Tales of Pablo Escobar were before a tad bit before my time but I managed to gather as much intel from movies and reading Wikipedia articles. Reading and watching the tales alone are somewhat overwhelming, so I can't even fathom how living in the areas of Columbia he terrorised was, but for some people like this Veterinarian called Gina Serna, it was definitely hell.
Over 20 years since the death of one of the most dangerous men the World has ever seen, his atrocities are still affecting the lives of Columbia. According to this NYPost article, Serna is one of the foremost vets in Columbia and she's the one facing the daunting task of curbing the hazards caused by the Hippos illegally smuggled into the country by Escobar.
For anyone who's seen these beasts on NatGeo wild, you should know that Hippos are not to be fucked with. Those beasts may look docile most times but they have horrible temper tantrums and sometimes accidentally kill their own kids in a fit of rage. Their natural habitat is in Africa, so what we have in Columbia is a bunch of disgruntled beasts with temper tantrums living in unnatural circumstance.
Now according to the post, the hippos that came in with a bunch of other exotic animals weren't even that many. Probably like 6 or some shit but ever since Pablo got killed in 93, and the properties seized, a couple of the over 1ton beasts somehow 'slipped" through the grasps of authority and are now in the wild.
Having one hippo roaming freely with the human population is a bad after years of breeding, the beasts got their thing going and are almost 100. Unlike other herbivores, Hippos can't be reasoned with, so there's no shouting these guys away, nope. One farmer learnt the hard way and came out with only a broken arm. Judging by the kind of damage I've seen hippos do to crocodiles(You read that right) in NatGeo wild, I'd say that's one lucky guy.
Now here's where things start getting a bit dicey, if you may. Hunting/killing the beasts is illegal in Columbia because of one incident where a hippo was gunned down by a military man in Medellin. Prohibiting the hunting of the beasts poses a different kind of problem and just like most things, bothers on money that Colombia doesn't have.
Remember Serna? Well, she's become some sort of hippo specialist over the years and asserts that the situation is more fucked up than most people realise. She mentioned how it costs roughly $3000 to sterilise one hippo, as they try to reduce the population by cutting off the supply of offspring, aka dicks.
This situation is pretty fucked up for Serna when you consider the fact that her dad's death was because of Pablo. So, she basically has to clean up the mess caused by the asshole that killed her dad, talk about a rough life.
