Pubdate: Fri, 02 May 2003
Source: Toronto Sun (CN ON)
Copyright: 2003, Canoe Limited Partnership.
Contact:  http://www.fyitoronto.com/torsun.shtml
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/457
Author: Jason Botchford

FAR OUT, MAN!

Toronto Has Its Pot And Smokes It Too

Late at night, cruising Toronto's downtown, there's plenty of crack to be 
had but not much marijuana is being sold by the city's street-level dealers.

"I can get you some pot but it's a pain," one dealer says. "Honestly, it 
won't be good. Most people just have their own. This is the place you come 
to get your fix, you know, crack cocaine. Pot? It's everywhere. You don't 
need to come here."

According to a Sun-Leger poll, hundreds of thousands of Toronto-area 
residents smoke pot in any given week and, as a result, break the law.

The survey, taken in the first week of April, shows that 7% of adults in 
the GTA had smoked during the previous week. That compares to 5% in the 
rest of Canada and in terms of population, it represents 309,822 people.

Another 177,041 in the GTA had smoked pot in the past six months, according 
to the survey.

"You have a lot of very ardent cannabis consumers in this city," said local 
hemp salesman Larry Duprey.

Dan Bryant, 40, is one. The recreational toker has been smoking three or 
four joints a day for 20 years. He smokes them to the nub and then keeps 
what's left -- the roach -- to create his own artistic tribute to pot.

Of the thousands of joints he's smoked, he has kept just about every one. 
He has made a guitar designed with 2,000 roaches. It took him eight years 
to create. He makes roach lighters for his friends and even has a 
collection of candle holders made with marijuana roaches.

"There's so many I am not able to keep track of it," Bryant said. "I mean, 
I have thousands and thousands of roaches ... I am a product of the 1970s 
who just got bored."

Tomorrow is the annual coming-out party for Toronto's pot smokers. 
Thousands of them will meet at Queen's Park to take part in the annual 
Million Marijuana March, an international event in about 100 cities that 
protests cannabis prohibition.

"It's a liberation day," Duprey said. "It's a day where we can stand up and 
say who we are. In the past, we've been made to feel like lepers and been 
forced to put our heads down. Basically, we are putting an end to that kind 
of treatment."

In 1998,the first year of the march, there was no parade in Toronto. But 
tomorrow the Toronto march is expected to be the biggest in Canada and one 
of the largest in the world.

Duprey said if Canada relaxes its pot laws Toronto will experience an 
influx of tourists.

"Toronto is getting there, but there is potential to draw a lot more 
tourists here," Duprey said. "And after the laws are changed everyone's 
attention will be shifted to making profits. There is a lot of money to be 
made."

Toronto Police Chief Julian Fantino said the increase in the amount of pot 
that has flowed into Toronto in the past two years has been shocking. He 
said that it has left Toronto cops in a quandary because they put resources 
into policing only to have courts turn pot growers and smokers around with 
conditional sentences.

"(Growing pot) is an epidemic," Fantino said. "We need to hear from the 
federal government soon to finally have a national understanding of what we 
are going to do."

About 10 years ago Toronto's Robin Ellins returned from a trip to a hemp 
store in London, Ontario with a marijuana pipe, something which could not 
be purchased in this city at the time.

"Looking at it, I said, 'You can't buy this in Toronto and that's crazy,' " 
Ellins said.

It wasn't long before he opened Toronto's signature marijuana paraphernalia 
store on Queen St. W., the Friendly Stranger. For the first eight months he 
had pipes and magazines cramped into a 200 sq-ft space, within a year he 
had a spot with 800 sq-ft.

Everything he sells is against the law.

"The Canadian law on paraphernalia is enforced but unequally," Ellins said. 
"Toronto is an educated community and police don't respond unless someone 
is complaining. No one complained."

The Friendly Stranger is now a golden-warm shop, entwined into the fabric 
of Queen St. W. and Toronto culture.

He now has a 2,600 sq-ft showplace where people scoop up marijuana grow 
books, T-shirts, artistic pipes and 'Bud Busters' which people use to grind 
their weed.

Ellins said one of the purposes of his store is to educate the public about 
the benefits of a plant that's been banned in this country for about 80 
years. He thinks it has worked.

"What has changed in the nine years we've been in business is the 
acceptance," Ellins said. "There is not the old reefer madness anymore. It 
has gone away and been replaced with an understanding that what we do is 
not a bad thing."

Friendly Stranger's business has stayed consistent during the past few 
years, a testament, Ellins said, to the city's desire to have the laws changed.

"Every time someone spends a dollar they are voting," Ellins said.

"This is what they want. By choosing where they spend their money they are 
shaping the universe around them."
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom