HIGH JINKS PREVAIL AT HEMP OLYMPIX

Cannabis-Scented Sydney Hails Games

SYDNEY, Australia -- The 3:45 p.m. ferry to Darling Harbor trailed a huge,
green-leaf flag not accredited to the Olympics, and its bearer, an underfed
gentleman named Chicken George, was clearly no athlete.

George wore a chartreuse body suit with a five-pointed marijuana leaf
emblazoned on the chest.

"We figure there's enough paranoia in this town now," said one member of
his entourage, Robin Harrison, a ponytailed actor in paisley pants. "We
thought we'd show there were still a few normal blokes around."

Normal for Sydney. This is not your average sort of place. And as the 2000
Summer Games approach, Sydneysiders' lovable looniness shifted to a higher
gear.

The ferry ride was Friday. Yesterday, George rode astride a 42-foot-long
joint as it rolled down Broadway to Town Hall, flanked by feeling-no-pain
supporters and followed by a phalanx of amused mounted policemen.

A red-painted tip glowed at the monster reefer's business end. The words,
"Let It Grow," ran along one side. The other was stenciled: "The Law is the
Crime."

This capped the cannabis-scented Hemp Olympix in Victoria Park:
joint-rolling for speed and artistry; a triathlon of hauling fertilizer and
water and crawling through bush; and a bong (water pipe) throwing contest.

Marijuana use is illegal in Australia but like a lot of popular social
activities, such as drinking in the streets and flouncing nude on beaches,
enforcement is not draconian.

Police Sgt. John Tate laughed when asked what he thought of escorting a
giant joint and half-naked dancers through the heart of Sydney. "It's such
a minor offense," he said. "Let 'em have their fun."

At official levels, tension is high. Nearly a half million visitors during
the Summer Games' supercharged two weeks means the potential for threat --
from traffic nightmares to high-tech terrorism.

Immigration authorities, traffic police and security guards near Olympic
sites feed the mood of paranoia Harrison described.

But most residents of Australia's beloved signature city, now basking in
world attention, are taking things easy. The constant watchword remains:
"No worries."

A faux Princess Anne, eerily like Britain's real item, opened the Hemp
Olympix, praising its sense of reality in the face of the "Over-the-Top
Olympics," which get under way Friday.

Lisa Yeates, the actress in royal clothing, later said these games had a
serious purpose: to focus attention on drug laws that send youths to jail,
where they emerge as human wrecks, if not real criminals.

They were sponsored by growers of the hippie community of Nimbin, north of
Sydney, whose annual Mardi Grass campaigns for drug education, control of
dangerous narcotics and a reform of drug laws.