Introduction

Marijuana ¹ is taken from the plant Cannabis sativa; the oriental variety, Cannabis indica, produces what is reputed to be a potent form of the drug. The plant grows in the overwhelming majority of countries of the world, including all those in the Western Hemisphere, Africa, and, on the Asian continent, from Lebanon to China. Although the drug from the female plant is more potent, different grades are also determined, in part, by the degree of resin in the flowering tops that go into the preparation. Pure resin, known in the Middle East and the West as hashish ("hash" in American slang), and in India as charas, is imported to the United States from the Middle East, often Lebanon, from North Africa, and occasionally from the Indian subcontinent. The resin is most commonly removed from the plant by one of two methods. As an ex-hashish smuggler who operated in North Africa two or three years ago described it to me, one method is to bend the stalk with one hand while the other hand, gloved, thrusts the flower into a receptacle 2and shakes off the pollen. Or, the resin can be removed from the plant by covering its top with a fabric resembling cheesecloth into which the resin collects. At one time, the pollen was scraped off the sweaty bodies of laborers who had run through a marijuana field for this very purpose. Whatever the method, the pollen is pressed into blocks, or "cakes," ranging in color from a dull yellow to a deep chocolate brown. Small pieces of cake will be flaked off, crumbled, and smoked, usually in a pipe.