"Along Colombia’s main river, fishing nets once filled with catfish are coming up emptier — replaced by the wake of churning beasts that shouldn’t be there."

"Fishermen are terrified to cast their hooks at night. 'They’ve changed our lifestyle,' said Giovanny Contreras, a fisherman, as he navigated his boat past the bulbous eyes of a male hippo peering at him.... It began as a drug lord’s whim: four hippos that Pablo Escobar brought as exotic pets for his sprawling estate in the 1980s. Now an unruly herd has bedeviled Colombia for decades...."

From "The Fight to Euthanize Pablo Escobar’s Hippos in Colombia/Colombia is planning to cull a population of wild hippos, the offspring of the drug lord’s pets, dividing a town where hippos are the main draw" (NYT).

It sounds easy. Kill them all. It's an invasive species — dangerous and damaging — and huge.

But no: "The hippos have long lent a touch of magical realism to daily life in Doradal. Visitors are greeted by kitschy hippo statues, locals offer hippo-watching tours and some residents have reportedly stolen baby hippos to try to breed them as pets. Many residents regard the beasts with a mix of pride, pity and prudence...."

Magical realism? The literary style? Is this related to "One Hundred Years of Solitude"? Would that be about attracting tourists to Colombia — readers who romanticize the destination and can be drawn into thinking they can see something dreamlike here — or is it about some kind of genuine culture of incorporating amazing new things into the traditional world?

The President of Mexico and the President of Colombia react quite differently to Trump's posturing.

The NYT reports on Colombia President Gustavo Petro:

After Mr. Trump said that U.S. military forces in the Caribbean could be used against Colombia and other countries, and accused Mr. Petro of being involved in cocaine production, Mr. Petro said: “If you detain a president whom much of my people want and respect, you will unleash the people’s jaguar.”... 

He added that Colombia has deployed more than 30,000 troops along its border with Venezuela to prepare for potential destabilization, a surge of migrants or confrontations with drug cartels that he said would “very likely feel increased pressure and attempt to harm the Colombian people.”

The NYT reports the Mexican president Claudia Sheinbaum:

President Claudia Sheinbaum brushed aside President Trump’s warning that Mexico must get its “act together” on drug trafficking or face possible U.S. action. 

“This is just President Trump’s manner of speaking,” Sheinbaum said at a news conference on Monday. She acknowledged that the White House had pushed for military action on Mexican soil, but said that the problem of organized crime could not be solved with foreign intervention.

Whose rhetoric is likely to be more effective with Trump? I see that Petro hotly deployed vivid language — "the people's jaguar" — and Sheinbaum coolly observed that Trump deploys vivid language. To Sheinbaum, Trump is a blustery beast, but she can handle him. To Petro, the people are a fierce powerful beast and they will rise up and defend him against Trump. 

"One day last year, when she was hungry, a woman came up to her and offered what sounded like a dream proposition..."

"... would she like to work in a studio, performing on camera and earning good money, in safety, without anyone touching her? She went to the studio: a block of flats where an administrator registered her. She soon realised everything she had been told was a lie.... For the clients who watched her she was a fantasy: a young Colombian woman in her bedroom they paid handsomely to act out their desires. In reality she was a prisoner. For three months Victoria was held captive with five other women on the eighth floor of a block of flats, forced into violent sexual exploitation, on camera, for at least ten hours a day. Her earnings were stolen by the men who controlled her.... Every time she asked for the money she’d been promised, they told her she had debts that she had to work off first: food she’d eaten, paper towels they’d given her. If she cried and refused to perform, they fined her.... "

From "Inside the world sex-cam capital" (London Times)(describing conditions in Cúcuta, Colombia).

"The U.S. has entered a new era in which narcotraffickers are classified as terrorists — and Trump is claiming the right to kill them before they or their drugs reach this country."

From "'We've never seen this before': Trump's drug war looks like a real war" (Axios).

The attack marked the first time a suspected "go-fast" drug-running boat was destroyed by a military missile, according to officials and drug-war experts. "There's more where that came from," Trump said in announcing the strike. All other details of the shocking, caught-on-video missile attack are classified, officials said....

What happened Tuesday was "a murder anywhere in the world," Colombia's president, Gustavo Petro, wrote on X. "We have been capturing civilians who transport drugs for decades without killing them. Those who transport drugs are not the big narcos, but the very poor, young people from the Caribbean and the Pacific."...

ADDED: "Trump Claims the Power to Summarily Kill Suspected Drug Smugglers/The move to treat criminals as if they were wartime combatants escalated an administration pattern of using military force for law enforcement tasks at home and abroad" (NYT). 

"Four children, including a 12-month old baby, have been found alive after they survived a plane crash and then managed to fend for themselves in a remote jungle..."

"... in Colombia for nearly six weeks. The siblings, who showed signs of severe insect bites and dehydration, are believed to have sustained and protected themselves by gathering fruit and building small shelters. A search force of almost 150 people, including special forces commandos and indigenous volunteers, had spent a month searching the impenetrable rain-soaked terrain. They were close to giving up when the remarkable discovery was made. 'Miracle! Miracle! Miracle!' rescuers said they shouted when they found the children."

 
The London Times reports.

The authorities have decided that Martha Sepúlveda — that Colombian woman who was planning to get euthanized today — must live.

WaPo reports: 

[A] medical committee determined that she no longer met the conditions because her health had apparently improved.... She had no idea health officials were even meeting to review her case. She had been quietly living out her final hours, and had tuned out media coverage of her case. 

“She canceled her phone plan because she thought she was going to die tomorrow,” her lawyer, Camila Jaramillo, said on Saturday night. Jaramillo’s law firm, the Laboratory of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (DescLAB), has vowed to fight the decision, which it described as “illegitimate and arbitrary,” and one that violated her right to a “dignified death.”...

Here's my post from 2 days ago, based on WaPo's story about the planned event. The authorities say their new decision is based on the "high probability" that her disease — ALS — wouldn't kill her within 6 months, but it's very hard not to suspect that the news reports — especially the big WaPo article — caused the authorities to retreat from strong support for euthanasia. It's not just that the public was put in a position to express disapproval. It's also that she participated in publicity, providing evidence that the committee relied on:

Sepúlveda appeared on television smiling and laughing as she dined at a local restaurant this month.... 

ADDED: The authorities seem to have unwittingly inflicted something like the torture of a mock execution. Not exactly like, of course, unless there have been some victims of mock execution who, preparing to die, genuinely wanted to die.

"On Sunday, Sepúlveda, who considers herself a devout Catholic, plans to become the first person in Colombia without a terminal prognosis to die by legally authorized euthanasia."

"Colombia’s constitutional court ruled in July that the right to euthanasia.... applies... to those with 'intense physical or mental suffering from bodily injury or serious and incurable disease.'... An estimated 73 percent of the population is Catholic.... Eduardo Díaz Amado, director of the Bioethics Institute at Pontifical Xavierian University in Bogotá, traces the development to the country’s long civil war and the violence wrought by drug lord Pablo Escobar. In 1991, in response to the country’s instability, Colombia rewrote its constitution. Unlike its 'paternalistic' predecessor, Díaz said, the new constitution expanded individual rights, emphasized 'the respect of human dignity' and underscored the separation of church and state.... In 2014, the court ordered the government to issue guidelines so that hospitals, insurers and health professionals would know how to proceed with euthanasia requests. The movement for euthanasia rights has drawn unexpected allies: Catholic priests. Alberto Múnera, a theology professor and Jesuit priest at the Pontifical Xavierian University in Bogotá, lectures his students on the 'exceptions' to the 'absolute value of human life' in church teaching. When Catholics follow their own consciences, even when that means choosing to end their own lives, he argues, they will 'behave well' in the eyes of God...."

From "She’s 51, a mother and a devout Catholic. She plans to die by euthanasia on Sunday" (WaPo).

"Bloated with eggs and ready to reproduce, the brown, cockroach-sized queens are prized for their rotund, pea-shaped bottoms, which can taste like peanuts, popcorn..."

"... or even crispy bacon when roasted and salted. 'For me, the flavour is unique,' said Higuera, while plucking the papery wings off ants that filled a small pot on her kitchen table. 'It reminds me of my past. I remember one time when my grandfather bought a barrel full of them and you could hear them all crawling inside. The whole family sat around it preparing them one by one.'... Wearing ankle-high rubber boots and long sleeves for protection, collectors must work quickly because the soldier ants of the colony, who are tasked with protecting the queens from predators, can inflict painful bites that draw blood. Villagers scattered in the fields deposit the mouth-watering queens into anything at hand – bags, jugs, pots, sacks – working frantically through the daylight hours.... 'That’s the reason why us baricharas (locals) usually live long, healthy lives,' said Cecilia González-Quintero, a shopkeeper who has been preserving and selling the ants in glass jars for 20 years. 'The ants give us a special strength – [especially] the ones with the juicy culonas (big butts).'"

From "Could eating ants help us live longer?/Crunchy and curvy, these ample-bottomed queen ants are as prized in Colombia as caviar. But to find them, you’ll have to make it past thousands of soldier ants" (BBC).

"In the 1980s, Escobar decided to make his own personal zoo on his palatial estate in Antioquia, Colombia, illegally importing... four hippos."

"When Escobar died in 1993, the government removed the animals to zoos and wildlife sanctuaries. Wrangling the grumpy hippos, however, proved too big a task. So there they remained without any natural predators, ready to breed like crazy. Today, Escobar’s herd has grown to upward of 100 strong. To residents, they are a threatening menace, but among scientists their presence is the source of spirited debate. Are Escobar’s hippos 'invasive'? Or are they 'introduced'? Are they threatening the local ecological community? Or are they helping to 'rewild' the area? The answer is far from clear, but the debate could change the way we think about preserving habitats.... [Hippos graze on land and] defecate in the water... and many scientists worry they could dramatically affect the ecosystem.... [But] South America was once home to many large herbivores, including a semiaquatic rhino-like creature known as a notoungulate. It was also home to the giant llama, which was similarly responsible for grazing and nutrient recycling in the ecosystem. But those megafauna disappeared thousands of years ago, largely thanks to humans.... 'We should be interrogating our conception of nature,' said Erick Lundgren, lead author of [a] study. For Lundgren, the point is not to say that hippos 'belong' in South America but to recognize that 'belonging' is a values-based concept created by humans.... Human intervention may make conservationists uncomfortable, but given the scale of our biodiversity crisis, it seems foolish to dismiss a tool that could help."

From "The great conundrum of Pablo Escobar’s hippos" (WaPo). A lot going on in that article, not much reflection. It seems foolish to dismiss a tool that could help... that's an inane way to sum up a problem! Yes, it's "foolish" not to give something any thought at all, but that's saying just about nothing. The comments over there are all over the place — some in the childish "I love hippos" category, some saying what about the poor people who live there, and others dragging Trump into it (as if life is a matter of: First person to make a Trump wisecrack wins).

"The president of Colombia was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for pursuing a deal to end 52 years of conflict with a leftist rebel group..."

"... the longest-running war in the Americas, just five days after Colombians rejected the agreement in a shocking referendum result...."

Colombian voters threw out the peace deal just days after the government had invited world leaders to a celebratory signing ceremony, leaving its fate — along with Mr. Santos’s legacy — in limbo.

Despite the setback, the Norwegian Nobel Committee recognized Mr. Santos “for his resolute efforts to bring the country’s more than 50-year-long civil war to an end.”

He convinced the Norwegians. He just didn't convince his own people.

Drug lord Pablo Escobar created a terrible invasive species problem in Colombia: Hippos.

"He smuggled in elephants, giraffes and other exotic animals, among them four hippos - three females and one male."

When Hacienda Napoles was confiscated in the early 1990s, Escobar's menagerie was dispersed to zoos around the country. But not the hippos. For about two decades, they have wallowed in their soupy lake...

Here, conditions for hippos are idyllic. The river is slow moving and has plenty of shallows, perfect for larger animals which don't actually swim but push themselves off banks, gliding through the water. Moreover, the region never experiences drought, which tends to act as a natural brake on the size of herds in Africa....

Colombian people, [one veterinarian] believes, are more vulnerable than Africans because they see hippos as cuddly, "floppy" animals...

"My father brought a little one home once," an unnamed girl told the paper. "I called him Luna (Moon) because he was very sweet - we fed him with just milk."...

Of course, hippos are deadly. They kill more human beings than any other wild mammal.

But there are 5 animals that kill more people. Try to name them in order, then look here. I thought the "wild" in the phrase "wild mammal" was a clue that dogs killed more people, but domestic dogs are 10th on the linked list.

ADDED: "11 Reasons Hippos Are The Most Awesome Animals Of All Time."

"Beginning in the first millennium AD, groups of Amerindians developed a political system, the cacicazgo, a pyramidal power structure headed by a cacique."

"Within Colombia, the two cultures with the most complex cacicazgo systems were the Tayronas in the Caribbean region, and the Muiscas in the highlands near Bogotá, both of which belonged to the Chibchan language family. The Muisca people had one of the most developed political systems in South America, surpassed only by the Incas."

In Colombia, today's "History of" country.

Acid attacks in Colombia.

"I would like to go to sleep today and not wake up tomorrow.... The truth is life is too hard and I am alone."

"I tell him, 'Baby, my cash money'... They never told me they were with Obama... They were very discreet."

The "high-priced escort" and the Secret Service agents.

There was a language gap between the woman, who said she was 24 and declined to give her full name, and the American who sat beside her at the bar and eventually invited her to his room. She agreed, stopped on the way to buy condoms but told him he would have to give her a gift. He asked how much. Not knowing he worked for Mr. Obama but figuring he was well heeled, she said, she told him $800.

The price alone, she said, indicates she is an escort, not a prostitute. “You have higher rank,” she said. “An escort is someone who a man can take out to dinner. She can dress nicely, wear nice makeup, speak and act like a lady. That’s me.”

In the end, though, he offered her $30, a really insulting amount. Hence the scene.

UPDATE: Blogger unpublished this post and said "Your content has violated our Illegal activities policy." This post is a link to a New York Times article that quotes and comments on the article. Once again, Blogger has interpreted a report about prostitution as participation in prostitution. 

UPDATE 2: Blogger quickly reinstated this post. I appreciate that. But I do hope it improves its crime detection. 

"Maybe my incoherence is for a lack of speaking. I was unable to talk with the guerillas who guarded me."

Said Oscar Tulio Lizcano, upon escape after 8 years of captivity in the jungle.

He did at least have something to read: Homer's "Odyssey." 8 years with no one to talk to. The difference between having "The Odyssey" and not having "The Odyssey" is profound.