Word: santas
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...food, the little Cessna circled lazily over the green hillsides. Below, everything looked peaceful. The one thatched hut nestled in a clearing appeared deserted. This was remote Guajira province in northern Colombia, which stretches from the Caribbean up into the rugged hills and ravines of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. Suddenly three shots rang out, reported TIME Correspondent Donald Neff. His Cessna twisted into a steep climb and fled to safety...
...farmers of Guajira do not like visits from inquisitive reporters or other strangers. They have good reason. For the grassy harvest ripening in the sun is marijuana, a luxurious marijuana of heady strength known as Santa Marta Gold. Most of it is destined for the U.S., where the 42 million Americans who have tried pot have made smoking it the most widely accepted illegal indulgence since drinking during Prohibition. They now consume about 130,000 lbs. per day, quadruple the 1974 consumption, and they spend $25 billion per year on their pleasure. Mexico provided most of the best marijuana until...
...comes in many varieties. The "catadores, "or crop tasters, report that although Santa Marta Gold is still the most famous of the Colombian line, the Arhuaco Indians in the higher altitudes are growing an even more potent variety of pot: Mona (blond) plants so pale that they look bleached. The Cielo Azul heights produce a pale plant known as Blue Sky Blond, developed as a hybrid two years ago with seeds from Thailand. Even the arid and low-lying fields of the Guajira peninsula, which are irrigated and farmed with tractors, grow a good green grass. The broiling sun forces...
...fortune brought in by drugs has created an underground economy that fuels Colombia's 20% inflation. Prices of land and homes in coastal areas like Santa Marta have rocketed. Rolls-Royces and $30,000 beds with built-in stereos are among the signs of the drug traders' conspicuous consumption. Also being purchased by traffickers: Colombia's judges, customs agents and police. The jail in the capital of the Guajira is so corrupted that the army has quit sending captured smugglers there. They routinely escape...
...Santa Rosa Medical Center in San Antonio, periodically plugged into life-support systems, lies Sante Alessandro Bario, 42, once a crack undercover agent for the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). He has lain there more than a month, his eyes always open, his brain waves showing no sign of activity, except for occasional convulsions. He is a victim-for reasons that remain mysterious-of the international drug trade...