriter Rafael Urraza, the organizer of today’s outing and whom we call “the Singer”—is the daughter of a millionaire cattle rancher from the Atlantic coast, and her sister is engaged to Felipe Echavarría Rocha, member of one of the most important industrial dynasties of Colombia; Nano and Ethel are decorators and marchands d’art, Ángela is a top model, and I am one of the most famous TV anchors in the country. I know perfectly well that if we fell into guerrilla hands, all the people on board the plane would be identified as oligarchs and, in consequence, “secuestrables” or “kidnappable,” an adjective as Colombian as the prefix and noun “narco,” which we’ll get to later.

  Aníbal has gone silent, and he looks unusually pale. Without bothering to wait for their answers, I fire off two dozen questions in a row:

  “How did you know that this was the plane they sent for us? Don’t you realize they might be kidnapping us? How many months are they going to keep us when they find out who the mother of your children is? And these aren’t poor guerrilleros; look at their guns and tennis shoes! But why didn’t you tell me to bring my tennis shoes? These kidnappers are going to make me walk through the whole jungle in Italian sandals, and without my straw hat! Why didn’t you let me pack my jungle-wear in peace? And why do you accept invitations from people you don’t know? The bodyguards of people I know don’t aim machine guns at their guests! We fell into a trap! All because you go through life snorting coke and you don’t know where reality is. If we get out of this, I am not marrying you, because you’re going to have a heart attack, and I do not intend to be a widow!”

  Aníbal Turbay is big, handsome, and free; he is loving to the point of exhaustion and generous with his words, his time, and his money, despite the fact that he’s not a multimillionaire, as all my ex-boyfriends are. He is equally adored by his eclectic collection of friends—people like the treasure hunter Manolito de Arnaude—and by hundreds of women whose lives are divided into “before Aníbal” and “after Aníbal.” His only defect is an irremediable addiction to nasal powder; I hate it, but he adores it more than his children, me, money, everything. Before the poor man can respond to my scolding, the plane door opens, and in wafts the warm, humid air of the tropics of what in my seasonless country we call Tierra Caliente—the Hot Land. Two armed men enter, and on seeing our stupefied faces, they exclaim:

  “Oh, God! You aren’t going to believe this: we were expecting some cages with a panther and several tigers, and it looks like they were sent in a different plane! A thousand apologies! How embarrassing, with the ladies and the children! When the patrón finds out, he’s going to kill us!”

  They explain that the property has a very large zoo, and evidently there has been a coordination problem with the guests’ flight and the one bringing in the beasts. And while the armed men fall all over themselves apologizing, the pilots emerge from the plane with an indifferent expression that says, We don’t owe explanations to strangers; our job is to follow a flight plan, not review the cargo.

  Three jeeps are waiting to drive us to the hacienda’s house. I put on my sunglasses and safari hat and descend from the plane, unaware that I am taking my first steps in the place that will change my life forever. We get into the vehicles, and when Aníbal puts his arm around my shoulders, I feel calm, ready to enjoy every remaining minute of our stay.

  “What a beautiful place! And it looks huge. I think this trip is going to be worth it…,” I tell him in a quiet voice, pointing to two herons taking flight from a distant shore.

  Absorbed, in complete silence, we take in that magnificent scene of earth, water, and sky that seems to stretch out beyond the horizon. I feel a burst of happiness, the kind you don’t see coming, the kind that invades you suddenly and enfolds everything and then departs without a good-bye. From a cabin in the distance, in the unmistakable voice of Roberto Torres, come the notes of “Caballo Viejo” (Old Horse) by Simón Díaz, that hymn to the Venezuelan plains that older men have adopted as their own throughout the continent, singing it to chestnut mares when they want to throw off their reins and hope the mares will do the same. “Cuando el amor llega así, de esta manera, uno no se da ni cuenta…” (When loves arrives this way, you don’t even realize it…), warns Torres as he narrates the old stud’s feats. “When love arrives like this, you just can’t help it…,” the plainsman justifies himself, ultimately demanding that the whole human species follow his example, “because after this life, you get no more chances,” in a tone full of popular wisdom and rhythm, the accomplices of warm air heavy with promise.

  I am too happy and caught up in that view to start inquiring about our host’s name or his life story.

  “The man who owns all this must be just like that: one of those old, crafty politicians, with plenty of money and mares, who think they’re the king of the town,” I tell myself as I lean my head against Aníbal’s shoulder again. Aníbal, that hedonist huge man whose love of adventure died with him only a few weeks before I gathered the strength to start telling this story, woven from moments frozen in the nooks and crannies of my memory, peopled with myths and monsters who should never be brought back to life.

  *

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  THOUGH THE HOUSE IS ENORMOUS, it lacks all the refinements of Colombia’s traditional large haciendas: there is no chapel, stable, or tennis court; there are no horses, English riding boots, or purebred dogs; no antique silver or artworks from recent centuries; no oil paintings of virgins and saints or gold-painted wooden friezes over doorways; no colonial columns or varnished figures of ancestral Nativity scenes; no studded chests or Persian rugs of every size; no hand-painted French porcelain or tablecloths embroidered by nuns; no roses or orchids cultivated by the proud lady of the house.

  Nor do I see the humble servants once typically found on my country’s rich estates, people who are almost always inherited along with the property—long-suffering folk, resigned and immensely sweet, who for generations have chosen security over freedom. Those peasants in ruanas—short ponchos of brown wool—with missing teeth but always smiling, who respond without hesitating to any request, doffing their old hats with a deep bow of the head: “Right away, sir!” “Eleuterio González at your service, here to serve!” and who never found out that
the concept of tipping existed in the rest of the world. They are almost extinct today, because the guerrilleros taught them that when the Revolution triumphs, someday in the not-so-distant future, they could also have land and livestock, weapons and booze and women like the bosses’, pretty and free of varicose veins.

  The hacienda’s bedrooms are off a very long hallway and are decorated in a Spartan fashion: two beds, a nightstand with a locally made ceramic ashtray, a cheap lamp, and photos of the property. Thank God, our room’s private bath has cold and hot water, not just cold, like almost all the farms of the Hot Land. The interminable terrace is dotted with dozens of tables with umbrellas and hundreds of white plastic chairs. The size of the social area—equal to any country club—leaves not the slightest doubt that the house was built to host on a large scale and receive hundreds of visitors; from the guest rooms, we deduce that, on weekends, they must be counted by the dozen.

  “Imagine what the parties are like!” someone in the group comments. “They probably bring the Vallenato King in from Valledupar, with two dozen accordions!”

  “Noooo, more like Sonora Matancera and Los Melódicos, together!” someone else says, with a sarcastic tone that lets just a bit of envy show through.

  The property manager informs us that the hacienda’s owner has been held up by a last-minute problem and won’t arrive until the next day. It’s clear that the workers have received instructions to take care of our slightest need so our stay is comfortable and pleasant, but from the very first moment, they let us know that the tour of the place excludes the second floor, where the owner and his wife and son have their private rooms. The workers are all men, and they seem to feel a great admiration for their boss. Their high quality of life, superior to that of servants of other rich families, is clear from their confidence and utter lack of humility; these peasants seem to be family men, and the work clothes they’re wearing are new and well made. They are more discreet than the young men on the landing strip; unlike that group, they aren’t carrying weapons of any sort. We move into the dining room for dinner. The main table, made of wood, is enormous.

  “This could feed a whole battalion!”

  The napkins are white paper, and the food is served by two efficient and silent women—the only ones we’ve seen since we arrived—on dishes from the region. Just as we had anticipated, the menu consists of a delicious bandeja paisa, a typical dish of the Antioquia region and the most basic of Colombian cuisine: beans, rice, ground meat, and fried egg, accompanied by a slice of avocado. Not a single thing on the property reflects a particularly refined or luxurious ambiance. Everything on this estate—more than seven thousand acres between Doradal and Puerto Triunfo in the burning Colombian Magdalena Medio region—seems to have been planned with the practical and impersonal taste of an enormous Hot Land hotel, and not in the style of a large country house.

  Nothing, then, on that warm, calm tropical night—my first at Hacienda Nápoles—could have prepared me for the world of colossal proportions I would discover the next day, or for the size of that kingdom that was so different from any I’d seen before. And no one could have warned me about the colossal ambitions of the man who had built it all, from only stardust and the spirit that makes myths that forever change the history of nations and the fates of their people.

  *

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  AT BREAKFAST we are told that our host will arrive at noon, and will have the pleasure of personally showing us his zoo. Meanwhile, we’re going to take a look at the hacienda from dune buggies, those vehicles designed for young people with no responsibilities, to ride over the sand at high speeds. They consist of a very low, almost ground-level frame that can resist anything, two seats, a steering wheel, a gearshift, a fuel tank, and a motor that makes an infernal racket. Wherever those vehicles go, they leave behind a little cloud of smoke and dust and a wake of envy, because someone who drives a dune buggy is radiant and tan, in shorts and sunglasses, with a pretty and slightly scared girl beside him, her long hair flowing in the wind, or with a half-drunk friend who won’t change himself for anyone. The dune buggy is the only vehicle that can be driven on the beach by highly intoxicated people without anything bad happening to them, without turning over, with the ability to suddenly stop, and, above all, without the police locking up the crazy guy at the wheel.

  The first morning of that weekend unfolds in utter normality, but then strange things begin to happen, as if a guardian angel were trying to warn me that present pleasures and innocent adventures are almost always the masks that cover the face of future sorrows.

  Aníbal is certainly one of the craziest human beings to ever walk the planet, a superlative that greatly entertains my adventurous spirit, and all my friends predict that our engagement will end, not at the altar, but at the foot of a cliff. Though he drives his Mercedes on narrow and winding two-lane mountain roads at more than one hundred miles per hour, with a glass of whiskey in one hand and a half-eaten snack in the other, the truth is that he has never had an accident. And I ride happily in the dune buggy with his little girl on my lap, the wind in my face and my hair flying, enjoying the pure delight, the indescribable joy you feel when you ride for miles and miles over flat, virgin terrain at top speed with nothing to stop or limit you. At any other Colombian hacienda, those vast expanses would be dedicated to raising zebu cattle, and they would be peppered with barred and locked gates to safeguard thousands of cows gazing languidly and dozens of bulls on eternal alert.

  For nearly three hours we travel over miles and miles of grasslands in every shade of green, interrupted only by the occasional lake or slow-moving river, a mustard-colored hill, soft as velvet, a slight undulation in the distance, similar to those prairies where, years later, I watch Meryl Streep and Robert Redford in Out of Africa, only without the baobab trees. The whole place is populated only by trees and plants, birds and small animals native to the American tropics, impossible to describe in detail because every new scene starts before the previous one has finished parading before our eyes—vistas that first went past by the dozens now seem to pass by the hundreds.

  At vertiginous speed we head toward a long hollow of thick and junglelike vegetation, about half a mile wide, to cool off for a few minutes from the burning noontime sun under the giant feathered fans of a guadua bamboo forest. Seconds later, flocks of multicolored birds take flight with a shrill squawking, the buggy jumps over a depression hidden by dead leaves, and a stick about seven feet long and almost two inches thick enters like a bullet through the front part of the vehicle, crosses the narrow space between Adriana’s knee and mine at about sixty miles per hour, and stops exactly one millimeter from my cheek and two inches from my eye. No damage done—to me or Adriana, at least—because dune buggies stop on a dime. And because, it seems, God has a very singular destiny reserved for me.

  In spite of the distance we’ve covered, and thanks to that invention called the walkie-talkie, which I had always considered snobbish and superfluous, in a matter of twenty minutes, several jeeps come to rescue us and to collect the “cadaver” of the first totaled dune buggy in the whole history of humanity. Half an hour later we are in the hacienda’s small hospital receiving tetanus shots and Mercurochrome swabs on the scrapes on our knees and my cheek, while everyone breathes a sigh of relief because Adriana and I are alive and have all four eyes intact. Aníbal, wearing the expression of a chastised child, grumbles about the expense of having that blasted machine repaired or possibly replaced, for which he’ll need, first of all, to find out how much it costs to ship one from the United States.

  We are informed that the hacienda owner’s helicopter arrived a while ago, though none of us remembers hearing it. Somewhat uneasy, my fiancé and I prepare ourselves to offer apologies for the damage we caused and to ask about how to repair it. Minutes later, our host makes his entrance into the small salon where we’ve gathered with the rest of the guests. His face lights up when he sees how astonished we are at his youth. I think he
senses how relieved my buggy-assassin boyfriend and I are that he’s the same age as most of the members of our group, because a mischievous look flits over his face, and he seems to fight against one of his guffaws that, I later learn, are the precursors to peals of laughter.

  Some years before, during a visit to Hong Kong, I was looking at the Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost that was parked in front of my hotel twenty-four hours a day with its chauffeur in hat, uniform, and black boots. Its owner, the venerable and elegant “Captain” Chang, answered: “Don’t worry, dear madam, we have seven more just for our guests, and that one is yours!”

  In the same tone of voice, our smiling young host exclaims with a dismissive wave of his hand: “Don’t worry about that buggy, we have dozens of them!” eliminating all our worries straightaway—and with them, any shadow of doubt about his resources, hospitality, or total willingness to share the infinite entertainment of his paradise with us. Then he sets about greeting us one by one in a voice that first calms, then disarms, and finally seduces us—women, men, and children alike. His smile makes each of us feel like the accomplice chosen for some carefully planned joke that only he is in on.

  “Delighted to meet you in person, finally! How are those scrapes? We promise to more than make up for the time the kids lost; they won’t be bored for a minute! Nice to meet you, I’m Pablo Escobar.”

  Though he is a fairly short man—under five foot six—I feel absolutely certain he has never cared a whit. His body is solid and of the type that in a few years will tend to gain weight. His double chin, premature and prominent, over a thick and abnormally short neck, detracts youth from his expression but adds a certain authority, the air of a respectable older gentleman, to the carefully measured words that emerge from his straight, firm mouth. He speaks with a serene voice—neither high nor deep, polite and truly pleasant—utterly sure that his wishes are commands and that his dominance of the subjects that concern him is complete. He sports a mustache under a nose that in profile is almost Greek and, along with his voice, is the only striking characteristic of a man who, in another setting, would be described as perfectly ordinary, more ugly than beautiful, and who could be confused with millions of others in the streets of any Latin American country. His hair is dark and curly, with an untamed triple wave across his forehead that he brushes away from time to time with a quick movement; his skin is fairly light—he’s not tan like us, who are golden year-round, though we live in Tierra Fría—the Cold Land. His eyes are very close-set and are particularly elusive; when he feels he’s not being watched, they seem to withdraw into unfathomable caves under his sparse eyebrows to scrutinize those outside. I notice that he looks almost constantly toward Ángela, who observes him with polite disdain from her stature of five foot seven, her twenty-three years, and her superb beauty.