Interviewer (58:44)
So I found out I'd been to Sinaloa a few times before, had reported on drug trafficking there, obviously was very aware of who El Chapo was. And, and I. And then I found out that he had fled Altiplano. And I had this idea like I know one of my very good friends is a journalist fixer in Mexico who in Sinaloa actually grew up in Sinaloa. He's any journalist that wants to do a story about Sinaloa. He contact this guy, amazing guy, Miguel Angel Vega. And so I called up Miguel and I was like Miguel, what is happening dude? Like they fled. Everybody's saying he's in Sinaloa for sure. He's the most wanted man in the world right now. And, and I think is there. We should do a story about what the hunt for El Chapo looks like. What does the hunt for the most wanted man in the world look like? So I basically flew to Sinaloa, met Miguel in Culiacan and we started the journey, me, Miguel, Alex and Pete, part of our team. All the way to where his mom lives lived because she passed away a couple of years ago, which was a two day journey out into the off roads. We had Miguel's brother's SUV that eventually actually broke down. But we had like at some point it was so off road that we were going through rivers and like water up until middle of the car. We had to stay overnight in one of the towns. When people would ask us what we were doing, we would say that we're going up to. To visit El Chapo's mother. And we get warnings. But most of all it was interesting because everybody there was. There's just such a more than fear. There's an enormous admiration and almost love for El Chapo in that part of the world. World, right. Because this is a man. The government, they see the government as having abandoned them. There's no programs to help the people of these. These. The mountains, the Sierra Madre mountains in Mexico. There's a lot of poverty. And here's a. The drug lord and an organization that's in a low cartel that actually helps the Poor and cares about what happens to them. That's how they see it. So there's a lot of reverence for El Chapo. And that's what we saw everywhere. And I remember when we finally arrived in the town and it was crazy. The mother's house is. You could see. It's one of the first things you see when I arrive in the town because it's this beautiful. It's the biggest house in town and it's right on the top of the hill. And. But we arrived and one of the things that shocked us is that the hunt for the most wanted man in the world didn't seem to be a hunt because we saw no one. We thought, we are not actually going to be able to get there because either we're stopped by the military that are in pursuit of El Chapo, or we'll be stopped by the cartel themselves. Where they'll tell us, where do you think you're going? Go back to where you came from. But none of that happened. So we kept on going further and further and further. We were never stopped. Eventually we get to the town and there's just two sort of like, there's like two or three military guys. We actually have it on film. And they asked, what are you guys doing here? And we said, oh, we've come to talk to la mama, to the mother of El Chapo. And again, even from the military guys there, there was reverence. And they basically, they did the go ahead salute, saluted us and said, oh yeah. Called them el senor. Oh, yes, please go ahead if you want to go el Senor, and let us go. And we went all the way up and we knocked on the mother's house. And then these guys, not very nice looking guys, showed up with armed, obviously, lots of weapons. There's like two or three guys and they had walkie talkies on them. And they asked us, we said, we just want to talk to the mother. We want to interview the mother of El Chapo and see how she's doing. And they said, no, I'm sorry, you can't. And they weren't being very helpful. And we thought, okay, we can't leave. We've spent 48 hours in a car, you know, in dangerous territory to get here. We can't just leave. So we thought, okay, let's just go around town and see if you can talk to other people. So the first, our first stop was at the church because we knew there's a church just like a block from the mother's house. That was Built by El Chapo for the mother, who's very religious. And we stopped at the church, and the wife of the priest was there. And the priest or the pastor wasn't there at the time, but the wife was there. Very sweet lady, offered us sandwiches. We were starving. And then as we were talking to her, this guy comes in a 4x4 and points to Pete, who happens to be the tallest guy holding a camera, but who also happens to be the only one that doesn't speak a word of Spanish. And they said, okay, you come with me. And Pete looks at us like, what? You go, what shall I do? And I start saying, sorry, I know it's strange, but I'm actually the boss, so you want to take me? And I speak Spanish. He doesn't speak Spanish. You don't want to take him, Miguel, by the way, my journalist friend, Mexican friend, was also trying to make the case that they should take him and not Pete. So we were both basically fighting for the chance to go in this 4x4 because we wanted to see. I knew they weren't going to kill us or. I didn't think so. I thought that they wanted to actually introduce us to the mother or somebody in the cartel. So it was a great. For us, a great moment, right? And then Pete just looks at us and they're insisting, no, no, no, we. It has to be him. The. The. The boss said it had to be him. And I looked at Pete and he said, what would you do in my place, Mariana? And I said, look, Pete, I'm dying to go, so if it were me, I would go, but I can't tell you what to do. And he says, okay, I'll go. Jumps into the 4x4, starts going. This is like one of those quad bikes.
