Thailand is preparing for peak tourist season and hopes that the recent law change that made cannabis use legal will attract large numbers of travelers.
Once-banned marijuana is now sold at market stalls, beach clubs, and even hotel receptions.
But the laws of this "grass paradise" are vague.
A distinctive, sweet smell wafts through the Fisherman's Village night market on the Thai island of Koh Samui mango sticky rice stalls and vans selling buckets of cocktails.
Samui Grower's cannabis stall is doing brisk business tonight.
On a table are glass jars, each displaying a different flowering green bud, with labels reading things like 'Road Dawg' hybrid THC 25% 850 baht/gram.'
Elsewhere on the island, at the Chi Beach Club, tourists lounge on couches smoking ready-to-roll joints and munching on pizzas topped with green cannabis leaves.
On Instagram, Green Shop Samui offers a marijuana menu featuring buds with fantastic names: Truffle Cream, Banana Kush, and Sour Diesel, alongside hemp cookies and cannabis herbal soap.
Anyone familiar with Thailand's notoriously harsh attitude toward recreational drug use might watch this film and wonder if they've been smoking too much.
A country where drug offenses are punishable by death, and where being caught with a joint at a full moon party landed tourists in the infamous Bangkok Hilton, appears to have turned around.
In an apparent attempt to attract tourists in the post-Covid doldrums, the Thai government decriminalized cannabis on June 9.
See: Cannabis is no longer an illicit drug in Thailand, but smoking in public places is prohibited.
Koh Samui's streets are already dotted with dispensaries bearing names like Mr Cannabis, and tourists report being openly offered marijuana at their hotel reception.
Yet cannabis laws are far more murky than this "weed paradise" suggests.
On June 9, the Thai government removed cannabis and hemp from its list of banned narcotics, leaving Thais free to grow and sell it.
The government line, however, is that production and consumption are only permitted for medical, not recreational, purposes, and only for low-potency marijuana, containing less than 0.2% tetrahydrocannabinol (THC, the main compound that produces a euphoric effect).
Recreational use of cannabis is discouraged, and authorities warn that anyone caught smoking cannabis in public can be charged with creating a public "olfactory nuisance" under the Public Health Act and face a fine of 25,000 baht (688 euros) and three months in prison.
People buy cannabis from a mobile stand on Khao San Road in Bangkok. Photo: Varuth Hirunyatheb
But on the beaches of Koh Samui, the law seems more open to interpretation.
At Chi, a luxury beach club in Bang Rak, Samui, serving magnums of Bollinger and fine French wines, owner Carl Lamb not only offers a CBD-infused menu, but also openly sells high-potency cannabis in grams and ready-to-roll joints.
CBD, unlike THC, does not cause euphoria and has many virtues; it is mainly known for fighting anxiety, stress and anguish.
Lamb, who first tried medical marijuana for his own digestive issues, worked with a Chiang Mai to grow medicinal cannabis for Chi's CBD-infused menu: CBD Berry Lemonade, Hempus Maxiumus Cocktails, and CBD Pad Kra Pow.
When drugs were decriminalized, Lamb took that as permission to start selling "real" joints in his bar.
“At first, I was just doing it to get a bit of buzz and I had a few grams in the box,” he smiles, presenting a large black cigar box filled with different varieties of cannabis – ranging from 500 baht (13.65 euros) per gram for BlueBerry Haze to 1,000 baht (27.52 euros) per gram for Lemonade.
Today, Chi sells 100g per day.
“People buy it from 10 a.m. until closing time,” Lamb says.
“It was really eye-opening to see how many people want to try it.”
It serves parents curious to have a puff while their children play in the pool, wealthy individuals who want ready-to-go joints, and tourists who buy it straight off the plane.
According to Lamb, the law only prohibits him from selling to people under 25 or pregnant women, "and if someone complains about the smell, I have to shut them down."
“We started getting phone calls from all over the world asking:
“Is it really true that you can smoke cannabis in Thailand and that it is legal?”
We already know that it attracts more tourists – people are booking for Christmas.”
The impact of Covid on the island has been “devastating,” Lamb says.
“The decriminalization of cannabis has, without a shadow of a doubt, a huge positive impact.
Now you can come here and lie on a beach in Asia at Christmas and smoke weed.
Who wouldn't come?
The Thai man who runs the Samui Grower cannabis stall at the market is equally enthusiastic.
"Very good for tourists," he says, when I ask him how business is going.
“Very good. Thai people like it.”
We make money."
Is this legal? I ask.
"Yes, yes," he nods.
Can I buy some and smoke them on the beach?
"Yes, good."
On the other hand, the manager of the Green Shop in Samui, which opens next week, tells me that he will issue warnings to his customers so that they know they should not smoke in public.
No wonder tourists are disoriented.
I find Morris, a 45-year-old Irish father, buying cannabis at the market.
"I didn't know it was so legal now," he said.
Does he know the law?
"I know I can't get arrested for it, but I haven't done much research," he admits.
"I won't smoke on the beach if there are other families around, but my wife and I might smoke at the hotel."
Other tourists are more relaxed.
Nina tells me at her hotel in Chiang Mai, northern Thailand, that cannabis is sold at the reception desk.
"I smoke it anyway," she shrugged.
"I wouldn't really care if it was legal or not."
“Nobody understands the law now, it’s a big mess – even the police don’t understand it,” a cannabis seller, who asked to remain anonymous, told me.
Operating under the radar, he delivers cannabis to "farang" tourists and hotel concierges, he says:
"I'm being careful at the moment because the law is not clear.
They (tourists) don't know anything about the laws.
They don't know they can't smoke in public.
However, it is very dangerous to smoke in public.
At the Chi Beach Club, Linda, a 75-year-old American woman who openly smokes a joint, feels relaxed about the vagaries of the law.
“I am not worried about the gray area in Thailand.
“Just be respectful when you smoke,” she says.
She believes that sharing a joint at the Chi Beach Club "has a convivial side, like buying a good wine for your friends."
The real question now is what will happen.
Can a country that once had one of the strictest drug laws in the world really adapt to one of the most relaxed laws?
See also:
Cannabis cafes, the latest tourism trend in Thailand
How Cannabis Can Boost Tourism in Thailand
Thailand's legalization of cannabis worries authorities worldwide
Source: The Guardian
Prepare your trip to Thailand
Book bus, train, or boat in Thailand
Manage your money while traveling with Wise
If our news, tourist information, or cultural content has been useful to you and you'd like to thank us:
You can follow us on:
Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Google News
Or install our app:
Install the Toute la Thaïlande app on your smartphone
⚠️ Cryptocurrencies involve risks: Invest only what you are willing to lose.
2 comments
As you say at the end of the article: "What will happen now?"
This article focuses on the unique situation of Koh Samui, an island renowned for its luxury tourist infrastructure, its shops, its beaches, its excursions, its “Full Moon Parties” on the neighboring islands of Kho Phang and Koh Tao, etc.
In short, for everything that can attract tourists who love tropical paradise vacations.
We must therefore now add to this already well-stocked range the bars, coffee shops, boutiques, market stalls and other street vendors who display and offer different varieties of cannabis for sale "over the counter" to foreign tourist consumers who are unaware of the terms of the law which regulates and limits the sale and use of this legal drug.
So, to try to answer the question, let's try to put ourselves in the shoes of an incorruptible police officer (yes, yes, they exist... you have to look!) responsible for enforcing the law and who happens to be in front of the shop of this Thai seller who openly displays and offers for sale "Road Daewg hybrid cannabis with 25% THC"!!!
Since the law clearly states that the sale of what remains in the eyes of the legislator a "drug" is only authorized for plant specimens not exceeding 0.2% THC, our dealer at the Fisherman's Beach market is unequivocally breaking the law and should have already been subject to at least an arrest and the immediate closure of his shop, pending a judge's decision for an indictment and conviction.
This does not seem to be the case, because I assume that this cannabis dealer has been operating in this market for some time.
We can therefore say that there is probably a certain laxity in the head of the Koh Samui police regarding the sale of this prohibited cannabis with 25% THC...
In such a context, as in the existing context of the sex trade and prostitution which is, I remind you, officially PROHIBITED in Thailand (!!!) we can ask ourselves the question of whether, with this new market currently "tolerated", there would not be a new financially lucrative niche for certain members of the police who are less scrupulous about the principles of their functions than our incorruptible policeman?
And will the said police be as lax when, in view of a situation which will inevitably worsen in the coming months, it considers a "sting operation" on beaches or other public places, against tourists who dare to smoke their joints in public?
Which is also prohibited…
BUT, can we really believe this seller who explicitly announces that he sells cannabis with 25% THC or is it just a pious commercial lie to attract a larger clientele than his competitors on the market?
Because, among the many different species of cannabis with more or less pronounced aromas, only about ten specific species offer THC levels between 20 and 30% and this concentration of active product "soaring" in the plant does not only present pleasant effects without temporary side effects for a smoker who is having their first experience.
These ten "ultra-strong" species (Bruce Banner, Gorilla, Banana and other Critical Kush) cannot (in principle) be cultivated in Thailand, because they are still classified as prohibited drugs in the same way as Opium (poppy seeds).
In conclusion, I would say that it is likely that the laxity currently observed on the part of officers at the head of local or regional police forces will be relatively short-lived and that when the judgment is made at the highest level, that the cup is full and that the last drop of water has just made it overflow, we will undoubtedly witness some large-scale operations orchestrated in the media so that no one, sellers, buyers, Thais or foreign tourists, will be unaware that there is a law on the subject, that it must be respected under penalty of administrative sanctions, heavy fines and prison sentences for which it is certain that tourists caught in the act of violating the law will pay the price...
A well-known saying is very clear on this point: a velvet glove can hide an iron fist... hiding a few gold coins!
That was all it took for the road massacre.
There weren't enough other drugs.