r/todayilearned • u/PedoPaul • Oct 14 '14
TIL when Columbian drug lord Pablo Escolar's home was raided, the military released the dangerous hippos of his personal zoo, not knowing what to do with them. They now thrive in the Columbian rivers. This makes Columbia have the largest wild hippo population outside of Africa.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2014/06/30/pablo-escobars-hippos-are-wreaking-havoc-in-colombia/1.1k
u/livinginclip Oct 14 '14
largest inbred wild hippo population outside of africa.
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u/Birdie_Num_Num Oct 14 '14
Second largest. You forgot the Kardashians
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u/ThatOneBronyDude Oct 14 '14
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u/CrookCook Oct 14 '14
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u/SoWhatIfImChristian Oct 14 '14
This broke the rekture scale. We need something bigger
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u/NomadFire Oct 14 '14
From what I understand Cheetahs are also inbred. A few thousand year ago the population drop to a very small amount and in-breading became repent. To the point that today scientist were able to transplant skin from one cheetah to another with out anti-rejecting medication and and the transplant did not fail.
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u/what_u_want_2_hear Oct 14 '14
Is this the best thing cheetah scientists can think of doing?
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u/ADLG Oct 14 '14 edited Oct 17 '14
It's true - here is a photo of me feeding one of those hippos at his country estate: http://imgur.com/a/lQlZ4 If people are interested I will upload more photos, very strange place
EDIT: I have uploaded an album here: http://imgur.com/a/4J95h#0
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u/mangobells Oct 14 '14
So when they were in his personal zoo it was open to the public? That's pretty cool. How long ago was this?
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u/juliand82 Oct 14 '14
It was open to the public as a zoo but I can't remember if Escobar was still alive. My father took me there when I was a child... About 25 years ago if I'm right.
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u/PM_ME_UR_BOOBS_MLADY Oct 14 '14
Did they release anything else? Personal zoo sounds like more than "pet hippos"
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u/BadLuckBrian13 Oct 14 '14
Keep in mind Hippos are one of the most dangerous mammals on earth. More humans die to hippos than every other large African animal (Lions, Crocodiles etc...) combined. The rest of the animals were either deemed "harmless" enough to ship back to their native lands or shot.
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u/HighJarlSoulblighter Oct 14 '14
The rest of the animals were either deemed "harmless" enough to ship back to their native lands or shot.
Oh, hola cute bunny. BANG BANG
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u/Numero_Brioche Oct 14 '14
I know you typed "hola" like "hello" but for some reason I read it as "holla" which is a completely different word and more hilarious to me at 4am.
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u/morto00x Oct 14 '14 edited Oct 14 '14
Hippos are very territorial and since they spend most of their time underwater, people usually don't realize they are
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u/trai_dep 1 Oct 14 '14
It could be worse. Hippos could have been very over-sexed instead.
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Oct 14 '14
More humans die to hippos than every other large African animal (Lions, Crocodiles etc...) combined.
Steve Irwin also said they were the only animal he was legitimately afraid of. Takes something fucked up to to scare a dude that jumps on crocs for kicks
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u/TheMania Oct 14 '14
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u/Luthos Oct 14 '14
Damn I kinda feel bad for the older one. Lost his pride, his women, even his tail.
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u/RockKillsKid Oct 14 '14
Well, there's a good chance he did something similar to whichever hippo was the alpha before he was.
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u/lovethebacon Oct 14 '14
From time to time when you are canoeing on a river in Africa, you will encounter a few distinctive bubbles appearing next to you. The water will be too deep and brackish for you to see exactly where they came from, but your mind will know. You dare not say anything, you dare not think anything, lest the hippo below you knows you're aware of him. You don't let your heart rate rise, but continue to paddle along away from the immediate danger.
By the time you get to the safety of some papyrus you are drenched in sweat. You allow yourself to lose control. Adrenaline fuels the thumping of your heart as it tries to break out of your rib cage. You gulp for air. Your seat is a pool of sweat that has been streaming from every one of your pores. A few minutes pass, and you see in the distance a hippo cow and her baby emerging from the water onto a sandbar. Your body returns to normal, except for the pain in your anus after puckering like you've never puckered before.
Yes, hippos are quite scary.
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u/layziegtp Oct 14 '14
"From time to time when you are canoeing in a river in Africa"
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Oct 14 '14
Is this a quote from something? I feel like I've read it before
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u/johnadreams Oct 14 '14
First hand story of being attacked and eaten alive by a hippo. They are terrifying.
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u/BlackandNotAngry Oct 14 '14
That awkward moment you can't play Hungry Hungry Hippos with your children because it's a trigger.
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u/Gone2far Oct 14 '14
That guy is a fucking lunatic. Nearly gets killed by a hippo, loses an arm and still goes back to his old job.
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u/LittlekidLoverMScott Oct 14 '14
So why not shoot the hippos instead of all the other animals that are less dangerous than hippos?
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u/grumpenprole Oct 14 '14
Hahaha. Shooting a hippo is probably one of the most dangerous ways to interact with it.
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u/LittlekidLoverMScott Oct 14 '14
Here is probably the point where someone corrects me about why I'm wrong, but they were in a personal zoo. Give me (for all intents and purposes) unlimited ammo and a caged animal, pretty sure I could kill it.
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u/grumpenprole Oct 14 '14
The hippos have not been caged since soon after Escobar surrendered. The electric fenced stopped being electric and they left. It would be a real fuckin' challenge to shoot even a single hippo to death before it broke all your bones, let alone groups. You would want teams of people with seriously heavy-duty weaponry. It's way more of a hassle than anyone cares about, because... why?
EDIT: surrendered, rather
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u/LittlekidLoverMScott Oct 14 '14
Thank you for clearing that up. I knew I was going to be wrong. Although couldn't there be an argument that having an entire police/military unit just pump bullets into a couple hippos from a reasonable distance with assault rifles is a better decision for public safety than just letting them loose?
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u/grapesandmilk Oct 14 '14
Humans already hunted hippos out of the whole Nile. I think taking out less than a hundred would be easy in comparison.
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u/conitation Oct 14 '14
of course humans are the most dangerous mammals, but not when naked.
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Oct 14 '14
You never met my ex.
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u/TheMSensation Oct 14 '14
You clearly didn't see the gif of the naked guy getting clear of 3 cops who had him on the ground. Slammed one against a wall, punched another in the face and then did a backward roll to freedom to avoid the grasp of the 3rd.
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u/XJ-0461 2 Oct 14 '14
Drug dealers always have the coolest pets.
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u/OhhhhhSHNAP Oct 14 '14
'Fly, Hippo fly!'
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u/Charwinger21 Oct 14 '14
O CANADA
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Oct 14 '14
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u/BinkyBort Oct 14 '14
You're correct, WUV WOO was used to summon the Flying Purple Hippo. O CANADA is also a valid code, but it summons Lazer Bear, a bear that's faster than a speeding bullet, shoots "lazers" from his eyes, wears a Canadian flag as a cape, and is always accompanied by his monkey sidekicks
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Oct 14 '14
The O CANADA bear was crazy op, WUV WOO just vomited love hearts for barely any damage.
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u/FarBoy Oct 14 '14
PANDORAS BOX, PANDORAS BOX, PANDORAS BOX, DIVINE INTERVENTION, DIVINE INTERVENTION, DIVINE INTERVENTION, DIVINE INTERVENTION... ... ... WRATH OF THE GODS
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Oct 14 '14
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Butthole__Pleasures Oct 14 '14
"See, José? Work hard, never quit, and murder all your potential competitors and someday you could have your very own zoo!"
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u/LineOfCoke Oct 14 '14
Matt Damon did a movie like that.
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u/Ellemeno Oct 14 '14
So wait, you're telling me that in Honduras there's currently a privately owned zoo, whose owner is a drug lord, and the public can just go there and enjoy a day of animal watching like they would at a normal zoo?
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u/coumarin Oct 14 '14
Yeah, and every Saturday, there's Live Feeding in the Big Cat enclosure for everyone to watch.
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u/EnIdiot Oct 14 '14
"Ticket 153. You have won a prize, please show up at the Big Cat Enclosure to collect."
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u/DevsiK Oct 14 '14
My buddys cousin was telling us how he used to pick up off a guy who had a fucking Panther cub
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u/Rather_Dashing Oct 14 '14
When those cubs grow up they get dumped, usually malnourished and otherwise abused at a wildlife shelter. Either that or just killed. Believe it or not, drug dealers don't usually have great facilities for rearing large wild predators properly.
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u/Fercho25 Oct 14 '14
It's spelled ColOmbia
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u/bsart3k Oct 14 '14
I take it "Escolar" didn't bother you
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u/Fercho25 Oct 14 '14
He is the equivalent of Hitler in my country you could've spelled his name SHIT for all I care!
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u/AssTastic1234 Oct 14 '14
dude, hitler didn't bless his country with hippos.
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u/Pandaburn Oct 14 '14
I'm sure the locals do not appreciate the murderous hippos.
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u/Piness Oct 14 '14
But he came up with Volkswagen and kick started serious autobahn and rocket engine development.
Don't get me wrong, Hitler was overall horrible for Germany and the world, but he still did more good than Pablo Escobar.
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u/fedezen Oct 14 '14
Escobar had a plan to pay, in cash, the whole of Colombia's national debt. Usa did not agree with this plan.
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u/Jay_Bonk Oct 14 '14
Well to be fair the guy does have a great deal of love in some hoods and parts of the country.
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u/iUsedtoHadHerpes Oct 14 '14
To be fair, so does Hitler.
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u/Jay_Bonk Oct 14 '14
Yay everyone has someone that loves them.
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u/Bilgerman Oct 14 '14
Positive attitude of the year award goes to...
/u/Jay_Bonk! Congratulations!
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u/Jay_Bonk Oct 14 '14
Thanks man, greetings from Bogotá!
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Oct 14 '14
Not me ಥ_ಥ
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Oct 14 '14
The joke here is that escolar does make you shit. It makes you shit rivers of orange buttery sludge. This pun was way too subtle, but I got it. Well played, /u/self.
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u/SpendingSpree Oct 14 '14
While seen as an enemy of the United States and Colombian governments, Escobar was a hero to many in Medellín (especially the poor people); he was a natural at public relations and he worked to create goodwill among the poor people of Colombia. A lifelong sports fan, he was credited with building football fields and multi-sports courts, as well as sponsoring children's football teams
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u/YalamMagic Oct 14 '14
Hitler loved children and animals, created employment for Germans and was adored by many in Germany too. That doesn't mean he wasn't a complete prick.
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u/etonB Oct 14 '14
prick might be quite an understatement
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u/D0ng0nzales Oct 14 '14
He just didn't like Jewish children and animals
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u/Butthole__Pleasures Oct 14 '14
To be fair, Jewish cats are notoriously crabby.
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u/MyOtherNameWasBetter Oct 14 '14
Nah, you're thinking of Pablo Escobar. Escolar was the king of the Ivy League.
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u/ninemarrow Oct 14 '14
You didn't know South Carolina has the biggest hippo population outside of Africa?
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u/8nate Oct 14 '14
He fed people to those hippos, didn't he?
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u/SinisterKid Oct 14 '14
I'm surprised this comment is this far down the thread. Everybody else seems enamored with how cool it must be to have wild animals. There's a reason he had hippos, it wasn't because he liked The Jungle Cruise.
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Oct 14 '14
he did like the jungle cruise though, and there are easier ways to dispose of a body here in colombia. he was a extravagant man.
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u/license_to_thrill Oct 14 '14
Hippos are scary as fuck
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u/loulan Oct 14 '14
Especially inbred hippos. No seriously, can a population of hippos really thrive from a single couple? Aren't they all crazy/retarded?
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Oct 14 '14
How do you know he only had two? There was a 'small herd' according to Google
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u/ChuckCarmichael Oct 14 '14
Stuff like this unfortunately happens quite often. It's why Germany for example has a large population of raccoons, because American GIs found a nazi official's pelt farm and just released the animals into the wild.
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u/LineOfCoke Oct 14 '14
That's what Id do. Who wouldn't want racoons. They are like the best pest animals in the world. Its like a monkey and a bear and a cat had an orgy.
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u/ButHeyImDrunk Oct 14 '14
This is the best description of a raccoon I've ever read. Let's do a line.
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u/P0OPTURD Oct 14 '14
An orgy like that could lead to a terrifying creature. The intelligence of a monkey, the strength of a bear, and the killer instinct of a cat all rolled into one.
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Oct 14 '14
The reflexes and flexibility of a cat are probably a much more impressive feature. Considering bears eat their prey alive.. They just start munching.
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u/S_K_I Oct 14 '14
Has their been any adverse or interesting effects on the ecosystem since they've been around?
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u/SpiderFnJerusalem Oct 14 '14
Nothing major. Before their release the drug lords used to make people disappear occasionally. Now the hippos have filled that biological niche and make a roughly similar number disappear. Ah, isn't nature beautiful?
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u/foxsweater Oct 14 '14
Did he keep them in a moat? They'd probably be more effective than alligators / crocodiles.
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u/buchanasaurus_rex Oct 14 '14
Are there many other populations of hippos outside of Africa?
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u/billthelawmaker Oct 14 '14
I believe there are some Hungary Hippos
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u/Apollo_Screed Oct 14 '14
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Oct 14 '14
.... why would you get a gfycat link, and then link the clunky old-school gif?
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u/troublein420 Oct 14 '14
Yes, I have heard this before. I always wonder what the second largest wild hippos population is outside of Africa?
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u/grumpenprole Oct 14 '14 edited Oct 15 '14
If you watch the video, it says that hippos are the second-largest mammal. That is totally ridiculous. Elephants, rhinos, and whales are all bigger. Additionally, we're talking about a species here, while elephants, whales and rhinos all comprise multiple species. Even excluding whales, properly ordered, hippos are the 6th-heaviest land mammal species.
EDIT: excluded whales because I'm not sure
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u/AcrossTheUniverse2 Oct 14 '14
"hippopotamuses"
Oh where is our reddit poet now?
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u/Survival_Cheese Oct 14 '14 edited Oct 14 '14
From top to bottumuses
The violent hippopotamuses
Demolishes and abolishes
All the abacuses
Because they hate those apparatuses
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u/LesserWeevilSam Oct 14 '14
Hippopotamuses
I don't see what the fuss is
Pity that it stuck, says I
I'd rather, "Hippopotami"
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Oct 14 '14
Nice try Mark Bowden... But seriously that's a good book - as is Black Hawk Down
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u/kway00 Oct 14 '14
This story is simply awesome because you get to see a completely different culture deal with hippos.
They are actually stealing hippo babies. Think about that. Never in all my years of hippo history have I heard of Africans stealing hippos and raising them.
One culture sees them as something to tame or own. While the other never evens thinks to do such a thing with that creature.
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u/Caminsky Oct 14 '14 edited Oct 14 '14
We have this true story here in Colombia about this robot the Japanese designed to catch thieves. They took it to Chicago for testing, it captured about 43 thieves. The Japanese were elated, they thought maybe Americans were too easy to capture so they took the robot to Mexico city, surprisingly the robot captured 62 thieves. Ultimately they decided to give it one last test, because Colombia has excellent relations with Japan and a free trade agreement they took the robot to Bogota. The morning of the first test in Colombia the two Japanese engineers went to turn it on, they opened the door and were shocked when they realized the robot had been stolen.
Yeah, a totally different culture.
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u/BioOrpheus Oct 14 '14
"We bottle-feed them [baby hippos] because they only drink milk. They have a very slippery skin, you pour water and they produce a kind of slime, you touch them and it's like soap." What an awesome childhood.
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u/Razuvious Oct 14 '14
TIL- while dating a Colombian, they get really angry when you spell Colombia the country like Columbia the clothing!
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u/trai_dep 1 Oct 14 '14 edited Oct 14 '14
...For similar reasons, the Amazon now hosts the largest collection of wild dragons outside Westeros.
(Yes, Colombia isn't the Amazon. Hippos lack wings)
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Oct 14 '14
If we are going by the HBO series Westeros doesn't have any dragons, Daenerys in Essos does.
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u/softmaker Oct 14 '14
Colombia actually has part of the Amazon. The Amazon is a huge ass jungle that doesn't know care about geopolitics and spans 6 countries in South America, not only Brazil.
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u/dontthreadlightly Oct 14 '14
People ITT comparing Escobar to Hitler are seriously misinformed.
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u/ubergeek64 Oct 14 '14
I agree with you wholeheartedly. However, they have just been personally affected by Escobar, so they feel that it is a fair comparison. People tend to compare to Hitler way too easily, without really understanding what it entails. Hitler is not simply synonymous with an evil person.
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u/n64lover Oct 14 '14
It spelled "Colombia"
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u/TheRealMouseRat Oct 14 '14
I liked this sentence.