Sunday, May 29, 2011

"Coffee Shops"


Omg. So, yes, I tried cannabis in Amsterdam. ... What! Give me a break! It's legal out there! And I'd never do it here. I've never been interested in doing it, but I'm glad I did. I thought it was real interesting, so I'd like to write a blog about it to help me remember my experience.

Friday, we bought a spliff, but it was more tobacco than weed. It did nothing for any of us.

Saturday, we bought a bag of stronger stuff. It was called Amnesia. We smoked quite a lot, then sat around for 10 minutes, while I was thinking "ahh, nothing's happening again". But we suddenly realised I was stoned when James asked me a question and I had no idea what he had just said and I struggled to say anything at all in reply.

Believe it or not, I wasn't high in this pic, but it was minutes before.
It hit me like a tonne of bricks! From nothing at all to total weirdness. The first thing I noticed was that I could not make any new memories! I literally couldn't remember anything that didn't happen in the last second. I guess that's where the name "Amnesia" came from. But it wasn't just my memory, even my eyes couldn't keep up! It was like I was watching a video with a really low frame rate. Every image was separate, and I could only remember the last five or so images. So weird!

It took me a while to realise that my actions weren't really affected. Only my observations. I could still have a reasonable conversation, but I felt like I was observing my own actions (with a delay). Like someone was talking for me, and after a second or so later, I would hear what I just said (and strangely realise that it made sense!). Every time I said something, it felt almost exactly like how I feel when I sleep talk when I'm only half awake. It's always "wow, what did I just say? Oh man, my brain is just not here right now..."!

I then realised that my mouth was also very delayed. I would take a sip from my drink, but only feel my glass on my lips after I had put it back down! Then I would feel the delayed fizz of the drink going down my throat. Eventually, I lost all sensation in my face and my mouth felt like it had been injected with local anaesthetic.


I was very self-conscious as I really believed that I was talking far too loud and that everyone else in the bar could hear me. My voice sounded very different, too, but friends convinced me otherwise. I wanted to see if my legs still worked, but I was worried I'd make an idiot of myself! I went to the bathroom but I ended up going for the ladies accidentally! The bar man called over to me and I apologised and went to the men's. (Later, May told me that I didn't look totally stoned, it was just a genuine mistake). I didn't actually need the toilet, I just wanted to see what walking was like. I waited in the toilet trying to remember how long I had been there so I didn't look weird, but it was very hard to judge time!

Strangely, I felt pretty good! After the first 10 minutes, I went through a panic/paranoia stage (think I did too much), but it was pretty easy to get out of. It took me a while to appreciate my state of mind (thought it was pretty rubbish at first), but I got more and more relaxed with my state of mind, and I really started to enjoy it! It wasn't very practical for everyday life, but it was really interesting. I'll sound like a total stoner, now, but it really felt like I was discovering a different dimension of my brain that I had never used before. It was amazing to see what our brains are capable of. I'm so used to this steady, sterile, predictable state-of-mind, so it was great to see my brain from another angle.

Ooh, we also did Shisha on Saturday. Went well with alcohol. Made me feel a bit smoother.
On Sunday night, we got some more weed. Unfortunately for us, they only had the strongest stuff left in stock. It was called "Purple Haze". We did some, felt nothing, did some more, felt nothing, did even more... Then we started to come up. Much slower, this time. It was nice! This time there were no crazy memory effects or anything weird. It was a much more smooth transition. I just felt happier and found things funnier, I guess. We were all having a great time. The funniest part was when one of us thought that our legs were glued to the floor! Couldn't move them at all!


...Then about 20 minutes in, a few of us started to panic. Myself included. It was harder to get out of the panic, this time (I actually felt like I would throw-up). But I managed, just about. But everything from that point on just went downhill... It made us all feel really miserable and depressed. I felt very serious. My memory was smoothly erasing itself, I felt very confused. We sat in the bar for several hours just hoping that it would wear off soon. But it wasn't going anywhere. We decided to try to walk home because the fumes weren't helping at all.

We got home and went to sleep. In the morning, We couldn't believe we still felt stoned! This stuff wasn't wearing off! I wasn't too bad, I just felt very disconnected from my brain, all day. And the next couple of nights I woke up in the night with a strange, stoned feeling. Anyway, I'm fine again now. But Purple Haze really put me off ever trying cannabis again. Shame, because Amnesia was really fun!! Ahh well, I'm glad I had the experience. Onto heroin next!

No comments:

Post a Comment