WHITHER MARIJANE?

Fear Not, Bloc Pot Says, The City's First Cannabis Cafe Will Open Soon

For a regular pot smoker, Hugo St-Onge sure has been active lately. The
29-year-old leader of the provincial Bloc Pot had to shelve plans to open a
cannabis cafe in the Latin Quarter just under a month ago, after the
building's owner, fearing unwanted attention on the part of the police,
nixed it. The cafe, Chez Marijane, was a couple of weeks away from opening,
and the setback renewed the debate as to how tolerant a city Montreal
really is.

But the good news, for St-Onge at least, is that Chez Marijane will open, a
month after its target date. The location has moved from the high-profile
Latin Quarter to an as-yet-undisclosed spot somewhere on the Plateau.
St-Onge won't say where it is, but promises a party when it opens just
before Halloween.

St-Onge doesn't bear a grudge against the owner of the old location for not
wanting a marijuana cafe in his building. "I didn't want to fight a long
court battle with him," he says, sitting in the living room of his Rachel
E. apartment and Bloc Pot headquarters. "I didn't want to waste my time,
money and energy. But of course, some people did feel let down."

What will concern him is the reaction of Montreal's finest when the cafe
does appear. Shortly after St-Onge announced the imminent opening of the
Latin Quarter cafe in mid-August, the police stated very publicly that they
will enforce a zero-tolerance policy when it comes to drug use,
decriminalization or not (a reminder: marijuana remains illegal, and the
decriminalization law before Parliament has yet to be made into law, which
may or may not happen). There are no signs they have changed their stance.

"We don't really speak to the police," St-Onge says. "But when we do, they
say that they don't make the policies, they just enforce the law. But I
think they just want to scare people."

To counter the police, pro-pot activists have to take to the streets like
all progressive movements have in the past, St-Onge states. "We're like the
gays before 1982," he says. "We have to get people out with their placards
and convince the world that smoking marijuana is a victimless crime."
Marijuana's not that much different, he thinks, than caffeine. "Both grow
out of the ground and are transformed for human consumption," he says.

The cafe, however, will only sell coffee and snacks. It will stand by the
policy that dominated the original one: consumption only, no trafficking.
"Bring your own," St-Onge says. "Each person who goes in there takes
responsibility for themselves."

As for the opening party and street demonstration later this month, St-Onge
says that all is going according to plan. "We'll get a permit no problem,"
he says. "For some reason, it's easier to deal with governments than it is
to deal with private enterprise. Because the Bloc Pot exists on paper, the
government thinks we're okay. We're like the Jazz Fest. We're doing our own
thing, and everyone at the demo is going to be pretty chill."