The journey began when I started
asking about “hookah” to one of Iranian friend here. He interpreted the hookah
as a pipe to smoke opium. There was a misunderstanding between us, I assumed it
was Shisha, not an opium pipe. Then we agreed to go somewhere during the night
for hookah.
He called his cousin and friend
to join. We had four people. They were really nice, like other Iranians. At
that moment, I realized that we would smoke Opium, not a shisha as I had
thought. They told me many things about how to do it for the first-timer. I was
in the middle of excitement and scare.
The journey took about 1 hour to
reach to very small village, predominantly by The Kurds. We had to pass the
road nobody travelled. It was covered by heavy snow and no road lights. We
drove slowly as it was foggy too.
One of the friends, Naveed, went
to the local shop to get some dates and sugars. I had no idea what for those.
After the risky journey we arrived in one of the house. At first, the village
was like other villages in Iran. However, this village was notorious for its
cheap opium, 1gram pure opium for 1 USD only.
We entered on of the houses; it
was quite big with several houses. The gate was open and our car entered. We
ventured one of the houses. There were two men there already. The older one,
about 60+ years old was preparing for opium, and another one just greeted us
friendlily. The Kurds are among the friendlies people to the foreigners.
Naveed supposedly had called them
before we reached there. We sat on the nice carpet inside shady house. The
middle-age Kurd prepared for the hookah (pipe) for us. My friends introduced me
to them and they seemed to be very happy to have foreigner there. That was my
very first time to see Opium and the traditional way to prepare for opium.
Based on my observation, here is
the opium preparation traditionally by the Iranian Kurds (and probably it is
same elsewhere traditionally)
1. Opium
is cooked (or boiled) until it gets very saturated.
2. One
it becomes very thick, the “chef” keeps stirring it until it is very glutinous.
3. The
opium becomes wax and time to cool it down then it will become a latex-like
form ready to consume.
These were my observation during
my stay for about two hours
This was very first to consume
opium and I am probably not going to take this anymore, once is enough,
hopefully. While the man was preparing our hookah, we chatted and I was warned
to not take a lot for the first time. Naveed prepared for the tea and he took a
drum of charcoal. We agreed to buy 20 grams of Opium for four of us.
The man heated the charcoal and
also cleaned the pipe. The hookah pipe looked so cute for me. As a would-be
smoker, I observed deeply to the man while he was preparing for us.
The pipe has bowl form the bottom
with small hollow to place the slice of ready-opium. He made sure that the
hollow was clear so we could smoke with no problem. At first, he tried for
himself to check how it worked. He put the slice of ready-opium on the hole, and
then another held with a charcoal to vaporize the opium. He did it very easily.
I didn’t take my first
inhalation; I just wanted to observe them sucking the pipe. The first was the
cousin of my friend’s turn. He did it not like a pro as he told me that he
rarely did this unless somebody he knew really well asked him to go, but it was
definitely not his first time, he did it several time, in Iran and surprisingly
in Myanmar, he knew the place for opium in Myanmar. In fact, He and his brother
have Bitumen Company in Myanmar where he frequently pays a visit.
The Kurd held the hookah and Ali
(pseudo name) ready to suck the opium. At first Ali blew the pipe while the
opium was just hairbreadth to the burning coal. He blew to make sure the opium
vaporized, once it vaporized, the Kurd asked him to suck the vapor inside the
pipe.
The smell was really irritating
me, and they told me that it was normal for the would-be first timer to
encounter that. Then my friend, Hamid (another pseudo name) was ready for his
opium. He did it more easily. He sucked few times and then the small slice of
opium on the hookah was already finished. The Kurd prepared for another slice.
I kept watching how to do it and
also prayed hard for the “sin” that I would do. Hamid was done with his turn
and the Kurd was ready to plunge me into opium world, and I just called it that
The Opium war was just about to begin. My heart beat faster than usual, and it
kept racing until I was just as closed as the relationship between China and
Iran to the hookah. I took a few deep breaths before my turn. Ali translated
the Kurd’s instructions to me. I blew the hookah mildly, no need strong
blowing, the opium would detach from the hookah if I did. When the opium
started melting and began to vaporize, he asked me to suck, as hard as
possible. On the other hand, Hamid just warned me to not keep the smoke. I just
kept for few seconds then voluntarily I exhaled it with great happiness. Then I
thought it would be my first and last, but they insisted me to finish the small
slice myself because they made it just for me specially. Okay, my first suck
was great, good enough for first timer. I thought that I would cough after the
inhalation, but I didn’t. I, furthermore, was ready for next turn for the
second time. Then it was failed for the second time, not as well as before. The
aftertaste was strongly attached on my epiglottis; I suddenly required tea and qorma, dates in Farsi.
The other guys continued the
ritual to suck the opium crystal and I just finished, I couldn’t do any longer.
It took about 2 hours for this activity. Hamid asked me to leave the room as he
and Naveed would take care of all the payments and its related activities. I
went out bending myself over the small door to the white snow cold outside. I
asked for one cigarette to warm myself. It was about 5 minutes waiting and all
was well. Hamid took the car and we were ready to go back to the city. The kurd
guy was smiling happily to me as if he was profoundly happy to see foreigner in
his hookah house (I hope this is not the last I visit). He run after the car
and knocked the car’s window
“Merci!” He said to me. I just
smiled as I was blank out. He kept smiling on us until we officially couldn’t
be seen from that place.
The journey back home was more challenging
than before as none of us at our stably sober condition. We asked Hamid to
drive slowly over the turns as not a single street lights beaming to the street
and also the road was icy and white of snow. He drove very slowly to make sure
we were safe to be at highway again.
We were safe and the highway waited.
Now, Hamid speeded up the car and he stopped somewhere to smoke weed, well yes
once was not enough for him and Naveed. I just stayed inside the car and tried
to sleep. Having finished the weed, we went home and drop everybody to their
desired place to stop. Hamid and I continued home.
Hamid perfumed me with very
strong scent to disguise the opium smell. Yes, the smell of the opium was very
strong and it seemed that Hamid already had prepared for this, as he stocked the
perfume in the car. As we were confident about our smell, we ventured home as
we just told everybody in the house we had played snooker. This journey will
remain at me and I hope I cant refuse to do it again anywhere I go.
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