By Seth MacKenzie
IG: @culinaryanarchy
culinaryanarchy.com
Once a year people gather in Seattle at the shores of Myrtle Edwards park to celebrate, make new friends and partake in some of the best weed in the world. While other cities are fighting over statues, we a building a better future and a true sense of community.
They label it as a “Free Speech” event, and yes, they do have a long list of speakers who come out and talk about everything from Urban Farming to well, I wasn’t really paying attention, and from what I gathered, not too many others were either.
Hands down it was one of the most disorganized events that I’ve ever attended. Due to its size and the fact that it’s free to the public, it’s run by a small committee and staffed by a small army of volunteers. While it might be well thought out on paper, the plans must have been used to twist a joint. This is a good thing; no one wants to go to something like this and have an itinerary. Even my plans were loose at best.
It lives up its claim to be the biggest Marijuana fest anywhere, and if you fine folks in Cali or Colorado have anything better, I’m game to come check it out. If you go straight from one side of the park to the other, without stopping, it’s going to take you thirty minutes.
I hate to say it, but at least half of the fest is food trucks and head shops selling the same stuff as the guy two booths down, and they both claim that theirs is the Nike of bongs. That being said, there are a lot of really great vendors that have some very interesting, one of a kind items that you might not even be aware of yet, and these hidden gems are the reason to go.
Marijuana is big business now and the ripples are being felt across numerous industries and the underground is going mainstream.
The crowd just wanted to get stoned.
I have never seen so many people smoking so much grass out in the open. Everyone you talked to was burning, except for my assistant for the day, whom I took to get a different perspective.
I expected it to be a lot more low-key. When I got the paperwork for my press pass, it had a bunch of stuff saying that smoking weed was still illegal in public, and cops, and cops and jail. Scary stuff. I guess they have to write things like that the same way that head shops used to have to post signs saying that the “Water Pipes are for Tobacco Use Only.” Yeah, okay…
I’ve been getting stoned for almost 24 years now, daily. While I hate the idea of being a “Pothead,” I burn a quarter of high-grade weed per week, if not more. I also work 16 hours a day between cooking and writing. After four hours at this event, I felt like I was back in 8th grade trying to keep my shit together in front of my friend’s parents.
Every time I tried to talk to anyone in the crowd I was passed a joint or a bowl or bong or blunt or some other kind of device that, out of respect, I never turned down. This was not my intention, I wanted to get a story, and instead, I was… what the hell was I saying? Yeah, everyone was high.
Now yes, there is news that the group that runs the event is getting sued. The long story short is that the guy suing them, Arthur West, a local Marijuana activist from Olympia, was denied permission to speak at the event and is pissed. His argument is that the organizers select speakers that support their agenda and have blacklisted others from speaking at a “Free Speech Event.” Granted, he does make some very valid points in his case and does have a history of going to court and winning, so I have no doubt that the event will have to adjust its policy in the future.
Please understand that the reason it was set up as a “Free Speech Event” is so that it was able to be held in the first place thanks to issues with city permits and things of that nature. How the books are being kept and who’s making money on what isn’t clear. What is clear is that 100,000 people came and had a great time, businesses at the event made money and businesses in Seattle made money. To the best of my knowledge, no one got hurt.
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