The person with whom this interaction has been taken was one of the best students in his school days. Apart from being a good in academics, he was the Captain of a local cricket team. He started taking ganja(weeds), as he says, from highschool. In engineering colleges in Orissa, of which I happen to be a part, there are groups that take ganja regularly. The following is an interaction with a person who has completed his engineering and is back ‘preparing’ for jobs. He shares, through a narrative of his own, his existential trajectory with an emphasis on ganja. The following are in his own words.
I was introduced to ganja when I was in high school (12th standard). I was about eighteen years old then. A friend of mine heard about it and asked me and six of my friends that would we like to have a try. We were all tobacco smokers. We said yes and he said that, he would try to find out where it was available. He got one ‘joint’(ganja and tobacco mixed and rolled like a cigarette) for us that cost us Rs.5 and all six of us took a couple drags each approximately. This was the first time we tried ganja. As far as I remember, people who had anxieties in their lives (then that was chiefly related to love) started becoming, sort of, what I would call, paranoid. Others enjoyed it. I was finding it very funny. All of us were laughing. Some of them were trying to get out of the hit as soon as possible. We were all laughing, at our own condition as well as at others. I remember it like it happened yesterday. I believed the amount that we had taken could produce panic that some others were showing.
Then occasionally we used to take ganja. The usual amount was one ‘joint’ per three people. And usually it was the same effect produced. The second time we noticed the external physical effect. Eyes were red, etc. We enjoyed what we did. We laughed away anything that appeared then. It was a small amount that we took and the effect didn’t last long. In that sense it was better than alcohol. Our beautiful atmosphere was confined to the boundaries of our brain. No one could have any idea of what was going on inside our heads and passerby’s could guess that we are under dope. We realised this after the passing away of the ‘dope mood.’ Unlike after taking alchohol, we could socialize after sometime. We were discussing these things amongst ourselves.
Then some of us went to do our undergraduate degrees. Some were preparing for entrance tests to get into govt. medical colleges(there was tough competition and usually people dropped out of academics in order to prepare for entrance tests). One of my six ganja friends got a seat after dropping out for three years. I too dropped for a year and went to this coaching centre[1]. I again doped in the later part of this year and it was once or twice that I did it. Unfortunately I did not clear the tests and got into an engineering college. After making friends with them, I asked a few people who were into ganja or not. Few people said that they had tried it and few were acquainted with it. So, I asked if we could do it there. They agreed. We realized it became a ‘symbol of fraternity,’ for those who used ganja. We went on outings there and it was easy to find ganja there. By then, I needed two ‘joints,’ for going high. I felt ganja near the college was a little worse in quality than Cuttack ‘joint’. Then I made joints together with better quality of tobacco mixed. I have never disappointed myself with the joints that I rolled myself. I could go really ‘high.’
I adored someone who was a very good student and an excellent cricketer. Academically, he was one batch over me. When I discovered that he was also into ganja, we had joints together. He had the craft of an artist in rolling the ‘joints’. We started taking ‘joints’ together, say, about two to three times a week. Then we started using the chillam*. When I first tried ganja in chilam, I threw up but later I got acquainted with and I realized it makes one high quickly. By the time I was in my third year we used to take ‘joints’ or ganja in Chillam regularly in along with freshly admitted juniors into the ‘fraternity.’ Towards the end of final year I can’t recall how many times we doped daily.
In the final year, when there are campus recruitments, my college didn’t bring any core** companies. As I was not interested in software, I didn’t sit for them. Only one core company came later in which I was not eligible because I had a backlog. Only one student out of 318 students could make it through to Vedanta, who, paradoxically wasn’t of core branch. But that is immaterial here. I have left Rayagara since mid 2010. Now I’m back with few of my old friends. We use Chillam rarely but in the evening we get together take joints. Have some good time and get back.
Rest of the day, I study. I am preparing for public sector. My aim in life is satisfaction and not just earning and so I chose private sector over public sector. The lifestyle in public sector is different from private sector where they screw for 12 hours. I’ve been inspired by my father. He does work, takes care of us. I want life to be complete. I rejected software jobs that paid about two lakhs per annum in Bhubaneswar. Though my trade doesn’t allow me to stay near home, given a chance, I would love to stay near home.
*A funnel traditionally used to smoke ganja.
** A term used popularly used to represent mechanical, electrical or construction related studies in Engineering college. It excludes Computer Science and Information Technology.
[1] There are a number of coaching institutes in Bhubaneswar and Cuttack where tens of thousands of students go to prepare for entrance exams. The coaching includes regular exams and every coaching institute stresses for preparing by intensive study for at least 12-14 hours a day. During the period, this person appeared for his tests, there were about 300 seats and 70,000 aspirants in Orissa.
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