18144: Lyall on the ganja thing (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: jedidiah daudi lyall <postmaster@lyalls.net>

I did not see the coverage of the marijuana smoking at the
(apparently) tail end of the last big Lavalas march. I certainly
heard about it tho. Madam mwen told me about it. She was rather
shocked.

Since hanging out with me she has learned that foreigners frequently
do not regard ganja as corrupting. Most haitians, however, think that
smoking marijuana is disgraceful. There are a very few rasta haitians
who smoke marijuana at semi public events but clouds of grass smoke
are never found over haitian parks as they are in the usa and evropa.
Maybe moskva by now too.

Allowing this marijuana celebration to go on the air (in this very
expensively produced news short) was probably a political mistake.

They had their own helicopter for the news coverage. I saw it
downtown, hovering over Nazon/Lalue. I stopped to check it out
because it was not Titid's mercenary copter, it was green. Someone
told me it was the BBC but bringing in a helicopter for BBC coverage
seemed rather incredible. Then someone told me it was for the
official news coverage, that the crew hanging out of the side of the
copter were coordinating with organizers on the ground. So, it was a
TNH operation for this well organized march.

Well organized except for putting the ganja rastas on the air. That
was probably a minus to the people intended to be influenced by the
march.

So as not to shock the liberal Brits out there, I don't care, I'm
scots/uhmerkun/haytian. Its the conservative haytians who didn't
appreciate it.

Oh, crack is usually smoked en melange with local marijuana here. To
mellow the hit of the crack as well as to disguise the smell of the
cocaine. As far as I know the Rastas don't smoke crack.

-- 
J.David Lyall, or
     Jedidiah Daudi
http://www.lyalls.net/