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[CAR ENGINE]
HANNAH BROOKS: Hey, I'm Hannah Brooks.
I'm in Nimbin for the MardiGrass festival.
It's pretty much a pot festival.
It goes for a couple of days.
This is a Friday.
It's about to start.
Usually, Nimbin only has a couple of hundred residents in
it, but over the weekend, there's expected to be 10,000
to 12,000 people here.
It's pretty weird already.
And apparently, it's going to get even weirder.
[FOLK MUSIC PLAYING]
-That's the official gong.
HANNAH BROOKS: Nimbin's a country town in the hills of
eastern Australia.
And it's known worldwide as the center of Australian
cannabis culture.
Unlike the rest of the country, which prides itself
on its pubs and beer, it's almost impossible to get a
drink in Nimbin.
But pot smoking is encouraged in everywhere.
It's a big reputation for small, one street town.
I'd heard how easy it is to score drugs in Nimbin.
And as soon as I arrived, I was offered weed, hash,
cookies, mushrooms, and acid.
But the old hippies who run the town hate the street
dealers, particularly the ones selling harder drugs like
*** and ice.
-Welcome to Nimbin.
And remember, don't panic.
Because it's organic.
HANNAH BROOKS: OK.
And so what exactly are you?
-I'm called The Plantom.
And he's the mascot for the MardiGrass.
It's a spoof character from the phantom.
Instead of the phantom, there's The Plantom.
Because the quicker you learn how to plant them, you won't
have to buy any off the *** across the road,
you'll have your own.
HANNAH BROOKS: Recently, some locals made an effort to clean
up the town's reputation and set up the Hemp Bar, which is
a place where you can buy and smoke weed.
It's tiny and full of people getting ***, even though
the police station is just around the corner.
They said we could film anything
there, except the dealer.
Hi, what's your name?
DAVE CANNABIS: Dave Cannabis.
HANNAH BROOKS: And what's your name?
BIG ***: Big ***.
HANNAH BROOKS: And what are you doing here?
DAVE CANNABIS: We're doing a webcast of the MardiGrass.
BIG ***: We're actually in year seven of what's called
the *** Madness De-creation Demonstration, where people
and governments from all over earth can see people using
cannabis and see that it doesn't turn them into an
insane, ravenous beast that's going to jump
down and kill them.
HANNAH BROOKS: We arrived just before 4:20.
DAVE CANNABIS: 42 seconds!
HANNAH BROOKS: When every day, they light a massive joint to
exercise their right to smoke weed.
DAVE CANNABIS: 4.20 seconds.
[INTERPOSING VOICES]
DAVE CANNABIS: 4:20!
[INTERPOSING VOICES]
[COUGHING]
DAVE CANNABIS: [INAUDIBLE]
BIG ***: Every day for many, many years now, we've been
doing this, day in, day out.
-God, that's smooth isn't it?
[INTERPOSING VOICES]
BIG ***: So that's the thing.
At 4:20, think peace for pot and pot for peace.
HANNAH BROOKS: It's Friday.
We haven't done that much today.
We got out of bed a bit later, had our break--
what?
I'm ***.
It's Saturday, apparently.
We've realized that Nimbin time runs different to the
rest of Australia.
It's very slow, because everyone's ***
*** all the time.
Nothing's run on schedule.
No one knows where anything is, and there's no one to ask.
We went to the Festival Office, and they told us to
smoke a joint and relax.
So we did and then got talking to some of the locals, like
The Goddess.
And so why are you The Goddess, may I ask?
THE GODDESS: Well, yeah, I channel.
HANNAH BROOKS: You channel?
THE GODDESS: I channel.
HANNAH BROOKS: Where do you live?
THE GODDESS: In Heaven.
I hang out with Jesus and Muhammad and those guys.
HANNAH BROOKS: What does The Goddess do?
THE GODDESS: All the ceremonies--
baptisms, weddings, exorcisms.
HANNAH BROOKS: The Goddess runs the Church of the Holy
Smoke, which is faith that promotes the use of cannabis.
He's trying to get it officially recognized as a
religion and holds services at the Hemp Bar every Friday,
where he lights a joint with a burning hundred dollar note.
So do people officially call themselves married to the
Church of the Holy Smoke?
THE GODDESS: Yes, married.
HANNAH BROOKS: Do you want to marry all
of us into the church?
Can you explain what that is?
THE GODDESS: Technical term is God has come.
And it's used in the sacred marriage ceremony.
HANNAH BROOKS: What does it involve?
THE GODDESS: I just rub a little bit of sacred ointment
on their forehead and join them, make them
one with the church.
That's beautiful girls!
You've got a [INAUDIBLE] magazine called Vice.
-I love it.
THE GODDESS: Couldn't we get into that?
-I love it.
THE GODDESS: I reckon I could write them a
story straight away.
-Every last one of us is mad--
not that we all admit it.
And in fact, it goes way beyond Nimbin.
But if you're a bit madder than the other mad
ones, you come here.
You'll fit in.
The saner that you are, the less likely you are to fit in.
So behind all this MardiGrass and the smoking--
behind that, are people who keep it
together, who don't smoke.
And if they have a drink, it would be in moderation.
HANNAH BROOKS: Somehow the stoners and the straight
people coexist.
The stoners need the straight people to provide essential
services that make the town function.
And the straight people need the stoners, because weed
keeps the town's economy alive.
Everything in Nimbin, in one way or another,
runs on green money.
[FOLK MUSIC]
HANNAH BROOKS: Nimbin was once a quiet, country town with a
thriving timber and dairy industry.
But in the early 1970s, Nimbin hit hard times and was almost
a ghost town.
In 1973, a bunch of hippies, attracted by the cheap
infrastructure and beautiful landscape, came to Nimbin and
held the Aquarius Festival.
Many of them stayed and set up communes and sought to
establish a new type of society.
The hills surrounding the area also made it the perfect place
to grow lots of weed.
Nimbin and cannabis quickly became synonymous.
However, since it's illegal to grow, sell, and smoke weed in
Australia, there are always going to be problems.
15 years ago, some locals held a protest to highlight what
they saw as the stupidity of the drug laws.
This became a tradition and over the years, turned into
what is now known as MardiGrasss.
-A group of people march down the street with a big joint,
went into the police grounds of the police station, made a
lot of noise and hoo-hah.
And there was a collection of local people.
The next year, they decided to try and attract more people.
And it sort of went on from there.
As the people arrived, peoples thought, oh, well we better
start creating other things to attract them.
And out of that came the Hemp Olympics and
all the other events.
-Take this Johnny!
-And the yell was, "Take this
Johnny." -Fly ***!
Fly!
-"Fly ***!
Fly!" was the yell.
And a nice powerful throw trying to cut underneath the
oncoming breeze.
HANNAH BROOKS: I'm a little bit nervous.
I don't know whether to go over or under arm.
[INAUDIBLE]
HANNAH BROOKS: I am.
-What's your name?
HANNAH BROOKS: My name's Hannah.
-And Hannah, where are you from?
HANNAH BROOKS: Melbourne.
Free the weed!
-"Free the weed," was the yell.
[APPLAUSE]
-That was a throw of 13 meters.
-13 meters for Hannah.
[FESTIVAL DRUMS AND MUSIC]
-The purpose was protest the drug laws.
There was a realization that our youth were being
incarcerated, that health issues were not being
addressed because of the criminalization.
-Cannabis law reform.
The law ain't working.
[FESTIVAL DRUMS AND MUSIC]
-Hello, how are you going?
HANNAH BROOKS: Good day.
[INTERPOSING VOICES]
HANNAH BROOKS: Sure.
What are you checking for?
-Drugs with the dog.
HANNAH BROOKS: Yeah.
-[INAUDIBLE] for the drug dog.
And just run a breath test, as well.
HANNAH BROOKS: There was quite a few police here last year
last year, is that correct?
-That's correct.
There was a substantial number of police last year.
HANNAH BROOKS: And why was that?
-Given the nature and the size of this particular event, we
wanted to have adequate police out here, just to ensure that
there was a safe environment.
There is a perception that when MardiGrass is on that
certain activities involving cannabis are legal, such as
the possession of, administration of, or supply
of cannabis.
That is not the case.
If the police catch people in possession of cannabis, if
they catch them supplying it, or indeed, administering it--
in other words, smoking it-- they will be arrested.
And they will be charged.
-And your time starts now!
[INAUDIBLE]
[APPLAUSE]
HANNAH BROOKS: Instead, Nimbin promotes its own kind of law.
It's got a street code that stresses tolerance and self
and community respect.
The locals' disdain for the law and the police that
enforce it is obvious.
While many cops do turn a blind eye to it all, sometimes
they make token arrests.
And when they do, the locals are always there
to police the police.
[INTERPOSING VOICES]
-If you go out to the cops with all
the M.U.N.C.H vehicles--
[INTERPOSING VOICES]
HANNAH BROOKS: With the introduction of saliva testing
for drugs this year, the locals set up the M.U.N.C.H
van, which follows the cops around monitoring unfair
Nimbin cannabis hype.
THE GODDESS: We had the media down in Pete's Park, and we
had the testing kits.
And we tested them.
And they were all wrong--
100% wrong.
The people that smoked didn't show.
The people that didn't smoke did show.
The people that smoked showed amphetamines.
People that took amphetamines didn't show anything at all.
[FESTIVAL DRUMS AND MUSIC]
THE GODDESS: This year it was great.
The cops stayed out of it.
They got the message.
Basically, it's a losing deal for them.
They can't win.
HANNAH BROOKS: That seems to be true.
While there were heaps of police, they were outnumbered
by people smoking weed and having a good time.
And that seemed to eliminate any paranoia.
[TRIBAL MUSIC]
HANNAH BROOKS: It's a totally grassroots kind of festival.
Half the scheduled events didn't happen, and the ones
that did, ran hours late and changed locations.
But no one seemed to notice.
And if they did, they were way too *** to care.
And everyone agreed that this year's
MardiGrass was a success.
[FESTIVAL MUSIC]
HANNAH BROOKS: The people of Nimbin see nothing wrong with
smoking weed.
And like Big *** said, weed doesn't turn you
into a crazy beast.
Hearing kids in Nimbin say, "Happy MardiGrass," like they
say, "Merry Christmas," shows that their efforts to
normalize pot are working.
THE GODDESS: Basically, it's a normal thing.
Bring it back to that.
And I think yeah, it does.
I think it has done that.
Successful--
mission accomplished.
[INAUDIBLE]
[DRUMS]