📸

SNOWING IN BALI

blew. He grabbed a chair, lifted it above his head, set to smash it down on Alberto. Two of his men stepped in between them.

It gave Alberto a second to interject. 'Hey, wait a second. It's not my fault, you know, it wasn't me calling the shots.'

Nanang was trembling with rage. 'I don't give a fuck.'

Alberto grabbed his phone, saying, 'Hold on one second, I'm going to put you on the phone to my friend.' Alberto called the seller. 'Man, this is fucked up; the guy just punched me in the face. Now you fucking sort something out.'

The seller located another kilo of coke for Nanang at the same price. All the dealers knew the Indonesians were volatile — charming one minute, ready to kill you the next — and Nanang was the worst.

There were also fractious tensions between the small cartels that flared up when tentative rules of business were violated. The cartels wanted to keep the price as buoyant as possible, but sometimes it collapsed when a Peruvian undercut, sabotaging the market for self-interest. It was easy for them to sell it dirt cheap, as they bought it for so little at home, and had minimal outlay if they carried it themselves. It was fine if they sold it cheap to the cartels, but not to the Indonesian bosses or other international buyers. The rate was usually around $50,000 a kilo, but if supply was weak it shot up to $90,000 or if strong could drop to $20,000. These were Bali's market trends.

Their drug businesses were volatile enough, with busts constantly blowing the bottom line, so when it was one of their own sabotaging the market, it exacerbated the fury.

Jose Henrici, aka Borrador, was living between Peru, where he had a son, and Bali. His expertise was stitching the bags, often working for Rafael packing coke in Peru or Bali into backpacks and surfboard bags. He'd worked with Rafael on Sparrow's

📸