| THE DRUG CENTER, the only pharmacy in the stiflingly hot jungle town of Camelias, deep in southern Colombia, looks ordinary, with wide glass counters and
shelves stacked high with medicines. Then the customer pays the bill.
The customer produces one of the clear plastic bags in which people here carry around coca paste. The pharmacist, Socrates Solis, scoops out a bit of the
paste, weighs it on a digital scale and gives back change - the excess he had ladled out.
Welcome to the Caguan River valley, a swath of jungle towns and coca fields in far-flung Caqueta province, a part of Colombia with no government
presence, only guerrillas. The economy is built on coca production, and coca paste has become a main currency. |