"Pablo lives," says a graffiti painted in black and blue on the front of Dallas, a building that was the most modern in Medellin (Colombia) until in 1993 two car bombs with 50 kilos of dynamite each left him semi-destroyed. At present there is only the structure and the weeds around it. In its interior there are ruins with important holes, rickety bricks and exposed iron. The "palace", located on the avenue of El Poblado, never arrived to inaugurate.
This is what Nicolás Solórzano tells us, a cultural guide that a few years ago organized, from his company Paisa Road, the Pablo Escobar Tour, a tour of the history of drug trafficking in Medellín. In combi, we cross places that are testimony to the power exerted by the colombian drug kingpin, who in the mid-80s, got to market 85% of the drug that was exported to the United States. As you know, there are men who build their legend in their own way, and there are always tourists in search of it.
This is me Cynthia with the tourist guide Nicolás.
The three-hour circuit starts in the aristocratic El Poblado neighborhood. The first stop is in the Monaco building, where Escobar lived until January 13, 1988, when a car bomb unleashed the war between the cartels of Medellin and Cali, two organizations that were fighting for the monopoly of the drug market. The house was a kind of bunker, with 14 telephone lines and a clear sample of the architectural style called "narc-decó", characterized by geometric constructions with several floors and the white front, in honour of cocaine.
The "Ovni" (of the same aesthetic) was the headquarters of the Medellín Cartel and is located in the Zona Rosa of the city, a neighborhood known for its nightlife that attracts travelers with its restaurants and discos, and where they often circulate beautiful prostitutes along with gentlemen who show off glittering jewels from their imported vans, known as the "narcotoyota".
The time of faith arrives with a visit to the sanctuary of the Virgin of the Mystical Rose or Virgin of the Sicarios, a grotto with flowers, candles and plaques of gratitude, where the gangsters or "assassins for hire"go (hired by the Patron) to seek protection and bless their weapons.
Sanctuary Virgin of the Sicarios Photo: Nicolás Solórzano
Gratitude: A thousand thanks for the favors received especially by those "we already know".
The end of the reign. While Nicolas - in charge of the tour - rushes the march, he arrives at the house where, finally, the Chief fell dead: a simple dwelling of two plants, in the zone of Los Olivos.
It was only a 20 minutes telephone conversation with his son Juan Pablo that the local Police Elite Corps managed to trace the call and finally locate the place where he was fugitive.
Police Museum in Bogotá: the phone device which gave Escobar's location away to police is exhibited.
When he was surrounded in December 2nd, 1993 , Escobar tried to escape through the rooftops, but received two bullets in the head. His family, however, says he preferred suicide when he knew he had no escape.
Scene of the death of Escobar in the novel "El Patrón del mal" (The Pattern of Evil)
Police Elite Corp smiles proudly of the result, after 17 months of intense search.
Photo: infobae.com
The tour concludes with a visit to the Jardines de Montesacro cemetery, where the drug trafficker's tomb (adorned with small pines and lilies) is the second most visited in South America, after that of Eva Perón, alias “Evita”, who served as Argentina’s First lady from 1946 to 1952, and became a powerful political icon with her campaigns to help the poor and give women the right to vote. 
"We do not make apology for the figure of Pablo Escobar," clarifies the guide. "We want to remember the history so we do not repeat it." In the land of coffee, vallenato, beautiful women and aguardiente, the King of cocaine, the dead most alive and powerful of Colombia, the man who, according to Forbes magazine, in 1989 became the seventh richest man in the world, used to repeat: "I poor, I do not die. For me, first God and then the money. "
Photo: Merca 2.0
Note: all the photos are of my authorship except those that have their corresponding credit.