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206: Fakes, Forgeries and Phonies
64 Plays12 days ago
Hey cryptic cuties, hope your 2026 is treating you well and we are so excited to be back. We have a fun episode for you, diving into the fascinating world of counterfeiting, forgeries and replicas, featuring everything from the well done, all the way to the bizarre and laughable.
Starting with the arrest of Frank Bourassa, Kelsey covers how a life of crime led one man on a path to printing millions and becoming named the world's greatest counterfeiter.
Alanna closes out the ep with a collection of expensive forgeries that shook the world, as well as some failed restorations that made the 2 of us question if some things should just be left alone.
Happy listening and catch up with you all next time! Join our patron for exclusive episodes, videos and even more banter and tangents!
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Transcript
Introduction to the Darkcast Network
00:00:01
Speaker
Darkcast Network. Indie pods with a dark side.
Meet the Hosts: Alanna and Kelsey
00:00:27
Speaker
You are listening to Castles and Cryptids, where the castles are haunted and the cryptids are cryptic as fuck. And I'm Alanna. And I'm Kelsey. And it's our first episode of 2026. Woo! Yeah, wow.
00:00:46
Speaker
Happy New Year. Forever, I feel like. It has been for us, yeah. like And like people that are listening in real time also. It's been a while.
00:01:01
Speaker
Yeah. Wow. That old song. Yeah.
Holiday Break Reflections
00:01:06
Speaker
oh I guess I hope y'all had a good Christmas and didn't like missed us, but not too much. Cause you know, yeah.
00:01:18
Speaker
We had a nice break. it's Yeah. yeah Hopefully you guys can forgive us. I know it's been, and what, a crazy month and a half, but... Yeah.
00:01:32
Speaker
It's hard with schedules sometimes, and then my vacation. ah yeah i would say they've had to like wait a month for a new episode-ish, because we dropped one, what, just before Christmas. Yeah.
00:01:48
Speaker
That was kind of part of one episode that is stretched into two, as I had so much to say on the topic. Yeah. yeah Well, it's not, and it's funny because sometimes people will talk about, oh, that break between Christmas and New Year's where like, nobody's doing anything. And I'm like, when you say that, you kind of, yeah, you sound like you're coming from such a place of privilege because a lot of people...
00:02:15
Speaker
work yeah christmas and beyond so funny to me like i know like some my after podcaster sorry yeah my brother had a month off oh my god wow yeah so that was nice for him i had like two weeks off i go back and as of recording this in two days um having two weeks off and i'll be happy to see everybody at work again catch up um it's nice specifically book that off too yeah yeah to have that time off because you guys were all doing shit it's like yeah yeah i don't uh i'm what i'm not one of those people where i could go straight back to work
00:03:09
Speaker
Maybe if I was only gone for like a couple days somewhere, then I wouldn't need like you need kind of a couple days before to pack and get everything ready. And then a couple days after, because I mean, the first day I was just unpacking, doing laundry.
00:03:26
Speaker
And then ah i had to go grocery shopping because there was nothing in my fridge. So I can't imagine trying to do that and then like go to work the next day or something.
Vacation Highlights and Personalities
00:03:38
Speaker
Yeah, because Kelsey had a nice little vacay. So it started to get for a trip. It's like, that's tough if you can't get enough time off to get at least a day off on either end and stuff like that.
00:03:52
Speaker
But at least stuff is, most stuff is closed for like a day or two. And this year it was like kind of a weekend. So I just had like five days off, which was like, nice. it' So I'm in mini vacay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then like,
00:04:09
Speaker
I know, it's been cold and snowy here and stuff. So then we just kind of hibernate sometimes. And then other of people are like, oh, I had such a busy time. And like, sometimes I'm a little jealous, but the same time, I'm a little like, at least I um don't feel like I'm exhausted. Like people that go home and have to visit between two families and stuff. And they're like, ah. I felt like I had to go two places in one day. Yeah.
00:04:32
Speaker
I... i
00:04:37
Speaker
I never know, like, people are always like, I'm an introvert, I'm an extrovert. I feel like i it really depends what kind of mood I'm in, because sometimes I am like, yeah, let's spend the whole day out hanging out and doing whatever. yeah I can have, like,
00:04:55
Speaker
however much going on and then the next day if i have like I don't know I'm like I have to go grocery shopping and I have to do something six hours later that would take five minutes I'm like god I'm so busy today i have two things to do yeah so it's true um because eventually everyone needs to go home and recharge their batteries, which is usually one of those questions they ask you. Do you get, you know, yeah charged up from socialization? it's like, yes, to a point.
00:05:27
Speaker
And then I have to come home and watch the big short for a bit like I did today. we were just visiting and then I had like done some grocery shopping and stuff and it's like and then I'm home for a bit and now I'm like a little bit better. Yeah. so I think it depends. i
00:05:46
Speaker
yeah, like hanging out with you, I never feel like I have to like, I never feel exhausted or anything hanging out with you, but some people I definitely do. So,
00:05:58
Speaker
right i yeah, sometimes I'm like, energy vampire, you know, like some people and have a little bit of it and that's okay. Yeah.
00:06:08
Speaker
who Yeah. Certain times I totally, i'd I'd say most situations I feel like I need to go home to my quiet house and hide for an hour or two before I can go to sleep especially after work um oh yeah after work that's a rough time
00:06:36
Speaker
um oh for some reason that made me think of uh I've been listening to a lot of a podcast where they go over your favorite meal and when they had Dan Aykroyd on, the comments first, I was like, Dan Aykroyd, I'm reading, I'll like read comments first and be like, ooh, kind of excited for the episode and what people
Guest Appearance: Dan Aykroyd
00:06:55
Speaker
are saying. It's like, this was great, but also like I'm exhausted. And I was like, wait, what? And like, he just didn't let them have a chance to ask him what he wanted for each episode.
00:07:05
Speaker
like starter and then you know main and dessert and everything he was just like first of all we're gonna be here at my place in uh wherever ontario and then i'm gonna start out with my crystal skull vodka and then i'm gonna have this and then i'm gonna have this person here and he just like told them his whole thing oh damn and just like went off and they barely had to ask him a question or get a word in edgewise and it was so funny but also like you've just rattled on for quite some time that you're just like Oh my God. Yeah.
00:07:39
Speaker
Ah, national treasure. um
00:07:45
Speaker
Anyway, yeah, it was fun because we got to chat a bit today and got get some of that out of the way because we hadn't seen each other in a while. Yeah, we had a nice little catch up this afternoon.
00:08:00
Speaker
It
Future Podcast Plans
00:08:01
Speaker
was nice. For our ears only. Off mic. For our own enjoyment.
00:08:08
Speaker
you know. But you always get, in oh yeah, work and we picked our next episode and also our next Patreon. Yes. This month's Patreon. Yes. January. Yeah.
00:08:20
Speaker
Try to do this month because we'll be, you yeah yeah, like a a week ahead. Yeah. Yeah, we're back. We'll be back every other week at least.
00:08:34
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah, kick off the, we'll end off the Chinese year of the snake with yeah some some saves, some of my saves, some of your saves.
00:08:49
Speaker
Excuse me.
00:08:53
Speaker
Um, so yeah, it should be some silly stuff, some funny stuff, who knows, uh, all sorts of things.
00:09:03
Speaker
Um, we'll let you know when that drops and yeah, don't forget to support us on Patreon. Join if you want, if you can check out the content there. And if people would rather have like a one-time donation, I also know you can do the buy me a coffee. So people can let us know if they would,
00:09:21
Speaker
if it would be worth us setting up a what that thing is, it's just like you can donate one time for people and be like, here's a beer on me, here's a coffee, here's $10 to buy a Bigfoot sticker, like whatever.
00:09:35
Speaker
Cool. I don't know, sometimes I think people are afraid of commitments, like subscriptions, even if they're quite affordable, if I do say so myself. Yeah.
00:09:48
Speaker
I joined many Patreons and I'll be be like, Oh, it's like maybe 20 bucks a month. You know what i mean? And then you're like, you know what i mean? Like when you have Netflix or something, you're like, Oh, worth it. Yeah.
00:10:01
Speaker
But also don't forget to rate us. Cause that really helps too. And would love to see Spotify ratings go like higher.
00:10:12
Speaker
and stuff that comment uh engage with us I don't know tap to us yeah um thank you to everybody who asked us when the next episode was coming out Daniel no maybe anyone else yeah yeah we're back so um this should be a fun one Yeah, what else? Nothing really.
00:10:45
Speaker
Yeah.
Fascination with Forgery
00:10:46
Speaker
Yeah, we could, let's get into it.
00:10:51
Speaker
This is a topic I always find really interesting. really? Maybe it was like my middle school obsession with the movie Catch Me If You Can. About check forgeries.
00:11:09
Speaker
Check forgeries. Yeah, I can't even remember his name. He's played by Leonardo DiCaprio, though. Famously played by Leonardo, I would say. Leonardo DiCaprizan.
00:11:27
Speaker
Back when he was still quite cute, too, I would say. Because, like, yeah. Yeah. he was I had crushes when I was coming of age. And, you know, Titanic. I was, like, preteen. Yeah, come on.
00:11:41
Speaker
Titanic, Romeo and Juliet, this movie. a Yeah.
00:11:50
Speaker
I do want to see his new one though. um really? Shoot, who directed it? Oh god, I've been looking at movies all day. Is it out now? No.
00:12:04
Speaker
ah Yeah, I think so. It's like one one thing after another one hit after another something like that not the one with will arnett oh one battle after another okay it looks kind of like weird and i dig it ah
00:12:30
Speaker
who else is yeah good cast uh benicio del toro He's in it. Sean Penn is in it. Okay. I saw something coming out with Bill Skarsgård, too, that I was like, that always gets my attention.
00:12:48
Speaker
Yeah, it looked kind of kind of crazy. Good, good, good. Hopefully it's another good year for horror movies and stuff like that. Yeah, I'm still trying to catch up, but there's some that have come out in the last couple of years that I haven't seen yet, so...
00:13:07
Speaker
I have some of them downloaded. I just, it was one thing I planned on my vacation. I was like, I have a bunch of movies saved, like, in case we didn't have Wi-Fi on the resort. I was like, I have all these movies downloaded on my laptop. I can watch through them all. And then we had Wi-Fi, so I didn't need to. And then you didn't. Yeah, I yeah.
The Counterfeiting Saga of Frank Barossa
00:13:28
Speaker
So I didn't. And then, yeah.
00:13:31
Speaker
Basically just wasted time for a week not doing anything. I was on vacation though. and Yeah, sometimes it feels a little decadent just watch a movie in the morning or something.
00:13:44
Speaker
Like, what am I doing? know. Yeah, draw daylight? Yeah. yeah I know. Well, we have these nice, because it is hard with our big bay windows, but then we got these nice blinds. So if you really can't see the TV, like that's what Pat got them for. Cause he's like, I know I'm going be using the TV in the daytime. Yeah.
00:14:05
Speaker
Put them blinds down, baby. My parents have the same thing. Their TV is in like facing the same direction and they have a big window in their living room. And yeah, same thing. You'll be trying to watch a movie and you'll be like, I can't see the screen at all.
00:14:22
Speaker
yeah i mean where else you gonna put it we've talked about we have the basement but then there's like a pool table on one end so that's kind of yeah all right that's my now i sound privileged My pool table's in the way. Can't put my big screen up there. God, where'd I put my giant tv
00:14:47
Speaker
That's funny. um What did you guys get for Christmas? It was a PJ year for me. and Yeah. I'm also having a thing where I'm like entertaining subscription boxes.
00:15:02
Speaker
Still, if not, I started some at Christmas. I got one for me and Pat that was like, cured meats. It's called carnivore. Nice.
00:15:13
Speaker
And you know what? Don't be surprised if people still get one, whether it's for, you know, a birthday or whatever. Like, I'm like, ooh, there's actually kind of cool ones too. If you look up like weird ones, it's like, do you want one that's kind of witchy or like sciencey? And you're like, maybe I do.
00:15:34
Speaker
ah Yeah. Cryptid of the month box hmm maybe so yeah it's fun right um so know yeah everybody tell us what you guys gonna do this year
00:15:56
Speaker
so sorry where did i where did we leave off you start we we were talking about four trees so then we started talking about movies again No surprise at all. yeah You've listened to us before. You know how it goes.
00:16:14
Speaker
Oh, I was just happy you said like, um not art forgeries. Because I think those ones are the kind of the boring ones-ish. you know A little bit. Yeah.
00:16:25
Speaker
They can.
00:16:29
Speaker
It depends. i Yeah.
00:16:34
Speaker
Yeah, not a huge thing. I guess they're just kind of... Maybe I just don't know a whole lot about art forgeries. I find, yeah yeah, like the check fraud, con artist kind of like false identity.
00:16:53
Speaker
that was kind of things more interesting. Right. Like to be able to like recreate someone's signature and something like that's kind of cool too. okay Yeah.
00:17:04
Speaker
um The one I specifically settled on, it was actually an Instagram post that got recommended to me ah weirdly. And i had saved it And i was like, oh, this is interesting. So I, of course, had to look up the case and learn more about it. Jumbled upon it. Okay, that's the best. Yeah. don't know what's happening to my Instagram algorithm that it's recommending.
00:17:36
Speaker
con a con't like i don't know I'm gonna call it con artist but um guess he is like a counterfeiter um his name is fang fang frank barossa and i think this would still apply he's considered the world's largest count or he holds the record of having the largest counterfeiting operation by a single individual which is really cool. Yeah.
00:18:08
Speaker
Quite the accolade anyway. Yes. i was like, oh, that's pretty impressive. So that caught my eye. I was like, I need to know more. What's your Guinness Book of World Records? Well, yeah, I think he actually is in the Guinness World Records book.
00:18:25
Speaker
Just like, who knows? The Guinness book, even that's like a topic that's interesting to kind of cover the origin of and stuff you're like Guinness like those Guinnesses know yeah think so yeah yeah my brother was always uh every year for Christmas he wanted the Guinness World Records book and then um when I was younger I used to always ask for the Ripley's believe it or not books yes both because I liked all the weird like talents and yeah things in there
00:19:01
Speaker
I think ah my sister Ressa bought it, but it's at my mom's place and it's an Atlas Obscura food.
00:19:12
Speaker
It's Atlas it's Gastronomicon. It's all about weird food all around the world. And that's a really, I really like that kind of coffee tea oh too. Yeah. That's cool.
00:19:24
Speaker
It's very interesting. I'm like, oh, what is this pie that has like fish heads popping out of it? o And they're like, you might so that up oran it's like it might be found in French Canada. You're like, wait, what? no Is it?
00:19:41
Speaker
Don't quote me on that. ah So this Frank guy, um I thought it was actually interesting. I had never heard about him before. he was actually born and raised in Quebec.
00:19:57
Speaker
Quebec Canada. French Canada. Represent Canada. What a great segue. Yeah. Awesome.
00:20:10
Speaker
And with the, yeah, he's just called Frank? Okay. I thought he was like Italian. He's a Francois. He's a Francois. There it is. Yeah. Everything just called him Frank. So I'll be probably calling him I think Farasa or Frank, switch back and forth. We jokingly called my uncle Francois unfuncle, but he's actually very fun and nice.
00:20:38
Speaker
honest oh yeah When we were kids, I think we made it you know. Yeah. he actually arrested on 23rd, 2012. So not he was actually arrested on may twenty third two thousand and twelve so not that long ago and yeah yeah yeah for the reason i mean i feel like counterfeiters you i would associate like 90s early 2000s not necessarily like 2012 yeah it's kind of crime that like kind of ages out in the modern times yeah harder and harder to like fake your identity and stuff yeah yeah
00:21:24
Speaker
He was arrested along with three other individuals, and which we'll get into, and police seized about a million dollars worth of fake bills.
00:21:36
Speaker
At the time of his arrest, which they were super, super happy about. They were like really celebrating that they had they had stopped a million dollars of fake ah notes or bank notes from yeah like being distributed. Pretty impressive. Yeah.
00:21:56
Speaker
Yeah, and they were also immediately shocked at the quality of these notes, with the police describing them as virtually undetectable to the naked eye.
00:22:08
Speaker
And not only did they feel or not only did they look right, but they also felt identical to the real notes. And they also had a dark vertical stripe that perfect, perfectly imitated the security thread on real bills.
00:22:25
Speaker
um Oh, yes. So these were like some of the highest quality um forgery banknotes they had ever seen. Wow. Okay.
00:22:38
Speaker
Yeah. So really, really well done. And
00:22:44
Speaker
ah Barasa, he was immediately charged with the production, possession and distribution of counterfeit currency. And even though him and three other people were arrested, he's the only one that's name was ever publicly released. So we don't know who the other three are, but they aren't really related to him um in the production of it. It seems to more likely be um people that were involved in the distribution.
00:23:20
Speaker
of the notes at the later time. Okay. Yeah. Kind of like after, crime. hit that um So because of the quality of these bills, police assumed that it was the work of this large, a large and sophisticated criminal gang.
00:23:45
Speaker
And they started really grilling him about who his accomplices could be. ah because they're like, this is too well done, they're really, really good, and there's a lot of them, like a million dollars, so... Yeah, he's not doing at home.
00:24:05
Speaker
So, Varasa was adamant that he had worked alone, and then we'll get into more of the details later, but a bit of a rundown. He ended up using...
00:24:18
Speaker
um because they confiscated a million dollars they he ended up telling them that he had another two million dollars or not two million two hundred million dollars in counterfeit notes ohm that he would give them in exchange for basically immunity like him not really being charged with anything he's like i'll give you all of the money i made if you don't charge me and i don't go to prison so okay yeah so yeah they had like a million dollars he's like i'll tell you where 200 million is and they used this as a him and his lawyer used this as a bargaining chip during his hearing
00:25:12
Speaker
What a weird Right? that's why I'm like, this guy iconic. It's crazy. After telling the authorities where the money was, they located it successfully, and they accepted the deal. And he basically walked free, having only served six weeks in prison. And ended up having to only pay about $1,300 in a fine because when he was arrested, they also found a small amount of drugs on his person. So he got fined for the drugs and spent six weeks in prison.
00:25:48
Speaker
i mean when you compare it to that guy that was not telling the court where however much money was and he's still in jail after like 10 years or something.
00:26:02
Speaker
And the guy's just so stubborn and they're like, just tell us. And he just keeps being like, I'm just in jail. And then like, it was like, they finally were just like, fine, we'll let you out. It's like, just do what this guy did. He obviously has squirreled away another stash somewhere. If he doesn't mind just giving me 200 mils.
00:26:21
Speaker
Maybe. There is some talk about that, which we'll get into. ah yeah it's interesting in that um like this was kind of his fail-safe if anything happened. So, yeah, he had been arrested. they had like confiscated a million dollars from him. And then while he was in prison, yeah he like told his lawyer, hey, if I gave...
00:26:49
Speaker
the police like the authorities a bunch of money do you think they'd let me go and they're like well like how much are you talking and he's like oh like i could give you like 200 million and they're like are you serious it's like yeah and it worked basically um i mean because these authorities had crime is the theft and stuff or like yeah it's like well if i'm giving back the pro yeah the crime then did the crime ever really happen no ever was yeah o um
00:27:23
Speaker
yeah because the police like weren't expecting to get more money from him or for there to be more money involved so this was kind of like oh shit this is deeper than we thought but if he's giving us everything then yeah Yeah.
00:27:39
Speaker
Wild. ah So kind of backtracking um into how this all started, which is pretty interesting. I wonder how we got It's a winding story. friend la Flashback.
00:27:58
Speaker
Sorry. I'm done. Francois was born and raised in Quebec, Canada, and don't have too much background other than like beginning at age 12.
00:28:12
Speaker
um Or I should mention actually, a almost all of this information is from a really good article from Business Insider, which I thought was really weird. Okay.
00:28:25
Speaker
But they don't have exactly where in Quebec he's from. even Interesting. ah They did. I just couldn't pronounce it, so I didn't pronounce it. Well, I was thinking about that. We watched that bit earlier where the community was talking about London, Ontario, Canada.
00:28:43
Speaker
Sorry. yeah all And though all the bit was that it was blamed after a more famous London, really. Sorry yeah to explain. um Yeah, and they like...
00:28:55
Speaker
They interviewed him, so a lot of these are quotes directly from him after when they interviewed him, which I thought was really good. Doing your best French-Canadian accent. and i'm Just kidding. i He said that at age 12, I guess, he started noticing that older students at his school would show up to school with bags full of expensive clothes that they had stolen from local stores.
00:29:23
Speaker
Okay. Yeah, i thought that was a little strange. um It was at that time that Frank decided to become a middleman and like a fence and began selling the high-end items to other students at the school.
00:29:39
Speaker
ah He said all that really mattered to me was that the supply was coming and that I had customers and that it was great and it gave me a very nice boots boost towards independence.
00:29:51
Speaker
Oh, yeah, yeah. He continued doing this for a few years, sometimes earning hundreds of dollars a week. And then at age 15, he was kicked out of school.
00:30:04
Speaker
he said he had a problem with authority. right cu Cal surprise. Yeah. No, really? ah Around this time, he moved out of his parents' house and began working as a mechanic.
00:30:23
Speaker
while at the same time selling stolen cars on the side. So continuing. Damn. Loves that life of crime, baby. Yeah, started fairly young. He continued this for another few years until he reached his late 20s when he decided to kind of like go straight, try and turn his life around.
00:30:47
Speaker
He used his experience as a mechanic in working with cars to open up his own factory, which produced brake pads.
00:31:00
Speaker
like I guess people always need brake pads. I don't really know what else to say. Just brake pads. Okay. Just brake pads. ah Not even. said not. Propane and propane accessories. Yeah. Yeah.
00:31:15
Speaker
ah Not willing to do anything by half. He was working crazy hours, up to 20 hours a day, trying to turn his business profitable. and it was working, but he was getting more and more exhausted.
00:31:31
Speaker
and Makes sense. Yeah. He ended up experiencing what he described as a nervous breakdown, um which I guess...
00:31:45
Speaker
he ended up seeing a doctor and was hospitalized for a little bit. And he says that the doctors told him he was, his blood work showed he was basically low on every vitamin. Like he just like had worked himself um into exhaustion.
00:32:03
Speaker
ah he needs a Gatorade fast. He needs some electrolytes. Yeah. I guess his hands wouldn't stop shaking. no matter what they did, and he was at that point unable to work.
00:32:17
Speaker
So he made a tough decision and sold his business. And then, this is pretty cool, but he spent the next two years using that money to travel through Europe, Asia, and Africa with his girlfriend he had at the time.
00:32:33
Speaker
oh I mean, i would love to quit my job and travel for two years. Just a casual... quit and try find yourself yeah yeah oh man you just like harry and megan was like well for our first date after we do one date i'll take you to africa just for a quick camp trip camping trip
00:33:05
Speaker
oh boy um Yeah, so he did that for two years, and then he returned home back to Quebec. um And he decided to, or he had come to a decision over those two years about what he wanted to do next. um And he had decided that returning to legal work or like regular work just wasn't something he was interested in doing again.
00:33:31
Speaker
i They quoted him saying, if I were to get into a different legitimate business, it would have been the same deal over again. 20 hour days. there was no way I was going to allow that to happen ever again. 20 hour days. Jesus.
00:33:48
Speaker
Yeah. Because that's what he was doing when he was running that um like break pad business. but beside but Yeah, right. he started thinking about his next move, saying that he worked better when he was alone.
00:34:06
Speaker
So trying to figure out what he wanted to do, he would just get around or get in a vehicle and just drive around and listen to music and think. and try and come up with what he wanted to do next and he supplemented his income at this time because he wasn't really working by getting involved in the still illegal marijuana trade at the time because this is like 2006.
00:34:38
Speaker
Right okay. or And this resulted Yeah, quite a few years before. This resulted in a drug-related charge in him being incarcerated for three months in 2006. That's enough time. It's on your record now.
00:34:57
Speaker
Damn. Right? Yeah. okay I don't really know what happens between 2006 and 2008, but he started going on long drives again.
00:35:11
Speaker
And the article said, quote, it occurred to me at a red light. Why the hell go through all this hassle of finding a product, selling it, finding customers, accounting and all that trouble to bring it back as money?
00:35:28
Speaker
um he said i loved money so much i decided to make my own so just just cut out all the middle part well why uh make a product to sell it when you can just make the money and that's why our money is so freaking weird now yeah very true so true ah Frank said he began studying how money was manufactured.
00:35:57
Speaker
He started visiting different official government websites, which listed detailed descriptions of each note's security features for, like, each country. um So he was trying to decide which ones would be the best to do and, like, the easiest. Yeah.
00:36:18
Speaker
he said i think he said that they like um what was it the details of like the u.s bill's security features were like the most detailed um yeah uh so he settled on the 20 u.s bill um so he even though he's living in canada he's doing um a like US s money. He's not doing Canadian money.
00:36:47
Speaker
they gives with some villager now He settles on the $20 bill as they're less suspicious than 50s and hundreds, ah which is pretty true now still. Like some, a lot of places in Canada won't even accept 50s and hundreds. So no, they're hard to, yeah, change. and Yeah. Yeah.
00:37:12
Speaker
spin um And then he also settled on the 20s because at the time the design on the $20 bills was older and actually had less security features than the $10 bills had.
00:37:25
Speaker
oh yeah, because they were updated. Yeah. Frank wanted to... Oh, this is what it said in the article, because there's been some discrepancy about why he settled on American money to do.
00:37:41
Speaker
um He said in the article that he wanted to emphasize that he chose the US dollar not because he disliked American people or the US government, as it implied in some like reports and articles, um but that he chose it because it was accepted in most countries.
00:38:02
Speaker
Like, I'd say that's pretty true. Yeah, it always has been fairly universal, unfortunately. Yeah. ah um Yeah, so that's kind of what he did. And then, so he's made his decision what he's going to do. Now he has to start getting equipment together. And one of the first things he had to do was try and locate the correct paper.
00:38:27
Speaker
which was a very unique blend of cotton and linen that was manufactured by only a few places. Oh, this is all quoted directly from the Business Insider thing. They had a nice like timeline of this.
00:38:42
Speaker
Saying he began phoning paper mills across Europe. hoping to find a producer who was either gullible or bent. go so like Or a little bit both. Yeah. Frank's con was dependent on the theory that in Europe, people would be less familiar with the constituent parts of the U.S. dollar bill and therefore more likely to take his order.
00:39:08
Speaker
He made sure to conduct all of his correspondence by email under fake name and a fake business. And he was there, he was aware that a recorded phone call conversations could end up being his downfall in any future court case.
00:39:24
Speaker
Yeah, that would end. Yeah, so he was trying. um he said they might all be nice on the phone, but how do you know if they're just, or how do you know if they're just going to turn around and call secret services?
00:39:41
Speaker
ah Frank told a paper mill in Germany that he represented an investment company that wanted to print bond certificates on secure paper to resist counterfeiters, and the mill agreed to tackle the job. Throughout the process, he returned with slight modifications, and Frank's second most audacious move was to ask for the printing company to add a small security strip that read USA 20, which is wild.
00:40:17
Speaker
That's can you put this on the money? they're like, I guess so. Change nothing else, okay? Yeah.
00:40:28
Speaker
um Harder than this was to trick the company into adding an etching of the US President an ja ah Andrew Jackson's Oh my god, I can't tell. Andrew Jackson's face to the watermark.
00:40:44
Speaker
To do this, Frank had to have several watermark machines made in Poland, which he had delivered to the paper mill in Germany.
00:40:55
Speaker
like... Gordo for being poopy. Even Gordo is standing up out of his seat. Yeah. Shock and awe.
00:41:09
Speaker
Yeah, so he has those delivered and remarkably the German paper mill showed no signs of suspicion. Or if they did, they certainly didn't tell Frank. Okay.
00:41:21
Speaker
um With this level of modification, the paper mill told Frank that the minimum order that they would do would cost him $30,000. that would be enough for about million dollars in fake currency.
00:41:38
Speaker
and so interesting how that works yes yeah right uh the equipment including an expensive heidelberg offset printer costs about three hundred thousand dollars woof so um yeah so the final cost for him to get all this stuff ready was about three hundred thousand dollars And Frank figured that if he sold the counterfeit notes for 30% of their face value, he would make nearly $80 million. dollars
00:42:14
Speaker
ah So that's what his plan was. He was going to print all this money then offload it to people that would obviously know the money was faked. But he would sell it to them for only 30% of the value if the film real. Yeah.
00:42:32
Speaker
It's still a real risk. A real investment. Yeah, absolutely. Gotta spend money to make money. oh Yeah, he said it wasn't a number specifically that he chose, but it just felt right, like the 30%.
00:42:48
Speaker
um While the paper was in production, frank Frank began sourcing the software and learning how to use it. um and he And he said that he sent ah set up an entire printing shop on the outskirts of town like um that he would use.
00:43:09
Speaker
And sam it is noted in the article that police have still never found the exact location of the print shop. And like Frank has never revealed it to them. And Frank has also vowed to never return to it. So if he is being monitored in any way, he will not be leading them to that print shop.
00:43:35
Speaker
so Well, that's good. Yeah, yeah even print shops back in the day could get targeted if and you're printing things that people don't like.
00:43:45
Speaker
They might try to set your house on fire. like ah um So it was at this time in late 2009 when Frank's big order of that paper arrived from Germany.
00:44:00
Speaker
oh From that paper mail. um Yeah, he said, quote I knew this second that he was filthy rich and that there was no stopping him. Yeah.
00:44:13
Speaker
but But he didn't pause to celebrate and Frank began working 16-hour shifts, printing nearly every sheet of blank note quality paper that he had received, um trying to reduce the amount of incriminating evidence that could be used against him.
00:44:30
Speaker
so just like, I guess not leaving anything blank. yeah ah Frank said to his girlfriend at the time, who had been the same one,
00:44:41
Speaker
that he had gone traveling with for those two years. um He said that she had no idea what he was doing doing during the printing process, saying that most of the time he'd tuck her in at 10 p.m. and afterwards he'd leave and go to the shop and he'd come back in the morning as often or as often times as possible to bring her breakfast or something like that.
00:45:05
Speaker
And that that was the criminal life he had. She's got her priorities straight. As long as he brings breakfast, who cares what he's up to? No, just kidding. Yeah, like, a he says she didn't know what was going on.
00:45:19
Speaker
saying that she never had a speeding ticket in her whole life. And that she was a fully fledged law abiding citizen. Okay, so he's protecting her. well that's fine. Yeah.
00:45:32
Speaker
Like, keep in mind in this thing, he's not spending any of this money himself. So, like, it's not like he's, yeah I don't know, suddenly paying bills or, like, buying flashy things that he shouldn't be able to afford. Like, that's just not happening.
00:45:49
Speaker
No, and it's sort of hard to find the victim in a crime like this where no one's directly getting, like... ripped off? I don't know, like right? Like yeah who's getting super hurt? I don't know, that's that's a good question.
00:46:07
Speaker
um So after about five months of relentlessly printing, he had gathered about 250 million dollars of fake banknotes saying that he was now quote unquote rich, um but that would only happen if he managed to offload all of the notes.
00:46:26
Speaker
And if that true was po like if that happened he would never have to work again. Yeah, I suppose it does kind of affect the yeah economy a bit. Yeah, I um actually have that in a second. You did touch on that in the article.
00:46:46
Speaker
um So after the start of his research process, Frank had managed to line up four potential customers, many of whom were like criminals, including international drug smugglers.
00:47:00
Speaker
Which had actually turned down Frank, or yeah, the international drug smugglers had turned down Frank's offer because they thought it was too risky. oh okay.
00:47:12
Speaker
Yeah. Risky business. Most of the customers that he ended up working with ordered small amounts. Like they they want to test the notes. They probably don't believe how good the quality is. um So they would order like $100,000 at a time.
00:47:31
Speaker
So he'd be making about $30,000. And they would test out the notes. And then once they were getting really good, um i don't know if you want to call it feedback or what, but like they weren't getting caught.
00:47:45
Speaker
um They were moving on to much larger orders, going up to $250,000 and then half a million and then even orders of a million dollars at a time from him. certainly some sort of positive reinforcement. Yeah. here Yeah, still winning.
00:48:05
Speaker
Frank's customers were deliberately all from outside of the U.S. He said he did this to avoid, quote, flooding businesses in the U.S. who were having a tough hard enough time as it was after the 2008 financial crash.
00:48:21
Speaker
so that's what kind of touched on. He didn't want to take the economy even worse. So he was doing this all outside of the U.S. And funnily enough, how I was just saying if we were just watching the the big short about the housing crisis.
00:48:40
Speaker
Yeah, it was down to a housing crisis and people exploiting the system, basically. Yeah. Yeah. woof um So this kind of continued for a while, but he was barely making a dent in this $250 million dollars he had printed.
00:49:01
Speaker
So he decided he needed to do bigger amounts. um Like people that weren't just ordering a million dollars at a time. He would do have to do that 250 times. So he's like, i need somebody that can do bigger and bigger amounts. So he located a new criminal gang and added that to his client list.
00:49:22
Speaker
Unfortunately, he didn't know that this group had an undercover cop that was in their ranks that got involved.
00:49:33
Speaker
Well, can't win them all. Nope. So this would prove his downfall. The cop had placed an order for $100,000, and the next day, supposedly thrilled with the first batch, he had ordered the same again. And Frank didn't realize that a police helicopter had followed them as he handed a box of counterfeit bills to a middleman, who then passed it to the undercover police officer.
00:50:02
Speaker
a um they couldn't arrest or do anything at that time because they i guess from the air or something like I think it said they couldn't prove that like that was in the box when he gave it to the middle man and that the middle man wasn't the one who switched it out so they ended up just following um Frank to his girlfriend's house where Yeah, on 23, 2012, the couple were sound asleep when they were woken by loud banging on the front door at about 5 a.m. m
00:50:43
Speaker
And it was RCMP and they had arrived by or accompanied by two agents from the U.S. Secret Service.
00:50:54
Speaker
He said that his girlfriend didn't have a clue what was happening and that her kids were there and it was a whole mess and he felt really bad. um about that like okay family man right um frank said he was immediately handcuffed while police searched the house and his car along with the guns they found printing press marijuana methamphetamine and hash yeah printing press Sounds so old-fashioned. Who has that laying around? like
00:51:32
Speaker
Yeah. oh ah Police also found $949,000 in fake currency. And um Frank says he remembers them being like visibly pleased with like this haul of drugs and the printing press and like less than a million dollars. And they were just like, yeah, woo!
00:51:53
Speaker
Woo! Good job, guys. like And he's sitting there going, wow, they have no idea. um and police didn't really have any reason to believe that there was more than $200 million stashed somewhere on the edge of town.
00:52:12
Speaker
Okay. Frank said, before I even started to plan for any of this, the very first concrete thing I did was work on and plan for my escape.
00:52:24
Speaker
He said he had entrusted a friend, a total outsider, who was not involved in the counterfeit um operation trusted them with the location of of his stash of counterfeit notes.
00:52:36
Speaker
And on Frank's orders, the friend would release the massive green paper it together to be used as one huge bargaining chip. He said he was hoping it would work, but once you're in prison, you realize you don't really get to decide and that was all up to the courts.
00:52:53
Speaker
Yeah. So. Jeez. Like what? Yeah. I drink. During Frank's interrogations by the police, agents from the U.S. Secret Service told Frank that they were looking to extradite him um and that he could face up to 60 years in prison.
00:53:13
Speaker
And Frank was worried. he had not expected to be in such trouble with the U.S. authorities. And he had, like, actually expected to be dealt with by the Canadian government, which he considered more lenient.
00:53:27
Speaker
oh no. You didn't think to look up if they had, like, an extradition policy? the The US government famously harsh. Yeah. Or the prison system, whatever. Nevertheless, Frank had still not like told them about the money.
00:53:48
Speaker
um Now this part, the article says most of the following details come from Frank as the crown prosecutors were unwilling to comment on many details of the negotiations.
00:54:01
Speaker
during this time. ah The court confirmed key dates of the case with Business Insider, and the account is corroborated and supported by further details from an earlier interview Frank conducted with Wells Tower for GQ. So this is mostly coming from Frank.
00:54:23
Speaker
Okay. It says that Frank's lawyer, who wishes to be kept anonymous, argued that the police's raid on Frank's girlfriend's house was illegal because it wasn't based on clear enough evidence and that Frank had been filmed driving into a parking lot but not actually moving the cash into his middleman's house.
00:54:44
Speaker
So the footage did not actually show Frank exchanging the counterfeit notes. And if judges bought this argument, Frank's case could have been entirely dismissed in court.
00:54:57
Speaker
ah The lawyer whom Frank described as the best in the world used this claim as a bargaining tool to get Crown prosecutors to suspend Frank's extradition to the U.S. So he's able to negotiate that.
00:55:13
Speaker
And then, i yeah, he ended up being able to get bail after just six weeks while the Canadian police gathered more evidence against him um in preparation for the eventual court case. Hmm.
00:55:32
Speaker
And said, at least now Frank was on home turf dealing with the judiciary system he had grown to know intimately since his earlier brushes with the law as a teenager. All right then, bud. Right? He's like, I've been here before.
00:55:51
Speaker
ah he ended up getting a job in construction and like his name was kind of in the paper and stuff, but he refused to talk about the money with anyone. expecting his phone and everything else like that to be tapped by the police. So like he wouldn't talk about nothing to nobody.
00:56:10
Speaker
Oh, that was Brad Pitt's character in the movie because he would start their phone conversation. He sang to them for like 30 seconds and they're like, I don't think we're being listened to. i don't and I don't know what the singing was supposed to do. I don't think they're listening to everybody at every second. But I do think that like keywords are probably monitored for like key sentences. Right. That may be. I think like certain people. Yeah.
00:56:37
Speaker
Yes, because they don't have time to sit there listen to everybody's phone conversation. Absolutely. Would you want to? Yeah. Sorry. Yeah. No. ah So Frank's court date was set for December of 2013 and on walking to the courthouse Frank finally said to his lawyer, I have 200 million. Can you do something with that? And the lawyer apparently responded, are you fucking kidding me? little boy And then Frank just said no.
00:57:09
Speaker
ah So the lawyer entered the... He was like, what fuck? No, I'm just kidding. yeah Oh my god. ah The lawyer entered the courthouse and approached ah the Crown Attorney telling him that the huge stash of or telling him about the huge stash of counterfeit notes.
00:57:32
Speaker
And then they ended up doing another couple months of negotiations and Frank's deal was set in exchange for the $200 million dollars in counterfeit notes and the offset printing press, um which Frank says would have ended up somewhere.
00:57:49
Speaker
oh the, the notes, the counterfeit notes would have ended up somewhere flooding the streets of the U S eventually. um Frank was set free and was ordered to pay the fine of $1,350 Canadian for the drugs that were found in his car during the raid.
00:58:08
Speaker
And yeah, so Frank arranged for the counterfeit bills to be handed over to police. And he was allowed to walk free out of that courthouse with no more time behind bars.
00:58:22
Speaker
For under $2,000. Wow.
00:58:26
Speaker
Right? Yeah. Okay. And I'm sorry. Did you say that you liked the catch me if you can or if that is the catch me if you can story? I'm so sorry. That's dumb question. Oh, no, this is somebody else. Catch me if you can.
00:58:43
Speaker
I don't remember, obviously. Oh, he like faked being. What did he fake? He faked being a doctor. he faked being a doctor.
00:58:54
Speaker
and young Different pilot. And then he did like check fraud and all that stuff. There is a similar ending that story in this one, actually.
00:59:07
Speaker
um yeah sort of similar well it's weird sometimes when people just want to impersonate someone they're like i want to drive a train or maybe i'm making this story up but then like the person's just like i didn't even want to do anything bad with it i just wanted to drive a train for a day and you're like okay and then you did somehow you will sneak so weird okay I don't have much more.
00:59:33
Speaker
um Yeah, this is kind of so that's basically the case. This is kind of aftermath little things. um Yeah, so Frank says he made about 250 or $250 million dollars worth of fake notes.
00:59:49
Speaker
And ah he did unload some of it But if you remember, he only offered the authorities $200 million dollars as a bargaining chip. So he's often asked where this other $50 million dollars is. right ah His response, the few times he's acknowledged it,
01:00:14
Speaker
English is basic just not my first language? Sorry, I'm just kidding. Maybe. He says you would have to ask my accountant about that. ah It implies complex mathematical questions.
01:00:31
Speaker
It's like, yeah okay. Basically no comment. Another quote was saying, there's no way I'm ever going to touch another counterfeit again, even with a hundred foot pole ever in my life. Okay. Yeah. touch him, says. Oh, another quote. And now I just hear our banks are being threatened to go all digital.
01:00:59
Speaker
At least that's what Pat was saying, but know what he was watching. Oh, I don't think they do that. It's not good for anybody. Yeah,
01:01:12
Speaker
yeah another quote was the deterrent factor of jail was really potent. And it's been a turning point in my life. He added you get 60 years at 40 years old and it means your life is over.
01:01:27
Speaker
Yeah, he was he was pretty lucky.
01:01:32
Speaker
I was like, yeah, we don't even have that long of sentences, really.
01:01:42
Speaker
Another thing is that since Frank first told his story, rumors have circulated that he did not create the huge supply of counterfeit notes all on his own. And when he's asked about this, he has a clear answer. um And this this makes sense to me. i mean...
01:02:03
Speaker
But I can understand why people refuse to believe it was just him that made this like in like by himself because it's kind of crazy.
01:02:14
Speaker
But this is his response saying, in what world would any criminal or criminal or organization organization give $200 million dollars to a front guy so that he could give it to the courthouse instead of giving him a couple bullets to the back of the head?
01:02:31
Speaker
Which I mean, true. Like, why would... He sounds like he's on the traitors and trying to defend himself. If I was a traitor, why would I do this obvious traitor move? Like, literally just sounds like... It's too obvious. i just... It wouldn't happen.
01:02:50
Speaker
and ands but yeah, like, if he was just a ah guy who was... Involved in an organization, why would they ever give up $200 million dollars just to stop him from going to prison? Like, they wouldn't give a shit about him. No.
01:03:06
Speaker
No, not more than almost quarter a million dollars. Yeah. Or a quarter of a... whatever, yeah. Like... um Yeah, because of the extent of his operation, Frank, or Francois Barossa, has been called the world's greatest counterfeiter.
01:03:30
Speaker
And yeah, like I mentioned at the beginning, he has the record as the largest single counterfeiter in the in the world or something. That's weird. And the part that's kind of similar that guy from Catch Me If You Can is I'm pretty sure he also owns a security company now and works with the police to catch other counterfeiters. And I think that guy did the same thing. Yeah.
01:03:58
Speaker
You know, when you're really, really good at something, why do it for free? Especially if the police already know about you. And I've already caught you once. Found your niche, exploited.
01:04:12
Speaker
Start working for the government. a CIA informant or you're like a hacker guy, but you help, you know, yeah protect the systems by hacking. oh So it said about this, like his new mission is now to eradicate the counterfeiting problems at the highest levels of corporations. Yeah.
01:04:35
Speaker
Frank said, I've decided to completely reinvent reinvent my counterfeiting operation and turn it into a positive opportunity to help people.
01:04:46
Speaker
it says Frank works remotely out of Canada out of fear of further extradition charges to the US. And he says he consults on preventing counterfeit fraud in bank notes, driver's license, passports, birth certificates,
01:05:02
Speaker
fashion and the pharmaceutical industry okay he's pretty involved i guess yeah wouldn't someone like him be good at helping to work a department that could be like head up against scammers and fishers and phone you know all the different types of scams we get via the phones and everything and emails maybe i think that counterfeiting thing is more his like niche than like it's all just fake hackers or whatever it's faking looking like something legit it's i don't know yeah but the physical like yeah um i don't know doing it digitally and stuff like emails and that kind of stuff i think is a lot easier than it is to do the physical
01:06:02
Speaker
certainly seems like they have teams working on it. Yeah. And we just get stupid little we're like oh you have to fast these phishing test emails and do these little work yeah you know books and yeah.
01:06:20
Speaker
And God forbid you fail that because then you're going get talked to by HR. It's like somebody fucking go out there and fight against these like fraudsters. Oh there's just too many. Yeah like on the red line it's crazy i don't know yeah they like get so smart at like social engineering and whatever they just yeah if they spent half their freaking energy doing legitimate businesses as everyone says i think they'd make their money that way well
01:06:55
Speaker
I thought it was fascinating. There was like a few pictures about um what they had some pictures about like the not completed bills. And then that was basically it. Like there wasn't a whole lot of pictures involved in this one because they like don't know the location of like where the bills were made and yeah, all that kind of stuff. So yeah.
01:07:24
Speaker
I may have saved, like, to bring it back to how we're going to go through, like, we go through some of our saved on some Patreons. There was a post on Reddit. It made me think of where, like, someone had been given fishy-looking Canadian bills, and they posted online because they, I think, were in the U.S. or not in Canada. And we're like, are these real? And then I was like, ooh, that's really hard to tell. And, then like like, when you looked closely and then they showed the back, i was like,
01:07:54
Speaker
no they look off but like yeah legit they they were it was a legit concern because a we have different like um yeah what it's made of the the fabric or whatever you call it we were like oh we have the plastic money now whereas the us it's still basically paper and ours is more polymer bullshit whatever like can't really rip it yeah Yeah, it's weird because I remember when they came out with the plastic money, like it's been a while. What was it like 2011, 2012 that we got the plastic money? i remember them being like, oh yeah, it's going to be so much harder. Yeah.
01:08:43
Speaker
yes for like counterfeiters or whatever to do and i remember within like three or four months from the money being released there was already counterfeit five dollar bills in like circulation and it was like jesus christ hold my beer like canada yeah it was just like are you kidding me because the job i was working at um it was right when it was my first job and it was right when the plastic money started coming out and we still got quite a bit of cash at my job and I remember them like I worked in a mall and I remember the security going around um with the proper new five dollar bills and then the fake ones that had been hit like at a bunch of stores in the mall and like going around and showing all the employees in the mall that's smart um
01:09:37
Speaker
and stuff about it and I remember it was only a few months after the money was released and yeah that would be the time for everyone's unfamiliar and I think it probably was just adopted all throughout the commonwealth right because like euros and like pounds and Australian money because we used to have all of that um in the travel department when I was working there and that was they would have similar like you know, those little shiny hologrammy parts and all that stuff. Yeah. The little see-through bits. And it sounds funny to call it plastic money, but it is really like quite a different material. You're not going to like U S money people that don't eat in the dark. It all looks the same. Yeah. I hate, I hate it
01:10:26
Speaker
It's terrible. Oh, but anyway, That was really good. Thanks. I had fun researching it.
01:10:37
Speaker
i find like yeah maybe it was because I just liked Money Heist La Casa de Papal. I'm like, yes, print print the money. Nobody dies, but print the money. Yeah. Make your own money. Heist, heist, baby.
01:10:53
Speaker
i love a heist. Any old heist. you know Any old heist will do. yeah all right. We'll take a break. We'll come back for part two but
01:11:09
Speaker
for part two. There are over 200,000 unsolved homicides in United States justice system right now. And many of those cases haven't seen the light of day in years.
01:11:22
Speaker
Decades in some instances. The case files and evidence are sitting in a box on a dusty shelf in a basement, forgotten by law enforcement and the media, while the families and friends left behind wait for answers and fight for justice.
01:11:40
Speaker
Sometimes there is nobody left to remember or to speak up on behalf of the victim. I'm Arlene. And I'm Leah. And that is exactly what Box in the Basement sets out to do.
01:11:52
Speaker
To shine a light on those forgotten victims and to bring attention to unsolved murders and disappearances. We want to help families tell their stories. And we want to assist the families and friends of victims find the resources and support they need to continue their fight for justice.
01:12:09
Speaker
Join us every Thursday for new episodes of Box in the Basement wherever you find your podcasts.
01:12:17
Speaker
All right. I also have some famous forgeries. Yeah. A lot of like fakes and stuff maybe. Okay.
01:12:28
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah.
01:12:34
Speaker
Quiet down stomach. There's a mic here. um Okay.
01:12:40
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. i was like, ah there's lots of ones that are like top 10 art forgeries and stuff like that. And I'm like, They're fine, but it's nice if there's like a bit of a twist too.
01:12:52
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Like two or three. um That caught my eye. So ah starting with the Caravaggio conundrum, sometimes called.
01:13:08
Speaker
Okay. Don't hear that too often. Conundrum. No. Why not? Let's bring it back. Yeah, it's a great word. Truly.
01:13:21
Speaker
and i you know I love alliteration. Yeah. So almost 100 of the painter or the artist Caravaggio's unknown works, we'll put that works in quotation marks or What did I call them earlier? I heard someone call them inverted commas and I was like, that's a new one. thanks.
01:13:47
Speaker
Yeah. Brits are strange. Bunny ears. You mean no an apostrophe? Double apostrophe? Yeah.
01:13:59
Speaker
Like. Now we're just saying what things look like. Yeah. yeah It's like the hashtag, the pound. Press pound.
01:14:10
Speaker
The hashtag symbol. Yeah, so it's the same thing. used to be called the pound key. Oh, God. Star 69. Okay.
01:14:26
Speaker
So, about a hundred of Caravaggio's artworks were found in a castle in Milan. But immediate controversy ensues.
01:14:40
Speaker
Are they authentic? Right? Yes. Why would 100 be just there, I guess? Ooh, guilty of that podcaster thing where I said, guess what? I didn't look up pronunciation of this castle, this Italian castle.
01:14:59
Speaker
Guys.
01:15:03
Speaker
It starts with an SF, so we're already off to a good start. near then It's Sbarro! Sbarro! It's... Olive Garden!
01:15:17
Speaker
What does that guy keep shouting? Opa! Birds? Bikes! Bikes! Bikes! Oh, God. especially
01:15:31
Speaker
god Wee's laughing. For Zesco Castle. I'm sorry. So sometime in 2011-ish, they... Okay. ah ah Yeah, like a couple people said they had started studying a cache of 96 possible Carbaggios located in his old mentor's workshop in the castle.
01:16:02
Speaker
for Sure, sure. Yeah? Sure. good I guess that's where you'd find him.
01:16:08
Speaker
um His mentor being Renaissance painter Simone Pieterzano and the researchers, more Italian names, Maurizio Bernardelli, Caruso Guerreri, and Adriana Conconi Federigoli. Yeah.
01:16:27
Speaker
said the pieces, show the faces, bodies, and scenes the young Caravaggio would use in later years.
01:16:35
Speaker
If you ever listen to Smart List, this is where they would have of a recurring fake Italian audience member who when somebody says something they've like done and nobody says anything, they're like, oh my god, bravo, bravissimo!
01:16:51
Speaker
They start saying like they're an audience member. I think we should adopt that. when we have to pronounce hard things.
01:17:03
Speaker
um So yeah, they said they found this cache of Caravaggio's in Milan, but the city representatives who had not yet been informed of this find were cautiously hoping it was real, but... Yeah.
01:17:20
Speaker
Big but. someone They said, we'll be happy to discover it's true, but it's strange. They weren't in a hidden place. They were accessible to all. And this was said by the city council city council's culture spokeswoman, Elena Corriana.
01:17:41
Speaker
If authentic, they are estimated to be worth 700 million euros. Damn. Yeah, I guess that's why it matters. Yeah.
01:17:52
Speaker
Yeah, that is a lot. Okay. Frickin' art. oh Yeah. I'm shocked at the cost of some art when have not heard.
01:18:02
Speaker
I mean, I'm not an art person, necessarily. but like, sometimes when I haven't even heard an artist's name before, they're like, this is however much money. I'm like, that's too much. I've never even heard of that person.
01:18:17
Speaker
No, literally. and it does jazz up a house, and I'm glad that like Pat bought that big one downstairs that says a painting of ah Edmonton, like with a lovely sunset kind of in the background. And you're just like, ah it's just like, you know, maybe local artists, too. No, it's like gorgeous, quite big. But like, and then you like find out it's like thousands of dollars. And you're like, oh that's why people have posters on their walls when they're like in their 20s and stuff. Because we can't afford anything else. Yeah.
01:18:49
Speaker
Usually.
01:18:54
Speaker
Although, we can get that sponsor that does frames for everything, frames really jazzed up. oh Anywho, the city also immediately opened several investigations.
01:19:10
Speaker
um Emails from May of 2011 showed the pair of researchers had requested access to review the paintings were denied ah but were denied on-site showings.
01:19:24
Speaker
So the best they'd had is like a, an electronic copy of the paintings basically. Yeah.
01:19:35
Speaker
Uh, Francesca Rossi in charge of access to the castle's antiquities and art. She denied the two had seen the works in person. I've never seen them here. They've never had access to the collection. They've studied the images exclusively from the computer disk.
01:19:53
Speaker
And another Francesca, critic Francesca Capaletti, who helped authenticate Caravaggio's The Taking of Christ, believes they are by his mentor, Peter Zano.
01:20:06
Speaker
Hmm. Which would also make sense. given that it was also his workshop.
01:20:17
Speaker
But perhaps we'll never really know. But they don't seem to have been able to get them authenticated or sold such. Oh, weird.
01:20:30
Speaker
Yeah.
01:20:33
Speaker
They're just like, there some say is some of his popularity too. ah after his death more it was because there was some mystery around his death, and which caused some continued curiosity, um which is why I just had a little bit about how he was born a long time ago in September of 1571. And. Oh, damn.
01:20:58
Speaker
Yeah, he was born Michelangelo Maurici, but then moved to a place called called Caravaggio. guess where he got his name yeah and then when he died at age 38 uh 1610 there was some uncertainty over how he died so maybe he died in some obscurity i don't know but centuries later dna tests led to the conclusion that he simply got ill and died and that he maybe was not murdered which was also on the table as a possibility distinctly oh okay
01:21:37
Speaker
um He was apparently known to flee cities and leave works unfinished because of his tempestuous nature, which led him to kill at least one man. Quote. Damn. Yeah. all Those Italians.
01:21:55
Speaker
We love you. You're so passionate. um As for those researchers slash discoverers, Mr. Bernadette, he caroes and Adriana Fedrigoli they have since um not seemingly been punished but they have published a book it was called Young Caravaggio 100 Rediscovered Works and ah the Italian Amazon refused to stock it they wouldn't sell it in Italy okay I mean do you need to write a book about that
01:22:35
Speaker
Still trying to make that bank. Yeah. Seems a little weird. Yeah. I think there's even maybe a sequel.
01:22:46
Speaker
So, yikes. Oh, to what? can't remember. There was a second one. Damn. Like, Will Amazon sell anything?
01:22:58
Speaker
yeah Yeah, Amazon will sell anything. If you can't get it sold on Amazon, you know it's a problem. oh Bezos, you whore. um so And I had to take away fun facts that, car because i don't I'm not real good with the art history, but I do find it Neither am I. cool I find it cool when people know stuff about it, yeah. um Caravaggio was known for quote rare naturalism and use of light and shade a technique called chiara scuro guess what i should have looked up probably at least that one because i have heard that term before or at least seen it written when i say okay i don't know what that is apparently it's the yeah it's the use of light and shade i don't know i'm like
01:23:54
Speaker
fucking artists I look at things and people know how to draw something and do shading on it and like that just to me is my brain doesn't even know how you do that yeah hu shit I do wonder if I totally butchered that because you know the fucking the problem with Italian for me this is the problem Italian never know how to pronounce the C's C-H Is it chew? Or like sometimes like you guys, what is ciabatta? It's spelled like CI, right? Like what's up with that?
01:24:26
Speaker
i have no idea. How are you supposed to know
01:24:31
Speaker
How is one to know?
01:24:37
Speaker
do you pronounce it? Someone say it out loud. Wait, if I can make my phone say it. Pronunciation.
01:24:50
Speaker
art terms. Oh, at least when they spell it out, then I know phonetically. Sounds like chiaroscuro.
01:25:02
Speaker
See, how am I supposed to know that chia is about schiara? It looks like chia pet.
01:25:09
Speaker
Anyway, i always have an easier time with French.
01:25:14
Speaker
And also, yeah, I don't know. I guess he was a big deal in the art world world because the notable quote about him was that Robert Hughes critic said he reclaimed the human form. There was art before him and there was art after him and they were not the same.
01:25:27
Speaker
No but wonder everyone was trying to like cash in on his shit. Yeah. I don't know. I've never heard of him. i was like, I think I have.
01:25:40
Speaker
But also I feel like some people, like if maybe if you looked up of an image, you might, it might seem familiar. i don't know. Some people have like very distinct styles.
01:25:52
Speaker
oh Yeah. The next one is not so much art but a furniture piece. Art piece.
01:26:01
Speaker
Maybe Ron Swanson would call it art. They are the chairs of Versailles. Yeah, Versailles. oops Words are hard, okay? So, some of the most expensive fucking furnishings and furniture and stuff are at the luxurious Palace of Versailles in France.
01:26:23
Speaker
Of course, people can cash in on that and try to replicate some of very expensive chairs. In the twenty ten s two chairs appeared on the French antiques market that were thought to be the most expensive chairs made for Miss Marie Antoinette.
01:26:40
Speaker
um the lovely last queen of france's you know ancient regime gonna stop trying to say things before the bloody french revolution yeah ah ah um yeah and she was honestly much maligned as much women in history are unfortunately I wish she was known for her less famous quote, which is when she accidentally stepped on the foot of it her executioner and said, oh, I'm so sorry, please excuse me, I didn't mean to.
01:27:15
Speaker
Like, polite to the very end. um But yes, out of this tragedy, all these chairs are so fucking valuable now.
01:27:28
Speaker
um These particular ones discovered were found to be stamped with the seal of Nicholas Winnebier Folia? A celebrated cabinetmaker in Paris in the 1700s.
01:27:43
Speaker
And they were like declared actual national treasures by the government of France in 2013. so Damn. Never thought a chair would be a national treasure. of like Can you get any... Could this chair be any more fancy and valuable?
01:28:04
Speaker
Yeah.
01:28:08
Speaker
And of course, so the palace wants to own any and all chairs and artifacts that pop up associated with the palace.
01:28:19
Speaker
But these two, or at least some of this collection, were snapped up by the Qatari Prince Mohammed Bill Al Thani for $2 million dollars and other furniture, including chairs. Yeah.
01:28:35
Speaker
like crazy expensive chairs
01:28:40
Speaker
um others have appeared from the 18th century royal collection on the market over the years and most are bought by Versailles for display uh but there was a quote about other ones other items included another set of chairs purported to have sat in one of Marie Antoinette's chambers in Versailles A separate pair said to have belonged to Madame du Barry, King Louis XV's mistress, and the armchair of King Louis XVI's sister, fucking Roman numerals, Princess Elizabeth, and a pair of ployants or stools that belong to the daughter of King Louis XV, Princess Louise Elizabeth.
01:29:25
Speaker
Even the stools. So precious. People just like chairs. I mean, I got a pretty the old chair, but I feel like it's maybe this is. It's not. I mean, it's like velvet. It's got it's like orange and orangey red and green velvet.
01:29:43
Speaker
Oh, my mom would be into the chair. She likes to love an old chair or, know, the ones that have like the basket kind of weaving, like you can restore them. Oh, yeah. She's been known to pick up an antique and like give it some love. This one I really, gotta get some, uh, yeah, some more like of that wood, like moisturizing polish and kind of do up the wood.
01:30:10
Speaker
I've never done that. It's.
01:30:14
Speaker
Yeah. That's it. That, like, kind of sounds amazing. And, like, I love that we're into wood polish now because we have this big wood table. And I'm like, we should probably be polishing this bitch.
01:30:25
Speaker
Yeah, I have, like, my... Well, see, when I first moved out, I had ah rocking chair. ah had my coffee table. My couch, the arms and back were wood.
01:30:40
Speaker
and then i have... I still have, like, the... like shelves, little like entertainment unit that's wood. It was all part of the same set. So I used to buy that like pledge furniture polish stuff and do it like every few months.
01:30:59
Speaker
um But now I just have the, I only have that like furniture shelf thing left. And then, so I just haven't really in a long time, I probably should.
01:31:16
Speaker
Yeah, it should just be getting dusty and should just wipe it off. It's something. Yeah. Lazy. Yeah.
01:31:29
Speaker
Could love a nice, like, corner shelf, though. put some trinkets on. Oh, yes. My friend Anita at work got a cute one. i was like, oh! It had, like, a light. Yeah. It could turn, like, purple or green in the background.
01:31:43
Speaker
behind your knickknacks. Oh, yeah. Very cute. um Two million dollars. No. no yeah ah um
01:32:02
Speaker
Yeah, so many of the chairs are still at Versailles, right in the palace, except for at least one who was bought by the Grand Hermès family.
01:32:13
Speaker
Ooh, don't they make fancy scarves? No, I don't know.
01:32:18
Speaker
The Hermes, they make the handbags. Yeah, it's like spelled the same. Possibly missing an accent. I don't know, that was like when somebody was talking about, it was an older release podcast episode, but they were reading a post that was like, oh I was today years old. Did you guys know that the Kinder Egg the inside that holds the the plastic toy, it's yellow because it's the yolk. And I was like, yeah, 38 years old. I don't think I've ever heard that. Just like something random. Weird. And then, yeah, it was weird. And then there's like going on about it. And then also reading further on, it was like, wait, wait, there it was made by the something Ferrero. And then we're like, wait, what? Ferrero Rocher?
01:33:08
Speaker
Yeah. Is it the same chocolate family? Yeah. probably still have we all under like Nestle or something. Who knows? Yeah, it's all Nestle, Toulouse, or whatever. Yeah. um So, but in 2016, this assortment of royal chairs would become embroiled in a national scandal that would rock the French antique world, bringing the trade into disrepute.
01:33:39
Speaker
The reason? The chairs were in fact all fakes. Damn. So dramatic. He's French. Two people were subsequently put on trial for both the deception.
01:33:52
Speaker
Antique expert, his name is George, like George in English, or George, Bill Palau.
01:34:04
Speaker
I'm like, why is your nickname Bill when your first name is George or whatever? But okay. um We'll call him Bill.
01:34:14
Speaker
or palette or however you say last name oh my god i'm struggling and award-winning cabinet maker bruno nu i think uh bruno the pair were charged with fro frode i don't think english is my first language
01:34:36
Speaker
that's how i felt i was like i can't read simple words anymore what's happening oh it might be an alien It's been so long since we recorded. I was like, or since I had even typed up my notes, I was like, what the hell is happening right now? I can't even read this.
01:34:55
Speaker
What are words? um Yeah. I'm just going to continue to call it frowed and money laundering.
01:35:06
Speaker
oh Nine year investigation. Director of the gallery was charged with a gross negligence. Oh, this one was fun because there was a a French name where it looked like the French word for gallery. So I thought they were just talking about the gallery, but they're talking about a person with the name gallery.
01:35:27
Speaker
Oh no. How confused I was, even writing the notes. I've never heard the name gallery before. I mean, i it's probably like gallery or something, but the way it was spelled, I got...
01:35:43
Speaker
so confused that it was his wife's name. um Either way, at the director of the gallery was charged with gross negligence. You never hear that about regular negligence, do you?
01:35:57
Speaker
A medium. a medium negligence. Oh, okay. It's never like extremely cute versus gross negligence. ugly noings Yeah, Yeah.
01:36:12
Speaker
Filthy rich. Yeah.
01:36:17
Speaker
The trial was set for March and both parties pled guilty. Not the gallery guy. Ironically, Mr. Pallet or Bill had previously been called up upon to give his expert opinion on other historical items in question. So like before his own trial, he'd been considered the top scholar on French 18th century chairs and literally written the book on the subject.
01:36:40
Speaker
Oh my God. Yeah, trust no one.
01:36:46
Speaker
Bill said it started as a bit of a joke back in 2007. See if they could replicate an armchair, quote unquote, that they're already working on restoring that once belonged to Madame de Berry. And they pulled it off, managing to pass it off as a true artifact of the period until they didn't.
01:37:03
Speaker
It's like, yeah, you say it started as a joke, but and then you're just going like, look, yeah i replicated this wonderful one and then I never did anything else with it. Yeah.
01:37:16
Speaker
Eventually. And I mean, like, I think I had to look up updates that ended up being from, like, last year, 2025. The two fraudsters were sentenced to four months.
01:37:27
Speaker
And they were, like, kind of, like, time served, basically. Oh, wow. Yeah. It was a huge deal in the end. But they... What about that chair that was sold for two million dollars?
01:37:47
Speaker
shrug
01:37:50
Speaker
I remember I was trying to like dig for the follow-ups because you know when it's like kind of a a one-off news piece or whatever I know they have this problem on podcasts that cover like petty crimes because you'll get like the headlines and then like the Florida man headline with no names and no like information and you're like oh great like how do I google this yeah yeah oh no it's bad
01:38:22
Speaker
Oh yeah. Okay. Now I have to look because I'm like, I have my sources, my exact one with some pictures because yeah, hard to find stuff. Um, that's that. And there was an honorable mention.
01:38:38
Speaker
I like the way they call them. Fakins. They are fake Francis Bacon works. Fakins. Okay. Six degrees of Francis Bacon. No.
01:38:53
Speaker
Yes. Francis Bacon was Irish born in 1909. Apparently known for his raw and settling imagery and focusing on the human form.
01:39:04
Speaker
lot of people like to focus on that human form. Apparently. Yeah. I know it's just hard to draw. Hard to draw a Hard to draw a face. Yep. Eyes.
01:39:15
Speaker
i can draw like one eye. yeah And then the other eye is like. Yeah. The other eye does not match. I can draw like.
Art and Restoration: From Family Memories to Funny Fails
01:39:24
Speaker
A right eye? I don't even know. What does that mean?
01:39:27
Speaker
i am not very good at drawing. I'm one of those people I got decently good at tracing stuff. ah But I never really got good at drawing.
01:39:38
Speaker
Like freehand or anything. No. Yeah. Doesn't seem to be whole lot that in our family either. Although my sister drew a cool tiger picture that I think my mom framed. I remember seeing it up on the wall.
01:39:55
Speaker
I have a weird poem about plants from like when I was in second grade. and nice It's actually like quite good. And it's like, Oh, like, like for my age.
01:40:11
Speaker
Yeah. it's this and that. And it like, it spiders up from the ground. And then it's like, I have roots that dig deep into the ground. It just like ends on such like a childlike note. It's so funny.
01:40:24
Speaker
The end.
01:40:28
Speaker
Oh, it's like <unk>s like I forgot. I was like trying to be a poet. No, I don't know. Oh.
01:40:37
Speaker
Okay. Francis Bacon Fakin'. One of his most notable works was The Breakthrough, Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion. even saying that I felt bored I'm so sorry but this is a triptych he painted in 1944 do you know what that is is it all it's it all red that's one from interview with the vampire don't know is is it all red and someone's chewing on a baby in the front or something that sounds terrible I think so
01:41:13
Speaker
But it's like, it's like famously creepy. No, I don't think that is this. ah This is talking about a triptych, which I think those are those type of paintings where you would see them in like, means like three, and then it might be like put up on a mantelpiece and it's like set, it's like it can stand up and then it's like three parts joined in the middle. I don't know if that makes any sense.
01:41:39
Speaker
What is that called?
01:41:42
Speaker
Um, the work is called Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion. Yeah, that's the one in Interview with the Vampire.
01:41:54
Speaker
is? Oh my god. Yes, it's the one that ah is in Louis and Amaran's apartment. they' It's the one that they're talking about so trying to sell in the one episode. And they say, oh, we have a liar bind up, we're gonna...
01:42:09
Speaker
talk to them. Oh, it comes up quite easily and when you just start putting that in at least. you don't have to type the whole thing out. Okay, let me see here.
01:42:19
Speaker
Oh, I see the red. This is not what i was thinking of, but yes. i ah Okay.
01:42:30
Speaker
Interesting. I'll have to tell Pat. He likes... Interview with a vampire.
01:42:38
Speaker
I'm pretty sure, hold on Let me change my Google. Never been wrong on this pod before. i'm just kidding.
01:42:52
Speaker
Oh yeah, and apparently just the end of that note was it helped seal his reputation as a bleak chronicler of the human condition. You're like, oh art that's not makes you feel good looking it.
01:43:03
Speaker
no Yeah, they're all creepy pictures. I think that's why it's like stuck in my mind.
01:43:12
Speaker
Yeah, I could see that. Born into poverty in Dublin in the early 1900s. Then ah met um a man named Peter Lacey, possibly the love of his life, but he used Peter's raging alcoholism and violence to engage in his love of S&M in a way. i was like, okay. Okay.
01:43:39
Speaker
dark no also suffered from asthma and died of a heart attack in 1992 which i also was like damn 1992 doesn't that seem like crazy you know that charlie chaplin was also alive briefly for a time when pharrell was doesn't that break your mind oh damn he must have been pretty old
01:44:04
Speaker
yeah there is There's a few pictures. None of these are really great, but there's a still from Daniel. He's standing in front of the picture.
01:44:15
Speaker
and then there's... Yeah. These other ones, it's like in their living room. He's sitting on the couch in front of it. Okay. Yeah. That's interesting. Apparently, I guess it's... If we were more... If we were more arty, we would know. two seconds. Yeah, I just remember like...
01:44:34
Speaker
seeing something and being like those pictures are fucked like you does some that evos youn is a that's of that's fucked yeah yeah that's basically it it's just there were some fakes of Francis Bacon's um one time it was 2021 when Italian authorities seized about 500 works of art supposedly done by Bacon just a few um that's coming in you to make 500 fake paintings that's fucking crazy yeah yeah and depending on the source it was five to seven people charged with it and also like maybe 480 so but whatever something
01:45:25
Speaker
like that yeah um The people were charged with criminal conspiracy and trying to authenticate and circulate fake works of art in money laundering, of course.
01:45:37
Speaker
Fraud. Fraud.
01:45:42
Speaker
The curse of Strode. um Along with cash and other valuables, the whole thing was worth about 3 million euros, I think, if it was real. Yeah.
01:45:56
Speaker
That's not even that much. Yeah. For that many, right? It's For 500 pictures. How long would that have taken to paint? You might as well have become your own artist.
01:46:11
Speaker
Exactly. We're giving you this bacon at a deal. They're like selling them out of the back of their van. Yeah. Oh my God. Terrible.
01:46:24
Speaker
So... The main suspect in this one was, uh, um, sorry. It is spelled Bologna. Bologna.
01:46:38
Speaker
Bologna. It was a Bologna-based man who was previously connected to a 2018 incident called the Paloma operation, which included faken's and purported Picasso paintings as well.
01:46:52
Speaker
Oh no. He was a twice-baked faker.
01:46:58
Speaker
ah That wasn't the only time fakins were found. 2013, the Francis Bacon Foundation discovered a deception by David Edwards, none other than the brother of Bacon's heir and companion, John Edwards.
01:47:14
Speaker
Wow.
01:47:17
Speaker
So close. Inside man. David had made 1.3 million euros off these fakes, which were slammed as being nothing more than pastiches or even parodies and profoundly disrespectful of Bacon's authentic body of work.
01:47:30
Speaker
Oh.
01:47:34
Speaker
And that is
01:47:38
Speaker
it except for... I'll show you a funny one. the Funny ones. Yeah. Um... honorable mention section to the botched restorations oh no like gonna okay okay i remember that one picture that went viral a couple years ago i can't remember it was a jesus or something that was like so bad yes there's a very bad you reader doing
01:48:12
Speaker
it's it's it's got its own like article Um, okay here's like the... I'm just gonna put a link in our chat of the one that would have all of the... ones I'll talk about.
01:48:30
Speaker
You know, there's a listicle of like 15 or so. 17 actually, being specific. But yeah, the um... That one, I was like, when I specifically went looking for them, I'm like, I know there's one called this. And it was the one, it's in a place called, I want to say Borja, Spain.
01:48:51
Speaker
B-O-R-J-A, Spain. And it's sometimes referred to as the Beast Jesus. The Beast Jesus.
01:49:01
Speaker
Well, I mean, there's different things said. It was, oh God, where is that one on this list? Or should just let that be in? it it It ended up like a viral unfortunate attempt at a nice rest restoration.
01:49:22
Speaker
Even if you look it up it's like beast Jesus before and after. They're all women, each, whatever. But like okay they were just trying to read you know restore an ah actual legit old um artifact in Spain.
01:49:43
Speaker
Yeah, some of these are weird. Like, what are they doing? lady, her name was Cecilia, and she was an amateur painter. beast They called it an internet icon after botched fresco restoration went viral in 2012. Oh, no, she's died 94, you guys.
01:50:03
Speaker
Oh. she's died at ninety four you guys oh um But it like brought a lot of, um, it does look kind of terrible, you must admit. it look it It once had a face. I don't know if before she tried to restore it, it then like didn't have anything, but oh boy, it loses all its features. That's all I can really say.
01:50:30
Speaker
like, yeah, she rough. Some of these are crazy. are crazy Um, yeah, I had a short list. There was the the first one they put on the list um that I sent you in the chat.
01:50:46
Speaker
It's if people want to see it, it's like 17 worst restorations or something, Artnet. You'll find it. Oh,
01:50:57
Speaker
Da Vinci's the Virgin of Child with St. Paul. They like tried to clean it up and then it just got like so much lighter and like a lot of time they just end up looking cartoony.
01:51:08
Speaker
Yeah, some of these, like this one that literally is all wooden, like stained wood, and then it's painted like a Disney cartoon in the slide beside it And it's like lime green and hot pink and teal and blue and red. And I'm like, but it was wooden before with no paint on it. So why the fuck would you paint it?
01:51:33
Speaker
Oh, so not the statue that looks like he's been, like, had a glow up where he's like, now Oh, yeah, the one has, like, lipstick and makeup on now. Wear makeup. Yeah, now I'm androgy. And a spray tan. That's the St. Anthony of Padua statue, solid and colonial. Yeah. They gave him sculpted eyebrows and, like... Jesus had his David Bowie glow up. He's looking good. Yeah. Yeah.
01:51:59
Speaker
i I love whatever this one is. It's the tree of fertility. I don't know what looked like before, but now it's a tree with penises on it. oh my god. That's great. Which one was that?
01:52:11
Speaker
Tree of fertility. Yeah, some of them are just, you have to see them to almost believe them. Oh, there it is. oh no!
01:52:23
Speaker
i did not even really register all the dick and balls. Yeah. Is famous for its depiction of numerous spouses, or at least it was before 2011 cleaning.
01:52:37
Speaker
Oh, so they were accused of censoring it. Wow, guys. They took away some of the dicks. ah Oh, Jester Lavor, critical role would not be happy.
01:52:53
Speaker
Yeah, some of them are, like, they didn't show much of a before and after, but Yeah, a couple that's where I'm getting confused because I'm like, what did it some of these before? What did they look like?
01:53:06
Speaker
I know the Great Wall of China. It's like they said that people were shocked to discover that restorers had essentially paved over a mile section of the Great Wall of China. You're like, OK, doesn't really show it very well.
01:53:23
Speaker
But then there was a couple where they're like they redid like a little crumbling old tower in that and that looks like something from Minecraft as they put it in some of the comments. Yeah. Like,
01:53:38
Speaker
Yeah, maybe some things we should just leave alone.
01:53:44
Speaker
know. Like, if something... Sorry. sorry If something isn't painted, like, and maybe we don't need to paint or maybe we can just clean the dirt off of something without redoing Without violently doing it, yeah.
01:54:01
Speaker
Yeah, some of these are crazy. yeah I had written down my top, like, nine, and then just kind of scrolled through some because they were so interesting. The Santa Barbara, it was ah I think that was a statue they redid.
01:54:15
Speaker
and Yeah, that one weirds me out because other than it being muted colors, like yellow and blue, kind of, it doesn't look like it's damaged in any way. And then the other statue looks totally different. so So why even do it? Yeah, yeah why even do it?
01:54:39
Speaker
we have to pluck your eyebrows. It's a No, what is oh they had real plucked high eyebrows from one of those decades one was a pyramid too and i was like what and then they apparently just like smoothed it but i was like or they damaged the facade but was like don't understand just looks like an old whatever um yeah saint anthony about to be my little short list saint
01:55:10
Speaker
Anthony of Padua, yeah, he's had makeup on. St. George's Church of San Miguel. De Estela Navarre, Spain. The Buddha statue in Anu China.
01:55:24
Speaker
Circa 1000, mind you. then they're fixing these things. Like, yeah. oh Oh, yeah, that was the kind of Minecraft-y looking one. The Okakli Ada Castle.
01:55:40
Speaker
Seelay turkey. That's probably all wrong, especially because I said turkey, but you know what i mean.
01:55:48
Speaker
And they made it look like it's got like a little face with the the windows like like they even have little eyebrow windows over the square parts. So weird. I don't know if something survived looking like that for like thousands of years. You can just leave it alone.
01:56:07
Speaker
like Yeah, just leave alone. Oh yeah, yeah, Buddhist frescoes. Those were also very old. yeah from like 900. Crazy.
01:56:18
Speaker
Anyway, that was just to end. I was on a fun note, but we'll put some of them up with the episode or whatever. Yeah. Little palate cleanser.
01:56:32
Speaker
Oh. yeah But you know what? At least that one brought a whole bunch of tourist stuff to see the poor crazy Jesus. God. can only imagine.
01:56:46
Speaker
don't know. That's what actors feel like when they get all, and oh, well, we're going to have to photo, or but not whatever you call it nowadays, because, like, we have to make you look younger
Looking Forward: Creepy Castles Teaser
01:56:54
Speaker
for this one. So we're going to give you that, like, airbrush.
01:57:00
Speaker
Yeah, damn. It's crazy. It's crazy. and oh well till next
01:57:16
Speaker
said our patreon is coming sometime next week gonna be saves some fun fun things videos whatever we feel like and then maybe some more funny stuff yeah Yeah, our next regular episode, which will be in February. i don't think we said what we were doing, but it's Creepy creepy Castles.
01:57:45
Speaker
Yeah. Taking it back to castles. It's been a minute. Uh-huh. There's definitely many more haunted and weird and scary ones that we have not talked about.
01:57:57
Speaker
yeah Plenty of history out there to cover still. if Until next time, keep it great day.
01:58:10
Speaker
Bye-bye.
Credits and Community Engagement
01:58:36
Speaker
Thank you for listening to Castles Encrypted. We love all our listeners and appreciate every subscriber, every new review, every listen, rate and download. Our music is by Kobe Offair and our cover art is by Antonio Garcia.
01:58:50
Speaker
We are also a proud member of DirkCast Network where you can find the best and spookiest of all indie podcasts. Follow us on social media where we are at Castles Encrypted on mostly all of the things now including TikTok. Check out our bonus content on Patreon cryptid clashes, video mini-sodes of your hosts making asses of themselves, ask me anything, quizzes, other special episodes, and more. Starting at just $2 a month, you can get one to two extra episodes, depending on your level.
01:59:22
Speaker
We produce, edit, and research everything ourselves, and any support you can lend helps us to keep it cryptic.