CANNABIS
Newsletter of the Cannabis Hemp Information Club No. 4
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CONSUMING CANNABIS A personal Journey by Free Rob Cannabis
My first direct
experience of Cannabis was when I was 16 and a joint was offered to me by
physics teacher on a school skiing trip. At the time I turned it down, as I
believed that Cannabis was a drug, and that drugs lead to addiction and
death. Zamos drug experiences on the BBC’s Grange Hill certainly had a deep
influence on me. However all the teachers on this school trip that I got on with, were all smoking the joint. Even though I was really
just into getting drunk, and not smoking, the fact that most of my teachers
smoked Cannabis, made me think, well it can’t be that bad. The next time I got
offered a joint was by a friend of my older brother, at a New Year’s party
when I was 17 years old. I remember just getting the end of the joint, and
taking a few tokes, the first smoke to have entered my lungs for 5 years,
when I quit smoking cigarettes. I had started smoking cigarettes when I was
ten, but quit when I was 12, because I was just about to start at the same
school as my brother and I didn’t want me parents to find out. I remember sitting down
after the joint and definitely feeling something from it. Being New Years I was already pretty drunk,
so the effects were difficult to clearly evaluate. I tried it a few more
times at my brother’s friends parties, but never
really got into it as I wasn’t into smoking but more into drinking. When I left Engineering students
were more into drinking than smoking pot, so I never encountered Cannabis
again until after my finals and I went with a group of friends to Soon after graduating I
got my first job working on the Angel tube station and started to score some
Moroccan hash from one of the London Underground safety inspectors. It was
while working as an engineer, often doing night shifts that I really started
to enjoy smoking Cannabis. After a long and often stressful shift I’d get
home and smoke a joint outside or by my window (I was living with my
non-smoking parents). It always
relaxed me, and often got me high. Less than a year after I
stated work, my mother died, primarily, I believe due to the side effects of
a drug called interferon that she was put on to deal with the side effects of
cancer chemotherapy. At my Mother’s funeral I
overheard from her colleagues, how stressed she was by the work I was doing.
I decided to quit my job and take a brake from the rat race. I bought a house with my inheritance and
used this opportunity to start growing my own Cannabis, both indoors (under
fluorescents) and out. Though I was still very much into just rolling joints,
I experimented with cooking with Cannabis. I remember the first cakes I made
were just from the shade leaf from one outdoor plant, but what an effect.
Within an hour or so of eating a couple of these cakes I could see Snow White
and the seven dwarfs walking across this big tie-die sheet I had hanging up.
Even though I had had a very powerful experience of eating Cannabis, I still
remained very much into smoking joints. The following year I
started work as a motorcycle instructor. Virtually ever instructor smoked
Cannabis (all in joints), and it was here that my consumption of Cannabis
increased to 1994 was to be the
biggest changing point in my life. The Criminal Justice Bill was being passed
through parliament, which aimed to criminalize certain lifestyles. I was
outraged that one could be sent to prison if you looked as if you were
waiting to attend a rave. My response was to get 11 piercings,
2 tattoos, and to start going to road protests, anti-live export protests and
any other anti-government protest I found time to go on. It was during the summer
of ‘94 that I came across a book called ‘High Times - Celebrating 20 years of
smoke in your face’. Within this book I found an address for the Legalise Cannabis Campaigne. I
wrote to them, got an initial response, sent of for a 5-year subscription,
and then waited and waited. During the wait I came
across several more Cannabis books when I discovered Compendium Bookshop in Later that year I went
to the seventh High Times Cannabis Cup. Of all the Cups I have subsequently
been to, this was the best. I got loads of free weed and I got to see
Cannabis being consumed in another way other than just smoking joints. The Americans, and it is mainly Americans who go to the High
Times Cup, pretty much only smoke there weed pure. Pure joints, bongs, and
pipes. Though I tried it, I still preferred my joints. I also got to see an
aspect of Cannabis I’d never seen before; Cannabis spirituality. I clearly
remember walking in on a ceremony being held by Jah
Levi, in which Cannabis was being consecrated and consumed as a Holy
Sacrament. It certainly made me think more about what I was consuming, though
it didn’t stop me from smoking joints. Leading up to Christmas
‘94 I was asked to work almost every day over the Christmas break, so I quit
my job as a motorcycle instructor and went full on into Cannabis activism. In early ‘95 I
eventually got to meet up with the Leagalise
Cannabis Campaign, when they held their first meeting at the House of Hemp, a
Hemp Products wholesaler. I found the LCC to be
very focused on the smoking of Cannabis with little interest in the multitude
of it’s other uses. Eventually I felt I could not
work with the high level of fear and paranoia that I felt existed within the
LCC so I set up the Cannabis Hemp Information Club, with the aim of raising
people’s awareness about the history and many uses of the Cannabis plant.
Much of the influence for setting up CHIC and the museum (see ‘what’s been
happening with CHIC’) came not from smoking Cannabis, as many people assume,
but from LSD. I’d first taken LSD in
October ’94 and it had a deeply profound effect on me. It was after having
read much of ’The Emperor Wears No Clothes’ and taking some Acid that my
mission in life became clear to me, liberate Cannabis
for the benefit of all humanity. On New Years Day ’95 I
smoked my last joint with tobacco. It was while working as a motorcycle
instructor that I got into the habit of smoking cigarettes (only one other
instructor didn’t smoke) on a daily basis. I quit smoking cigarettes on their
own for New Years ’94, although it wasn’t long before I realized that by
smoking joints with tobacco, I was still addicted to nicotine. I remember
very well smoking the last few hash joints and thinking how can I possibly
give this up. Well I quit tobacco and what I think helped me stay off it was
the discovery that commercial tobacco is radioactive and cured with thousands
of highly toxic chemicals such as arsenic, hydrogen cyanide and formaldehyde.
I am so glad that I quit
smoking Cannabis with tobacco. Not only is it far more unhealthy and
addictive, it also lines the pockets of governments and corporate businesses,
as well as causing a whole load of environmental destruction. During the first few
months of quitting tobacco I kept rolling joints, but with ‘nicotine free
herbal tobacco’. I found the taste of most of these pretty
rank, and it wasn’t long before pipes and occasionally bongs became my
preferred method of Cannabis ingestion. Throughout the mid to
late 90’s, through to the new millennium, I was a fairly regular smoker of
Cannabis. I would smoke it pretty much every day, although the ritual around
it’s use certainly changed after I was arrested for it’s possession in March ‘97. It was while I was
constructing a defense for my possession of Cannabis that I researched the
spiritual and sacramental use of Cannabis. It was while working on the Though I didn’t actually
use this as my defense in my first trial, in subsequent trials I stated that
I was a devotee of Lord Shiva, and that I consume Cannabis as a spiritual
sacrament, a right protected by article 18 of the UN Declaration of Human
Rights. During the many years
that I smoked Cannabis I would always give a prayer in honor of Lord Shiva.
The first ‘Chillum Mantra’ (A Chillum is a clay pipe used for smoking
Cannabis, and a mantra is a short payer/ invocation said often in groups of
108 times) I learned while in Christiana Squat City, Denmark. This Indian guy
taught me it while we were preparing this massive veggie curry. It went like
this: BOOM BOLANATH,
KETANARTH, JEDANARTH, PASHUPATINATH, BOOM SHANKA, BOOM SHIVA.
This translates to an initial
awakening (BOOM) of Shiva (BOLANATH), in the temples of KETANARTH, JEDANARTH,
PUSHBATTI NARTH, with further repetitions of calling out to Shiva in his
various names (There are 1008 to choose from). Over the years I have
got deeply into my Shiva worship. I can understand that some people may find
this a bit odd, but each to their own. The more I would sit and pray to Shiva
(I’ve learned loads more prayers, mantras and invocations to Shiva over the
years) before smoking Cannabis, the higher I would get. The thing that got me
still higher was to take brakes from smoking Cannabis. Though I didn’t smoke
Cannabis every day, it wasn’t until September 1996 that I quit for just over
2 weeks. The initial plan had been 28 days, leading up to the ‘Turn Yourself
in Day’, but it was this girl’s birthday who I really fancied and I ended up
sharing this pipe of some of Soma’s hand pressed pollen, with her. Although I
only had one toke, it was almost like tripping on Acid in its effects. This
really taught me that less is definitely more when it comes to the smoking of
Cannabis. At the first Turn
Yourself in Day, and each subsequent Although I would happily
eat Cannabis, my preferred method of consumption was still to smoke it. In late March/ early
April 2001 I did a week long hunger strike at HMP Horfield,
Bristol City Prison. Just before going to prison, I’d done an Ejuva herbal cleansing program. Although by this time I
was on a totally raw food diet, and drinking Hemp milk nearly every day, I
still wanted to break my Cannabis fast with smoking it. I held a small party
to celebrate the event. I certainly got very high from smoking, but I also
had to deal with some really negative heavy vibes from this manic-depressive,
later on in the evening. His vibes really bought me down and I ended up
smoking to try and get me high. This didn’t work so I resorted to eating lots
of food that I’d prepared as part of a raw food feast. This made me sick, so
I smoked more, which made hungry, so I ate more, got sicker, smoked more, and
so the cycle continued for about four days until I realized I was doing
myself a lot of harm. The following year I
celebrated Maha Shivratri
(The main Shiva Festival that falls over the New Moon between February and
March) by making loads of raw Hash truffles and distributing them around For my 35th
birthday, Later that month I
decided to take a total break from consuming Cannabis, especially smoking it,
until after my court case (This one was for holding a public Cannabis
auction). I did very well, and lasted through to my trial in November 2002,
without consuming any herbal Cannabis or resin. The trial ended in a hung jury, and I was
told there would be a re-trial. I decided that I would
drink Bhang for Christmas, which I would be spending with friends in the Later that day we all
sat down to a ‘raw feast’. I was a few minutes behind everyone else getting
ready for lunch, but nothing could have prepared me for the ‘musical’ accumpliment to our meal. As I walked in to the dinning
room I just couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Over Christmas lunch one of
my friends decided to play ’Gangster Rap’ with the repeated lyrics of ’Kill
the Mother F**cker!, Kill
the Mother F**cker!’. I just sat there in stunned
silence for several minutes. Eventually I started to eat, which I kind of
regret having done, because soon afterwards I felt ill and depressed. This
was the first time I was feeling ’down’ in several months and I felt like a
smoke, but rather than smoking I thought I’ll use my new ’Vapir
Digital Vaporiser’. Problem was,
the friend who was playing the gangster rap had leant it to a friend. This
really pissed me off and only made feel more depressed. I woke up Boxing Day
feeling really down, so I decided to head off into the woods and have a
smoke. But again, just like the bhang, no effect. I smoked again the next day
and again no effect. This was really starting to concern me, would Cannabis
no longer have an effect on me? I decided to lay off smoking
again, but for New Year I had a smoke with some friends and got really high
again. This led me to get into the old habit of smoking several times a week
for the next month. Just before Christmas
I had received a letter saying that a date in early February had been set for
the re-trial. I wrote back saying I wouldn’t be available until mid June.
This letter was ignored, and then with less than a week to trial I went up in
front of a judge to get a new date. In every previous trial I have always
been given a new date without question, but this time I was refused. Three
days before the trial my shop was burgled and several thousand pounds worth
of uninsured stock was stolen. This totally gutted me. I was also let down by
a friend who said that they would give me a lift to Although I did get into
smoking again, I had cut down greatly from what I had been smoking. For my 36th
Birthday ( I continued smoking
about once or twice a week until early June 2003, when I came up to Drink from the Tree of Life and you become the Tree of
Life. Drink from the Tree of Life and you become Immortal. I’d been given various samples of Cannabis
at the rally and I was very tempted to smoke some, which I eventually did.
Straight away I felt very tired and soon feel asleep. The next day I was
determined to quit smoking, at least for the next 13 days. By evening I ended
up having a smoke, but that was to be my last smoke for 5 1/2 months.
Although I did start smoking again I really managed to control my intake. As
I write this article in Easter 2005, its been over 6 weeks since I’ve had a
smoke, although I am very tempted to, and if I get this magazine finished by
Good Friday, I may well treat myself with a Hash Chocolate and a smoke on
Easter Sunday. Eventually however I feel that I’ll totally let go of smoking
and the desire to smoke. As it turned out I never got issue 4 of Cannabis I know this article has
been a bit long winded, but it’s been quite a journey that I’ve been on with
my Cannabis consumption. To summarise
I would say this. I feel the best way to consume Cannabis is to eat/drink it
in its raw natural state. Taken in this way it is a true healing medicine.
Better still, is to be surrounded by loads of it growing in a tropical
climate, so that you are breathing in the volatile turpantines.
Better than smoking is to
use a vaporiser. The digital models like the ‘Vapir’ allow for accurate temperature control so you can
just consume the vaporized THC. They do work, although a heavy smoker may
find it takes a bit of time to get used to using one. If you are going to smoke,
remember the less often you smoke, and the better quality the Cannabis
(outdoor organic is best) the higher you’ll get. Also consider what you are
lighting it with. ‘Solar puffing’ on a hot sunny day using a magnifying glass
is best, or if not enough sun, use a lighted cocktail stick, or the ember of
an incense stick. Butane lighters burn at a very high temperature, causing
you to lose a lot of the THC, and then of course there’s the health effects
of inhaling burned butane to be considered. Having run a shop selling smoking paraphernalia for several years, it
always pleases me when people say they are quitting tobacco and want to buy a
pipe or bong. It’s the first major step towards creating a healthier
relationship with Cannabis. Just how far people want to go along this path is
down to them. I hope very much I have inspired some people along this path.
Good luck. I LOVE TO EAT
RAW CANNABIS IT MAKES
ME HAPPY, HEALTHY AND FULLY ALIVE
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