Medellin Sheds Cocaine Image to Become South American Hot Spot

It’s not often that a city known for its 7 a.m. breakfast meetings and workaholic residents also gains renown as a premier party town. Yet in Medellin, Colombia, the paradox begins to make sense very late on a raucous Friday night, when I find myself in a packed nightclub discussing the finer points of entrepreneurialism and urban planning between shots of 60-proof aguardiente. And that’s before I’m hugged by a mustachioed dwarf in a mariachi outfit.

Until recently, Medellin hasn’t had a whole lot to offer in the way of nocturnal amusements or legitimate business deals, Bloomberg Pursuits magazine will report in its Holiday 2013 issue. Police curfews often kept people inside their high-security homes, and the most significant commercial transactions tended to involve large amounts of cocaine. The city was the longtime stronghold of Pablo Escobar and his Medellin cartel, which once controlled the majority of the cocaine shipped illegally into the U.S.