Cigar Trends

[Ringo]

I grew up in Miami. I was there during the Mariel boatlift. Everything you saw in "Scarface" was, although technically fictional, real. Castro dumped all of his criminals and other "undesirables" on Miami and made it hell. Your house was broken into 2-3 times a year. Your car, more. It seemed normal to me. There were practically drugs and money floating in the air. Several people I know, including myself, found troves of either drugs or money. It was insane. A friend was parked in a remote spot and saw a plane circling overhead so he flashed his flashlight at it just for the hell of it and the plane started dropping dozens of kilos of cocaine all around him. Another friend found a shoebox with $21,000 in it. Another friend found eight ounces of cocaine that was pure as driven snow. I found money, I found drugs - I literally thought that's how it was everywhere. And murders - there were at least 25 a year just within 2 square miles of me. I went to school with Escobars driving new Trans-Ams and sporting enough gold to buy another one. Ochoas too, and the rest of them. It was chaos for several years. Home invasions were commonplace. Fortunately we never had one of those. NOTE - there is NOTHING good or acceptable about drugs. I certainly do not use them. They are evil. They killed my brother. I am just relaying information. Cigars are the only "drug" I need.

[grtrx]

I thought cocaine came via the Columbian cartels mostly but my memory is not what it used to be. But crime is bad. Doesn't matter who is doing it.

[Ringo]

Originally Posted by grtrx

I thought cocaine came via the Columbian cartels mostly but my memory is not what it used to be. But crime is bad. Doesn't matter who is doing it.

It did come in via the Colombian cartels at the time (now it's Mexico.) Escobar, Ochoa, Carlos Lehder, Griselda Blanco and more. All Colombian. But most of them lived in Miami when they were in the U.S.A. The market was flooded there. I had cartel members asking ME if I could hook them up with people to sell large quantities of cocaine to and I was only sixteen! And it got so crazy that one of them built this incredible bulletproof truck with a turret and then they had an Uzi shootout in a busy mall; and this one was different because they shot civilans too, on purpose. Craziness man! As for Scarface, some of the Cubans became involved, but for that matter people of every race got involved.