Paris

Law Enforcement

Police patrolled the streets on foot and by car. Sometimes they looked away, especially if you kept a low profile. They could also arrest you, and small personal-use cases sometimes ended in a warning. On paper it looked tough. On the street? Don’t freak out, the French smoke a lot! Still, I wouldn’t smoke in public or in a car. You get pulled over, the officer smells it… hmm, no good.

“Keep it cool” was the watchword. A couple of spliffs of hash felt like one thing, four or five grams like another. Some cops seemed rough about hash and friendlier about weed, even if you heard the opposite about the law. The amounts people talked about and the claim that police couldn’t search you unless they saw you smoking were street lore. For the legal overview, see Marijuana Laws.

“The entire time I’ve lived in Paris, I’ve smoked in the street without problems, especially in the east: the area from Belleville to Nation, through Ménilmontant, Gambetta, and Charonne.”

“They piss us off, but it ain’t Nevada here.” Bike cops sometimes made rounds in the little parks. I’d stay out of dark corners where a hood made you stand out. On Friday and Saturday evenings, the quai near Notre-Dame was a different scene: teenagers and people in their twenties playing music, skating and smoking J’s. You might strike out looking for weed and still make friends over a beer or a bottle of wine. Sometimes somebody would trade a joint or two for the beer.

Where to Buy Marijuana

Hash was easier to come by than weed in Paris. Knowing somebody made a big difference, especially when it came to price.

“Paris is a gigantic rip-off”

“No hesitation: the suburbs. Paris is a gigantic rip-off if you don’t already know somebody or can’t handle a conversation with French ‘bros.’ A year earlier, I could find 12 grams of hash for €25 if I looked around and wasn’t afraid to negotiate. That wasn’t happening anymore. For those quantities, I had to go outside the city.”

Around Pigalle and Blanche, somebody might ask for a cigarette “for the family,” and then offer you what was supposed to be hash.

“Most of them weren’t actually selling marijuana at all. They were selling caramel bars that cost about 50 cents in a bakery. If you want to pay €20 for that, go ahead. I won’t do it again. I went several times and never got even a gram of decent hash.”

Châtelet and Strasbourg–Saint-Denis had a longstanding street trade in hash and sex work. I worried about undercover cops and getting robbed. Saturday nights and big events were a little different: you might find decent hash around busy public spots, but you’d be lucky to get a gram for €20.

Out in the suburbs, it helped to go with French friends who knew the area and could do the talking. Savigny-sur-Orge was about 30 minutes out on the RER C toward Étampes, about €8 for the trip then. Around the station, I heard about good hash called sum and fairer prices. People tended to disappear when it got cold, wet or dark. I’d stick to daylight and public places. Following somebody to a flat or basement was “very, very, very, very risky.” Robbery was the least of my worries, and kidnapping crossed my mind. I’d keep cash separate and leave my passport and valuables somewhere secure.

Trocadéro, Anvers, and Montmartre

3 March 2009

At Trocadéro (Métro line 9), there was good hash around the steps facing the Eiffel Tower. The trouble came after the sale. People might follow you, demand the hash back and threaten to call the police.

My advice then was to laugh and tell them to “fuck off.” I figured you could call the police yourself and say they’d tried to mug you.

Anvers (line 2) felt different. Near the Métro exit, people were making bracelets by the park entrance. If you walked uphill past the clothes shop and café, it was a busy tourist spot. A bracelet could start at €5, though you might be asked for more. The words you heard were “weed,” “marijuana” and shit for hash.

“Some of the best weed and hash I found was at Anvers. Most of the people I spoke to either spoke English or understood a little. They could still try to rip you off, but the weed I got was very good Amsterdam skunk. One hit and I was baked.”

Two small bags of weed could go for €50, four for €100, and sometimes less if you bargained. Sometimes you’d wait while somebody fetched it in the park. I wanted to see what I was paying for before handing over the money. I found that standing my ground over the price could work.

A different experience below Sacré-Cœur: There were usually three to five people making cotton-string bracelets at the lower park entrance. I mostly came across hash there, almost never weed. It might be fetched from under a bench or a rock, a bin or the bushes, and the first offer could be a small bar for too much money. Bargaining could knock about a quarter off.

Belleville and the eastern neighborhoods

Really, really, really good hash around Rue du Faubourg-du-Temple and Boulevard de Belleville, sometimes for a few euros. Weed was tougher to find, but with luck there was Amsterdam Orange or Ice. In the 10th, 11th and 20th: positive vibes, quiet people and potent pot.

“There were lots of bars and always plenty of people on the street. I found excellent hash at genuinely fair prices. Around Rue de Tolbiac, near the university, I also found good weed at fairly low prices. For the best deals, though, I thought it was worth knowing people outside the center. Reggae events and the Canal Saint-Martin were other possibilities. A lot gets smoked in Paris.”

Stalingrad, Boulevard or Rue de Belleville, Charonne and Gambetta were other possibilities in the northeast and east. Farther southeast, there was Quai de la Gare, Bel-Air and Butte-aux-Cailles. In the African and Indian neighborhoods I knew, smoking hash or weed was a normal sight, and there were plenty of Rastas. “For good weed, I needed to know someone. I smoked excellent stuff for €5–6 a gram.”

Les Halles and Boulevard de Clichy

There was also Les Halles, the Forum des Halles and Barbès, if you didn’t already know somebody. Watch your money.

“At the Forum des Halles at night, near the jazz clubs, there were plenty of rip-offs. Prepare to pay. I got a quarter-ounce of decent Moroccan hash for €50. It came as a stick. It was worth it, though.”

Another night near Blanche:

“I just had to walk around for a while and someone would approach me. There were lots of people out at night, especially on the weekend. It felt safe because there were always tourists around. The sellers spoke English and charged a lot, but I usually thought the quality was good. When I had no other contact, that was the place I knew.”

Even around the same Métro stop, you could come away with good hash or a piece of caramel. A French friend or someone you already knew was the better bet.

Marijuana Prices

Prices varied by year, neighborhood and who you knew:

• Central Paris: €30 or more for a gram of poor hash. A contact might quote €30 for a barrette of ordinary hash. For 12 grams, prices ran from about €30 in the suburbs to €70 or more in town, with €50 a typical quote.
• Trocadéro, late June 2007: €5 for a gram of hash in the park across the Seine from the Eiffel Tower.
• Lower Sacré-Cœur park: €35–50 for a decent 12–15 gram bar. Watch the weight. A bar sold as 15 grams might weigh 12, and bars could be anywhere from 12 to 20 grams.
• Through French contacts: €30–50 for 12 grams of hash and €50–90 for 12 grams of weed, depending on quality and the seller.
• Smaller purchases: five grams of hash for €20 or five grams of weed for €40.
• La Boule: €30 ziplock bags with around 5–6 grams of hash or 4–5 grams of herb. You could get four or five bags at once. “No soapbar there. They had a reputation to keep up.”

“I live in Paris. A barrette doesn’t have to mean 10 grams. There are €10, €20 and €30 barrettes. The way we cut it, 200 grams made four 50-gram pieces, eight 25-gram pieces or about sixteen 12-gram pieces. A 12-gram piece could make two €30 barrettes or three €10 ones, depending on the seller and the quality. I’m talking about hash. Weed can be different. In France, we call hash shit.”

In the days of francs, a gram of poor Moroccan cannabis could be as little as five francs, under a U.S. dollar at the time. There were also quotes of €10 a gram for top-quality Amsterdam skunk or Northern Lights, and €5–6 a gram for hash. Weed prices varied wildly, particularly if you were buying by the gram from somebody you didn’t know.

More Information

Watch what you’re smoking

DO NOT BUY WEED FROM STREET DEALERS. Know who grew it or who you’re getting it from. An unfamiliar seller pushing it by weight gives me another reason to walk away.

From 2006 on, there were news and TV reports about gritty or doctored weed. Glass, sand and fluorescent powder were among the things people worried had been added for weight or to mimic THC crystals on what was sold as White Widow or Dutch imports. There were even rumors about mercury in newer batches. Paris, Nantes, Lille and Lyon were named, with rumors spreading well beyond them. I trusted local growers more, and I heard about big €50 bags around Montpellier.

“These guys are murderers, not dealers.” The anger was real, as was the urge to give the police a name so they could investigate. Some of the claims circulating at the time were extreme: that heated grit could stay in the lungs for life, cause bleeding or punctures, and put you in hospital with a five-year recovery and no smoking. There were also claims that buyers couldn’t face fines or jail if they came forward, that a seller could face 30 years to life for attempted poisoning, and that a European health card would partly cover hospital care or evacuation by plane or ambulance. Those claims were unverified.

For a better evening, I like the terraces along the Canal Saint-Martin. People say you can buy there, but I’ve never seen a deal or made one, and I live five minutes away. Try a reggae or dancehall night on a boat on the Seine. Hot! There was weed going around at some of those nights, too.

Food, terraces, and a Paris evening

Chez Denise, 5 Rue des Prouvaires. A classic Parisian bistro. It stayed open very late, possibly all night, though we weren’t sure. Big portions, tables close together and a bright, talkative room.

“Don’t be intimidated by the locals who WILL stare at you and your friends. Enjoy the simple but delicious menu. A real CLASSIC!”

Pershing Hall, 49 Rue Pierre Charron, 75008. A hotel restaurant with great lighting, a big space and a weirdly wonderful feel. Go for a drink or a full dinner. The food, wine and cocktails made for a night you wouldn’t soon forget.

WeBeHigh’s Paris tale

Paris has always had room for indulgence: a rich meal, legendary wines or a potent joint. At the time the city was described as a capital of 13 million. People talked about good weed growing alongside the grapes out in wine country, and it wasn’t unusual to catch a whiff in the city.

William Butler Yeats reportedly smoked hash on a Paris visit in spring 1898. Jim Morrison, who died here in 1971, was part of the city’s smoking lore, too. Even as the government pushed hard against drug use, that taste for joie de vivre hung on.

“Most people of our generation take some marijuana fairly regularly,” said Emmanuelle, a 27-year-old French woman. RV, an Australian, spent Sundays a different way:

“On our day off, we’d all meet at the local Algerian café. We spent the whole day eating couscous, drinking Algerian wine, listening to Algerian raï music, and smoking some of the best Moroccan hash.”

Blinkin watched his French friends roll tobacco and hash off a little brick, using a bus ticket for a filter tip so the joint was easier to hold and smoke to the end. He also remembered one the size of a cigar, made of what he called “realistically pure hash.” Emmanuelle used shit for hash, barrette for a piece she called 10 grams and savonnette for about 100 grams. As the price section shows, people used barrette more loosely, too.

Friends were the easiest introduction. Otherwise, nightlife ran the gamut from giant dance clubs to seedy bars. Montmartre and Pigalle had red-light districts and the kind of street offers that came at a price.

Cannabis politics in the Chirac years

Jacques Chirac’s government took a hard line against drugs. Even a public “presentation in a favourable manner of narcotics” could draw charges under France’s public health code. The cannabis magazine L’Éléphant Rose folded after its editor, Gérard Jubert, was prosecuted for encouraging cannabis use.

Jubert was reported to have received an 18-month suspended sentence and a 300,000-franc fine, put at roughly US$40,500 then. Jean-Pierre Galland, a long-time cannabis campaigner with the Collectif d’Information et de Recherche Cannabique (Collective for Information and Research into Cannabis), also received a suspended sentence and a fine for presenting marijuana positively. More fines followed for the annual June 18 “18 Joint” rally.

NORML’s summary at the time said French law drew no distinction between soft and hard drugs. It quoted two months to a year in jail and fines of €56–1,680 for drug use, and two to ten years for possession and trafficking, but described small personal-use cases being downgraded, dismissed with a warning or dealt with by a treatment order. These figures belong to that period. See Marijuana Laws for the legal overview.

Michel Bouchet, head of the Interior Ministry’s Anti-Drug Commission, put it bluntly: using any drug was illegal, but it didn’t mean you’d “waste away in prison.” He rejected the soft and hard labels: “It’s difficult for there to be ‘soft use’ of hard drugs, and it’s certain there is hard use of soft drugs.” Health Minister Bernard Kouchner opposed decriminalization, though he said he wouldn’t oppose a measure allowing people to smoke privately at home.

Californian Jim Lohse had simpler advice:

“I’d suggest you have a great time in the Netherlands, Switzerland, and Germany. But in places like France, I just don’t think it’s worth the risk. Drink more beer, or in Paris, drink more wine.”

Travel details recorded with the guide: France, GMT/UTC+1, and the Paris telephone prefix +33 1.