BRINGING DRUGS ON HOLIDAY

MAY 16TH, 2022

Illustration by: Maria Golajewska.

“Posted like silent sentinels all around the town, stand thousands upon thousands of mortal men fixed in ocean reveries. Some leaning against the spiles; some seated upon the pier-heads; some looking over the bulwarks of ships from China; some high aloft in the rigging, as if striving to get a still-better seaward peep. But these are all landsmen; of week days pent up in lathe and plaster— tied to counters, nailed to benches, clinched to desks. How then is this? Are the green fields gone? What do they here?

   But look! here come more crowds, pacing straight for the water, and seemingly bound for a dive. Strange! Nothing will content them but the extremest limit of the land; loitering under the shady lee of yonder warehouses will not suffice. No. They must get just as nigh the water as they possibly can without falling in. And there they stand— miles of them— leagues. Inlanders all, they come from lanes and alleys, streets and avenues,— north, east, south, and west. Yet here they all unite. Tell me, does the magnetic virtue of the compasses of all those ships attract them thither?”

 Those words were not my own, but some of Herman Melville’s opening passages from Moby Dick. It was in just such an ocean every that I found myself recently when I had the following meditation on travel in general, which I have taken the trouble to commit to ink below:

A good friend of mine is reckless in challenging authority. Whether he risks a black eye and a fine, such as you get for smoking in a bar, or a lengthy term of incarceration, such as awaits those caught bringing a bag of cocaine through Sydney’s international airport, his lax attitude to the law sets my nerves on edge. 

But this is the grand realisation I had: some centuries ago when tobacco became popular, people must’ve had a few drinks in a pub and thought they should all have a smoke right there in their seats. What must have followed was a large enough majority with this temperament led smoking indoors to become the norm. 

My good friend isn’t antisocial, or unpleasant, you see. I’ve now realised his manner belongs to a different era. As for his other infraction, although drug use wasn’t so common a century ago, some voyagers going by sea would think nothing of bringing a bag of cocaine or a locket of opium with them, with no reason to fear it would be confiscated by any authority. 

In a lot of ways the world of one or two centuries ago was obviously more restrictive than the present, but in some respects it’s clear that we too live in an era of repression, characterised by a decline in the spontaneity the average person can expect to enjoy. 

You can see this dampening of the spirit if you go to clubs. You usually see half the crowd barely moving and quite a few poor souls completely ill-at-ease, constantly looking around. The majority of people worked manual jobs 100 years ago and my theory is that after a hard week they really felt the tension wound up in their sinews, and they just had to release it. Perhaps modern dancefloor anxiety isn’t just that people think they’ll look stupid but that they often don’t actually have any particular need or urge to dance in the first place, and so must convince themselves not to leave their friends and go home. Hence the awkward standing around and peering about the place—it’s the best effort they can muster.

So, that’s hard labour argued for. Now for bringing a big bag of drugs on the plane. Sea voyagers from a hundred years ago really would find it bizarre if you told them of the long jail terms for smuggling a gram of coke on holiday. I was completely wrong to think my friend an imbecile for taking that risk with Aussie airport security. He’s really a completely sensible fellow defiantly refusing to follow a senseless rule. 

You, reader, who have almost certainly tried a drug or two in your life, shouldn’t just accept the idea that bringing a few joints or a couple of pills on holiday is actually a real crime with a real victim. If bringing small amounts anywhere you want was allowed, say five grams, it’s not like cartels could profit, since they’d have to pay two hundred mules to carry enough to get a kilo of coke overseas. They’d just continue to ship it, since one dock worker on their payroll can let through hundreds of kilos at a time. 

I’d like to propose the following: a special class of law, such as those that apply in international waters. So an Australian could expect to go unmolested by authorities if he brings crystal meth to London, and England could expect her citizens to have their right to bring ket and pills to the Sydney opera house respected in return. The idea is that we agree the laws not through one bunch of government nerds legislating with another bunch, but as one people reaching a gentleman’s agreement with another proud people. 

Now, I understand those with their doubts, it is of course natural and right that an Englishman should rebuff a Sydneysider’s offer to ‘melt some ice’ or the Brisbanite’s exhortation to ‘get skitz and rip some shard.’  Yet, we shouldn’t keep them from their time-honoured cultural practice just because we don’t hit the crystal pistol ourselves. 

We don’t intend to adopt their customs, nor will we implore them to adopt ours. The principle is simple: if we grant them the respect and freedom they are due, they of course will grant us the same. Thus will the heavy yoke laid on by countless bureaucrats over the decades be lifted from all men’s shoulders, and we will finally see a great increase to the gaiety of the nation.