No Fear & Loathing in Amsterdam
The Changing Face of Europe’s Adult Playground

Iona Miller Interviews Expat, Joseph Aaron on the Amsterdam Scene, 8/2008

US citizen, expat Joseph Aaron, whose name in the Church of the Subgenius is Daddy of Jesus, managed the vaporizer at The Hash, Marijuana & Hemp Museum for years. During that time his Italian partner Claudia, called “Cloud,” expertly grew the plants for Sensi Seed Bank. Over the last decade, they have had a ringside seat in the jaded heart of the Red Light District from which to watch the morphing social scene of Amsterdam through a dense cloud of cannabis smoke. The consensus is more restrictions are coming. Joseph and Cloud also attended Albert Hofmann’s 100th birthday party in Basel, Switzerland with several other psychedelic activists, artists and luminaries.

"In 1484, Pope Innocent VIII issued a papal condemnation of witchcraft in
which he specifically condemned the use of cannabis as an 'antisacrament' in
satanic worship. The black mass celebrated by medieval witches and sorcerers
presented a mocking mirror image of the Catholic Eucharist, and in it
cannabis traditionally took the place of wine - serving as a pagan sacrament
in a counterculture that sought to undermine the established church.

The fact that witches and sorcerers were the first Europeans to exploit the
psychoactive properties of cannabis probably sealed its fate in the West as
a drug identified with feared outsiders and cultures conceived in
opposition: Africans, hippies. The two stories fed each other and in turn
the plant's power: people who smoked cannabis were Other, and the cannabis
they smoked threatened to let their Otherness in the land."-Michael Pollan's "The Botany of Desire", p. 173-174

That Was Then; This Is Now

Freewheeling Amsterdam is legendary. Anyone who has been there has experienced that particular brand of psychic freedom unavailable anywhere else with “No Fear.” The passionate heart of Amsterdam beats in her internationally famous Red Light District. But Amsterdam is not immune to the war on drugs.

What happened to Amsterdam’s liberal attitudes? In 1987, not long after the Hash, Marijuana & Hemp Museum opened it was promptly raided “We are not so liberal as people think,'' said Eddy L. Engelsman, head of alcohol and drug control in the National Ministry of Health. “We find that with our integrated policy the drug problem is stabilizing or diminishing.”

Since the 1960s Amsterdam has been known for political and social activism. Drug use is not legal but it is regulated. The city is changing due to inexorable pressures from its neighboring countries and internal forces. Many loath the changes this has brought about and fear that it a slow erosion of their precious cognitive liberties.

Official Leniency: Legalities of Use and Growing

Don’t think for a minute that possession of soft drugs is legal. They are simply decriminalised. Anyone over eighteen can possess thirty grams of soft drugs without arrest. A coffeeshop can stock five hundred grams of weed and can sell five grams to each person per day.

After 100 customers the owner needs to replenish his stock. Selling is decriminalised but storing is illegal. So is manufacture and importing. Even a coffeeshop owner can be prosecuted if he has more than thirty grams. The risk is confiscation of the product with a €1000 fine.

Foreigners think they might just walk down the street smoking reefer, but such is not the case. Smoking is only sanctioned on private property, mainly the 700 or more cannabis coffeehouses. You can smoke outside if you are using their curbside facilities but not on public streets.

Amsterdam's top attractions are places that usually don't sell coffee, but specialize in mind enhancing products. As advertizing marihuana is not allowed, you will have to ask for the menu, which shows a variety of weed and hash. Prices range from €5 to €15 per gram. The Dutch used to mix weed with tobacco and smoke their joints in the coffeeshops, but new laws are changing that.

Public cannabis use is not generally acceptable in Dutch society. While marijuana smoking is tolerated by the government, smokers are wise to restrict their consumption to designated coffeeshops and private homes. Judges must be discreet out of consideration for nonsmokers and local customs. Unless you're in a coffeeshop or your own hotel room, always ask permission before lighting up. Do not smoke cannabis in your hotel lobby or corridor.

At the cannabis coffeeshops, marijuana and hashish are sold either behind the bar or at a separate window. Most shops provide a written menu, but due to government prohibition of any sort of advertising of cannabis products, you will usually have to ask to see the menu or to be shown samples. Many shops also provide free rolling papers and little strips of cardboard for making filter tips. A few coffeeshops provide pipes, bongs and/or vaporizers for customer use.

Coffeeshops are places to hang out, offering a living-room-away-from-home atmosphere where you may feel free to read, write, play games, talk to friends and meet strangers while enjoying a beverage and a relaxed smoke. Although most coffeeshops don't serve alcohol, there are still quite a few that offer beer, wine and liquor on premises. Whatever their selection, it's considered polite to eat or drink something while at the coffeeshop. In the tourist district (the Red Light/Dam Square area) some shops require that you purchase something in order to sit down. (High Times)

Around 2004?, rules for psychedelic mushrooms changed. Due to pressure from neighboring France, it became illegal to sell or possess dried psychedelic mushrooms. Yet the varieties sold were perfectly legal until they sat around on the table for a week and naturally dried out, thereby becoming contraband.

Cannabis is sold in myriand forms, confections and chocolaates, etc. If you want to eat the cannabis concoctions called space cakes, be careful. It can take an hour to feel the effects on an empty stomach, while if you've already eaten a meal, it can take up to two hours. The effects last much longer and are more intense than from smoking cannabis. Panic reactions are common, even with regular users. Space cakes used to be more prevalent in Holland, but the Dutch government got tired of tourists getting too high and now views eatable cannabis as virtually a hard drug.

Ironically, smoking regular tobacco was recently banned in all cafes. So, strangely enough, you can smoke pot but not tobacco which most locals prefer to mix with their hash or weed. Similar to bans elsewhere, the new law prohibits smoking in bars, cafes, restaurants and clubs to protect people from secondhand tobacco smoke This move is part of a trend, an over-all crackdown.

Hash, Marijuana & Hemp Museum & Sensi Seeds

Naturally, Amsterdam is full of art and museums for media, photography, architecture, religion, shipbuilding and history. Besides the well-known Rembrandt, Van Gogh and Anne Frank Museums, it has its share of alternative museums, also – sex museums, torture museums, wax museums, Biblical and cannabis museums. It gives new meaning to “drug of choice.”

Anyone hearing him would swear this must be Tommy Chong’s little brother. Thirty-something Thelemite, Joseph Aaron worked at the Hash, Marijuana & Hemp Museum from 19 -200 . His highly desirable job was making sure the patrons got a good demonstration of the drug’s effects when they toked on his huge vaporizer, the Volcano. Plenty of people would love that job! Inhale a lungful and walking the cobblestone streets resembles a roller coaster through Wonderland. And the Dutch pastries are divine!

Of the numerous museums of Amsterdam, this unorthodox one has the most kitsch. Expert staff take you down to their grow room and explain to you how to grow your own weed. Located in the heart of the Red Light District, the Museum has attracted over a million visitors at roughly 75,000 per year.

The pungent whiff of thriving marijuana plants from the indoor garden greets the visitor on entry. Elsewhere the 8000 year history of cannabis is explored in an unsensational, fact-packed manner, detailing the use of hemp in the textile and paper manufacturing industries, the medicinal usage of marijuana through the ages and, of course, the plant's role as a recreational drug. Smoking paraphernalia and an impressive collection of original artwork and photography is also displayed. One collection of black and white photography documents the hash manufacturing process from start to finish in Afghanistan.

The museum attempts to present an objective perspective on the controversial plant while educating the public on its various uses. It discusses scientific breakthroughs involving cannabis and its ancient and modern medicinal use. Visitors emerge much more enlightened, educated and probably a little more dizzy than before.

Dec 1, 2008 Dutch Mushroom ban goes into effect

It is official now - the Dutch ban the possession and distribution of
most mushrooms which naturally contain psilocin and psilocybin. Not all such mushrooms, because the law is
targeted towards a long list of (mostly) Panaeolus + Psilocybe species.
But some newly discovered species are not on that list.

Amanita muscaria becomes illegal too. Most likely
the Netherlands are the first country in the world where this is so.

Another strange formulation is the "naturally containing" part. To my
knowledge Panaeolus and Psilocybe species which are capable of
producing psilocin and/or psilocybin stop doing that when they grow on
substrates which naturally contain lots of phosphates (think about soil
rich in bird droppings for instance). The reason for that is that
psilocybin is a phosphate. And when there is a lot of phosphate in the
soil the mycelia produce enzymes which break those down, including their
own psilocybin.

So at first sight the new law is bad for smartshops and tourists but not
necessarily lethal for mycophiles who grow their own.

The prosecution guidelines for Psilocybe mushroom
production/possession/distribution published Dec. 1. According to the
Amsterdam TV station AT5 there is a treshold amount under which the
police will not take action. The threshold is half a gram for dried
mushrooms and five grams for fresh ones.

This means that you can still grow mushrooms for spore production, even
if the mushrooms do contain psilocybin. Five grams may not be much but
it is enough to stay on the safe side of the law.

And of course... sclerotia are not mushrooms. The Dutch law only outlaws
the fruitbodies and their cultivation!