Rome

Law Enforcement

Cops in Rome seemed pretty relaxed. Smoke right in front of them and they might approach you, but in a crowded piazza or at home, they seemed to have other things on their minds. “They’re too busy flirting with girls and smoking cigarettes.” See Marijuana Laws for the legal overview.

Where to Buy Marijuana

Definitely not Campo! That’s a good place to score bad stuff.

Try Santa Maria in Trastevere and the nearby Bar San Calisto. That was where you’d run into pierced, homeless-looking types. Make eye contact and expect to pay more. Around Termini, some of the Moroccan guys knew friends or relatives who dealt and could offer better prices for larger purchases. The station also had a reputation for rip-offs, robbery and worse.

San Lorenzo

“San Lorenzo is a student district, I suppose. Walk around and keep your eyes open. Mostly Albanians, with shaved heads, some tattooed and scary-looking.

“Otherwise, ask for a place called ‘trenta-due’—32—opposite ‘trenta-tre,’ which I suppose is 33. It’s an alternative place; just ask someone. Smoking is socially accepted there. Be careful, though—and nice.”

Marijuana Prices

Hash went for about €10 a gram. The actual weight of a piece could swing quite a bit:

• €10: approximately 0.7–1.5 grams.
• €20: approximately 2–3 grams.
• €50: approximately 6–12 grams.
• €100: approximately 30–50 grams.

Weed went for about the same or a little less, though it wasn’t always worth it. Some of the visitors quoted U.S. dollars instead: about US$10 a gram for pot and US$20 for hash. Tourist prices at the Spanish Steps and a local price at a pub could be worlds apart.

Types of Marijuana

Mostly Moroccan hash. Sometimes you’d find good zero-zero, the first-press stuff, or Nepalese hash and black Afghani. The weed was usually homegrown crap, but sometimes you’d get really nice orange bud, well dried and cured.

More Information

“I’ve lived here for a year now. I recommend making friends and learning a tiny bit of Italian. If you only buy on the street, it might not be good. But if you get to know someone, he can introduce you to what he’s smoking.”

An old city with a late-night pulse

Rome is ancient and cutting-edge at the same time. Get up early to take in the Colosseum, the Spanish Steps and Circus Maximus, or save your energy for the nightlife. It’s hard to do both.

Olives, grapes and ganja all do well in Italy’s balmy climate. You’d hear about cannabis grown in apartments, greenhouses and big southern fields bordered by sunflowers. Imported hash was around, too, and locals smoked alongside the tourists. Hemp goes much further back. Roman ships used it for ropes and sails, Lucilius wrote about it around 120 BC, and Pliny the Elder described its preparation and different grades in the first century AD.

In the days of Italy’s mandatory one-year draft, Marco Cappato of the Transnational Radical Party estimated that up to seven million Italians smoked pot. “It’s common knowledge that an overwhelming majority of the soldiers smoke joints,” he said.

The Vatican took a hard line. “Drug laws should not be liberalized,” said Cardinal Silvano Piovanelli. Smoking in Vatican-controlled areas struck us as a particularly bad idea.

At the time, the Ministry of Health described personal possession as decriminalized, with possible loss of a passport. NORML maintained that Rome police rarely imposed those penalties. Giving cannabis away, even for free, was described as carrying the risk of jail. See Marijuana Laws for the legal overview.

Visitors’ Rome

Joe from Seattle pointed to the Spanish Steps, the broad staircase from Piazza di Spagna to Trinità dei Monti near the Spagna Metro stop. It’s a tourist hangout, with tourist prices on everything. At Circus Maximus, chariot races once drew crowds said to number 300,000. Circo Massimo is the closest Metro stop, and buses serve the area. Tomva, also from Seattle, made it there a different way:

“Drunk and armed only with a map that seemed to be ripped at every important intersection, we quickly got lost and ended up at the Circus Maximus. It’s a large field populated—at night, at least—by Rome’s pot-smoking community and their faithful dogs.”

A hostel or a pub could lead to a chance introduction. Peter, a DJ from the eastern United States, met somebody in a cellar:

“One of the guys we met last night, while drinking and smoking hash in this really cool old Roman cellar that seemed a couple of thousand years old, dealt pot too. I knew he was hip!”

Wine, music, and the club scene

Bacchus encouraged everyone else to get carried away without getting drunk himself. His sort of evening is still easy to picture in Rome: cheap supermarket beer or wine back at the hostel, or a drinkable Chianti at the restaurant down the street. The distance to stumble home is shorter. The club crowd got going around midnight. Dress codes were ordinary and, as we saw it then, it was easier for women than men to get past the door.

Alpheus, at Via del Commercio 36 near Piramide, was one of Rome’s big clubs. Its Friday Muccassassina (“cow killer”) parties mixed ’80s music with the commercial stuff. Goa, at Via Libetta 13 near Garbatella, felt earthier: a thatched roof, tiki torches and a young, trendy crowd. “Don’t go in your thigh-high latex boots with the ultra-mini. You may stand out.”

Watch for pickpockets. Keep your bag, pipe and valuables in front of you and leave passports and tickets in the hotel or hostel safe. A hostel worker warned that either sex could get groped or, in their words, “getting penised” on a packed bus or Metro. Their advice: turn around, stare them in the eye and say it loudly. Non mi toccare! (“Don’t touch me,” non me toke-car-ray.) Or, less diplomatically, Hai un piccolissimo cazzo! (“You have a very small dick,” eye un peek-coal-lease-ee-mow ca-tzo.)