German Cannabis Legalization – A Canadian Perspective

Marge (00:00:05) - Guten tag, my friend. Quite as passionate about cannabis in Deutschland. And for those of you who don't speak German. Good day, my friends. Today we're talking about cannabis in Germany. And if you do speak German, I'm sorry. Welcome to Bite Me, the show about edibles where I help you take control of your life. I'm your host and Certified Ganjier. Marge and I love helping cooks make safe and effective edibles at home. I'm so glad you're here. And thank you for joining me today. Greetings, friends. Welcome back to another episode of Bite Me. We have a fun program for you today, so if you're just tuning in for the first time, welcome. I'm glad you found me. How did you discover the show? Let me know. I would love to hear it. And if you've been tuning in for a while, thank you from the bottom of my heart because it really means a lot to me. And if it wasn't for you, I wouldn't be doing this show.

Marge (00:00:56) - Because as much as I love to hear myself talk, it's really nice to know that there's somebody listening on the other end. Which is why I love to hear from you. So if you want to let me know how you found the show or any feedback, concerns, praise, whatever it is, then you can hit me up via email, podcast hotline, DM on Instagram. There's all kinds of places where you can find me. Now, you may have noticed that I've been doing a lot of interviews lately, and this is because I knew I'd be going to Germany, and it just so happens sometimes I book a lot of interviews and they just all happen to fall into place quite easily. It doesn't always work out like that. But before I left, I had a number of interviews booked, which worked out quite well because when you're going to a new place, sometimes it's impossible to know what things will be like once you arrive. And I know I'm in a big city, but there has been some crappy internet.

Marge (00:01:48) - One day we were out for a full day, and it took me two days of trying to upload some audio and so it hasn't been totally smooth. Which kind of surprised me because I'm in Berlin, which is a huge city. And yeah, I don't know if it's it's internet, just particularly in this place that I'm in, or if subpar internet is something that people are more accustomed to here. I can't say for sure. I know back home, I guess maybe because in Canada we're so spread out super fast. Internet is almost essential because, you know, you're, for instance, my sister lives for a four hour drive away and you haven't even left the province yet if you're going that way. So in any case, there are some things that I really love about being here, though. First of all, SIM cards. I bought a SIM card for my cell phone so that I could use cheaper data while I was here because I was going to be here for so long and for €10 a month, which I've calculated to be about $15 Canadian, and that includes ten gigs of data, unlimited calling and texting within Europe.

Marge (00:02:57) - And this is taxes in. Did I mention all the prices are included or all the taxes are included in the prices now? By comparison, Canada has some of the highest cellphone rates in the world, and I pay probably $70 a month plus tax for my phone plan, and that's considered probably relatively decent. It's not low, but it's also not high. And cell phone companies really know how to get you here. They just always seem to find ways to just add little extra things to your to your plan. So that next thing you know, you're paying 70, 80, 90, 100. You want to get a new phone. Oh the story that new cell phone plan isn't available anymore. You have to go with this new one, which is inevitably always higher. There's ways to get around that, of course, but you get the idea. Also, the transit system top notch. And for €50 a month I have access to all the buses, the bands, the spawns, S-Bahn is Strasbourg and U-Bahn is Autobahn which is basically Strasse, is street and onto is under.

Marge (00:03:58) - You get the idea. Once I made that realization, it was a lot easier to keep it separate in my mind. So the subway and the aboveground trains and the buses and there's so many, and they run so frequently that you really don't need to own a car to get around here. Another thing that I've noticed, which I find just interesting, is that they don't have screens in the windows here either, which when I first got here, I was like, what? Like what? Wait, what? Because back home in Ontario, if you didn't have screens in the windows, your house would be full of flies and mosquitoes and other such bugs. And that just doesn't seem to be a problem here. I mean, we open the windows pretty frequently, and we've noticed I've noticed a couple flies that have gotten in. I don't know what ever happened to them because I never did kill them, but it was a little annoying. But I mean, that happens back home anyway. Even with screens in the windows, somehow flies managed to get into the house.

Marge (00:04:51) - Does that mean they don't have mosquitoes that I could get used to? What don't I like? What don't I like about being here? maybe what I don't like is I wish my German was better, because often people automatically switch to English when they hear me speak, and they don't slow down when they are speaking German. So that's not really I mean, that's partly my own poor German, I suppose, but I really do wish I was more conversational. I have a pretty decent understanding of a lot of German. Words, but stringing it together in a grammatically coherent sentence is far more difficult. Talk to me like I'm a toddler, people. My go to phrase is expression or ambition Deutsch. And that essentially means I only speak a little German. And sometimes people don't always understand that when I say it. I guess my accent is obviously a heavily English accent, so I speak in a certain way. But in any case, it's pretty interesting being immersed, because when I am on the public transit or just walking around and parks and and places, restaurants, shops, all kinds of places, German is all around me and I can listen in and hear it and hear the colloquialisms.

Marge (00:06:02) - However, you say that the words that I never expected to come up over and over again is fascinating being here, because I pretty much learned German on an app, and then being here and hearing the German language in action with people as they converse in places is fascinating, and I know it's helping, even if it feels a little indirectly, because once again, my ability to put together a grammatically correct German sentence is is challenged. We've got a lot to talk about today in this episode, but before we get into it, I wanted to start out by thanking a couple of people who bought me a cookie, and I just wanted to say thank you so much for that generous donation. So the first one was from Kathy, and she sent along a really nice note to go with the the cookies that she bought, and that was really appreciated. I love it when people leave notes too, but it just really, really got me in the fields, I'll be honest. And the next one was from a more anonymous supporter.

Marge (00:07:11) - I mean, it wasn't totally anonymous, but the screen name was a combination of letters and numbers, and they also bought me a cookie. So I really appreciate the support from these two wonderful people, because once again, there's a lot of costs associated with running a podcast and work and all the rest of it, and I'm independent. And this kind of support really means a lot to a small, independent podcaster like myself. And the things have been rather wonderful lately, I have to admit. I mean, I came to Germany about a month after I moved out of my home that I've been in for 15 years, and there had been a lot of life transitions, and being here in a new place with a really close friend has been wonderful. It's been a nice to have that change of perspective for a little bit, and when I come back, I feel like I'll be in a different sort of place. I've had some time to process and that's been super valuable. Again, thank you all for your support and giving me a platform to even talk about this a little bit, because I feel like I'm processing and a lot of different ways, and being able to talk about it a little bit on the show is also helpful, because I know that, you know, I would talk about Chris from time to time and how he was one of my my edibles tasters or taste testers on occasion.

Marge (00:08:27) - I mean, he didn't eat a lot of edibles by the time I left his laws, he didn't know what he was missing. But, yeah. So you were all probably if you've listened to this show for a little bit, you were all familiar with him. And a lot of that has changed now. Moving on to the next thing I wanted to mention is I found, I don't know if any of you are playing with too many of the AI tools that are coming out these days, but I did find a new tool because I love hearing about these new AI tools. I find them fascinating. And of course, this is sort of the next iteration of the internet as we are starting to know it and things are happening very quickly. It seems like it was just yesterday, almost, that ChatGPT exploded onto the scene, and now I feel like every single, software as a service that I use, of which there are several for running this show, has incorporated some kind of AI tool into its software.

Marge (00:09:24) - And so it's becoming ubiquitous. And I'm sure some of you are probably finding the same in some of the tools and things that you're using through work. But I found this fun one, and I'll link to it in the show notes so you can play around with it if you want. Because I was able to create a free account and it's called Suno. And basically you put in a prompt, which it creates songs. So you put in a prompt and it'll allow, it'll create a song for you within a minute or two. And you can put in the genre that you would like, singer songwriter or I did one that was an Irish folk song, which was for somebody that I sent it to somebody in particular. It was kind of fun to play around with, but it creates lyrics and we'll come up with two versions of the same song and yeah, it's just something fun to play around with. I can't really see a need for it necessarily in my particular everyday life, but I did create a fun song about Bite Me, and I am going to play that at the end of this episode so that if you don't want to listen to it, you don't have to.

Marge (00:10:26) - But I thought I thought it was kind of funny, so maybe you'll enjoy it too. Let's get into the meat potatoes of this episode. So I find myself in Berlin, Germany and I'm staying with a very close friend of mine. She is a dual citizen of Canada and Germany, and I met her back in Canada, back in my hometown, and probably 4 or 5 years ago now, sometime during the pandemic, we became really good friends. We are very aligned on many things, and we just have an easy way of being around each other. And she really supported me through some tough times, and she was also going through some shit in her own life as well. We were there for each other, and one of the people that I'm really grateful for in my life. So in any case, we had talked about me coming to visit her while she was in Berlin for quite some time. A couple of years probably. So I finally had the freedom to do it and I was able to bring my work with me.

Marge (00:11:23) - Have laptop, will travel. I've never been to Europe before, so this is a pretty big adventure. And as it so happens, cannabis became legal in Germany on April 1st, just days after my arrival, and I knew one person at the city at the time, the person I'm staying with, and also one other acquaintance that I'll link to that in the show notes as well, because they have appeared on the show and we met. I'm not even I can't even quite remember how we met, but I just recently met him in person very briefly. So there. And it's interesting because I have arrived here and there's no even though it's legal, there's no dispensaries. The Gro clubs haven't opened yet. And so where does a tourist like myself get cannabis without getting ripped off, mugged or worse? Needless to say, I took a tolerance break for the first two weeks. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I'm already, when it comes to inhaled cannabis, a huge white lightweight. So that probably will allow my weed to stretch even further.

Marge (00:12:25) - but I didn't have any cannabis ingested or eaten for the first couple of weeks. Probably. And other friends have told me in Europe that drug dealers here often deal with multiple drugs, and so there's more of a criminal element. There's a couple of people I want to ask about that, actually, but there's not really, any way for me to verify this account except for this one person's personal experience and they don't actually live in Germany. But that's sort of the sense that they gave is like where they are drug dealers usually deal in a whole bunch of different stuff. So back home, you could easily find people who only sold cannabis, so it didn't really feel as unsafe because there's obviously. A certain element that comes along with harder drugs, I guess, and there's more money involved, so that ups the ante and all the rest of it. But usually knew somebody that you were buying weed from in some way or through someone, and usually you would like go meet at their home and you'd have to hang out for a little bit to, you know, make sure there was no heat or whatever, make it not seem like a drug deal.

Marge (00:13:35) - And I mean, this is going back. But even more recently, before legalization, it was sort of the same system. You would just sort of go to someone's house and pick it up. There was no like back alley deals or meeting in park, so maybe there was a little more comfort. Of course I'm back home. So again, you know the people. But here, when I was kind of looking around, they were kind of like, you could go to a park and you know, if you, you can probably spot the people who will have drugs. But I'm not sure I really felt comfortable doing that. I'm like a middle aged lady in a big city, and I'm not really sure that I was ready for that kind of excitement in my life. The other acquaintance here told me that he also just got his medical card, and the way he described it is sounded much like how you get your medical card at home so he could order his cannabis online, which I'm sure really made it far more accessible.

Marge (00:14:27) - And it sounded like he did a virtual appointment with a doctor, and then he was directed to medical cannabis websites from what he could order. And it's funny because I just got my own medical cannabis license back home, and unfortunately, by the time I went through the process and then got my approval with the dispensaries that I'd be working with, I was leaving for Germany. So I haven't even had a chance to order from them yet. But that is definitely one thing I'm excited about doing when I go back home. Now, the same acquaintance who had just gotten his medical cards said he knew a guy where he could get some cannabis, and he wasn't really needing to do that anymore because of this new, you know, medical cannabis thing that he had gotten and wasn't having to buy it off the street anymore. But this fellow that he knew was kind of like, yeah, he would do it, but only if you were buying a larger quantity. And it was very expensive, very expensive compared to what I pay at home.

Marge (00:15:23) - So I was able to reach out to some people that I knew here, a community that I'm a part of. And before long, I had a name and a contact, and this person was a long time resident here and he gifted me some weeds. So that was really generous of him because it is pricier here for sure, compared to what I have come to expect to enjoy back home. I've been consuming it carefully, which hasn't been too bad because essentially, like I said, I took a two week tolerance break and my already low tolerance was now even lower. So it hasn't been that bad. I mean, I've been using my dryer vaporizer so I can collect the AVB because I have an ardent on its way. Ardent is sending me a Nova with a 220 volt plug because there's been shipping and because there's been shipping problems, then none of us could have foreseen before we got here, because the address written on a screen provides zero context. I've had three packages shipped to me in total since I've been here, and all three have had issues, so it was not anything necessarily that ardent did on their end.

Marge (00:16:34) - but the easiest one to resolve was a book from Mila, the hash Queen, that she sent me. She's in Amsterdam, and I'm sure she's more accustomed to the European way of doing things and the addresses, so that one arrived very easily, and I'm not even sure why it didn't come the first day it was supposed to come. I think she put the address exactly as it should have been written. But, so ardent is it is supposed to arrive today. At the time of this recording, the artist is supposed to arrive later today, and I'm super excited because they use a 220 volt plug here, which is. I knew I brought some adapters with me, but when I was talking to them about them sending me one because they have a travel ardent is like a mini. And I was thinking like the ardent comes with a carrying case. If you didn't know that already, it comes with a nice purple case with the handle on it, so you could put it into a bag. I mean, if you're doing carry on, it's probably a little big.

Marge (00:17:29) - We'll see how the Nova is, because the Nova is smaller, and I don't know if they had the ardent minis with the 220 volt plugs. I was just like, well, you could just send me one. And I have a travel adapters and they're like, it doesn't really work as well with the travel adapter. If you're going to be going to Europe, you're better off with the one that comes with a two 20 volt plug. So here we are. But after some hiccups, it should be arriving today. So I'm really hoping come through for me ups. Don't fuck me over. I would really love to get that, because I've been carefully saving my AVB so that I can get some edibles made because I went to also a 420 I had. So I was here for for 20 as well, which was a blast. And there was all kinds of events going around the city, and I did manage to get myself an edible at this one event that I went to, and I was just like, oh, I would love to get a whole bag of that stuff, but I don't think they were for sale.

Marge (00:18:22) - Fortunately, it was an edible that was stronger than I needed, so I was able to cut this gummy in half. So I have a couple, but that's the first edible I've had since I've gotten here. And I have to say, I've been so spoiled back at home. I have this medical card now so I can access a couple of online dispensaries that have fantastic selection, and there is a weed store on, like every corner, it seems like, I mean, it's not that bad of my hometown, but if you go to bigger cities to like Toronto, then there's weed stores everywhere. So think what you want about legal weed. you have access to concentrates and flower and edibles and tinctures and topicals and so many things in every store that you go to. There's still a legacy market, if you're so inclined, and you know some good, reputable sites, then you can still score that way. And then, of course, you can grow your own. And I have friends that grow too.

Marge (00:19:20) - So you're trading weed and growing weed and we are just awash in weed. And I have to say, I've really come to appreciate that now that I'm in a place where the access isn't so easy and it's still tricky and cumbersome. Now, of course, Germany just legalized like at the time of this recording, three weeks ago. It's going to take some time and they are going to I'm sure it's going to look very different in a year or two years or five years, because obviously Canada has had legalization for over five years now. So it's going to look very different in Germany in five years. But as a tourist, it'll definitely make things a lot easier to to access. So 420 in Berlin was also pretty cool. This new friend of mine that was able to help me out with some cannabis, who was vetted as well. For all of these, you might be like, Marge, you're crazy to be hanging out with somebody that you just met, but it was somebody that, you know, sort of like I knew several people that had met this person in person before, so it wasn't like a total stranger or anything like that.

Marge (00:20:22) - And that is the power of community as well, which is really nice. But we went to this big 420 event at the Brandenburg Gate or Brandenburg tour, as they say in Germany. Tor is the German word for gate. It was packed. There were so many people there. It was really cool. They had a stage set up and there was music, performers playing and speeches being given. And at 420 everyone was smoking and of course people were smoking before and after that as well. tons of people there all openly smoking cannabis. The cops were there. And of course it's legal now, but it's just because it became so legal so recently. I'm sure it feels quite strange for a lot of people, to be consuming outside like that in a public place. And this place is sounds like a spot where they often have a lot of community events. This one just happened to be focused on cannabis. And for 20, and it was great. So we stayed there for a while. I was able to put a bite Me sticker somewhere with the shot of the Brandenburg Gate in the background just to say, hey, bite me podcast was here.

Marge (00:21:30) - Bite me. The show about edibles showed up to 420 in Berlin right after legalization 2024. Then we went to another event that we've been invited to. Well, another event that we've been invited to by the other German acquaintance that I have, and that was really cool as well. That was like at a at an event space that was specifically set up for 420. And it had like an indoor outdoor space where you could consume cannabis, which is really interesting because here are three weeks later. I don't know the legality of these types of events. I mean, it was a ticketed event, so you had to sort of, you know, show your ticket in order to get entry, but back home. I don't know. We don't. With legalization all these years later, we still don't have like consumption lounges. But in any case, there was food and music and dad bars. That's where I got the, edible. And there was people just hanging out and consuming cannabis, and there was dancing.

Marge (00:22:30) - And it was a really fun time there as well. At first I was a little unsure because the outdoor space was like, it was really cool. That day in Germany, the weather was, you know, the sun was coming out. It was a cloudy day, so the sun was in and out. When the sun was out, it was just brilliant and glorious, but it wasn't always out. And so it could have been warmer. But hey, it seems as though April in Berlin is very much like April back home. The weather is unpredictable. Some days it could be beautiful. We've had some gorgeous days here where it's been, you know, plus 20 degrees and people are out and like, you know, t shirts. And then today it's going up to maybe eight degrees. So we've run the gamut. And of course, I packed very much for much warmer weather. I think I was being Canadian and optimistic, thinking that perhaps the weather was going to be a lot warmer than it has been.

Marge (00:23:27) - I literally had to buy more clothes since I've been here. But yeah, I brought a lot of stuff, thinking it was going to be way warmer than it has been, and that was super shortsighted of me. Perhaps I should have realized that April here was much like April back home, but I was hoping to skip all that bullshit weather. But alas, it's been wonderful. Anyway, so the event when we first got there, a lot of the food and stuff was outdoors and we hung outside for a while, but it was really cold. And sometimes when I'm smoking or as well, not so much with edibles, but if I'm inhaling cannabis and I brought my packs vaporizer because that's my preferred if I'm not doing edibles and edibles are my jam for sure. But if I'm not doing edibles, I really love my dry herb vape. So I had that with me. And a lot of the times I don't know about you, but I find when I inhale cannabis that initially it can make me feel cold.

Marge (00:24:16) - I don't know what that is, but the friend I was with as well said the same thing kind of happened to them too. But eventually we decided to walk around the event space a little bit, and it was really cool because the outdoor space was really nice, and it was just a shame that it was so cool out that day. But we found this indoor space. It was sort of indoor outdoor. They had a heater in there, people were consuming cannabis, so I can't remember. It felt closed off. There was a DJ in there and that's where the bar was, and it was so cozy and warm and the vibe was so good. We ended up hanging out there for a while and dancing and smoking a little weed and all the rest of it before we left in search of more food. So I am hoping to get some feedback from some of the people that I know here about what weed is like from the eyes of someone who lives here. I mean, I've sort of giving you my take on, like I said, a random Canadian lady that has found herself in Berlin, and I should say that my really good friend that I'm staying with, she doesn't consume cannabis.

Marge (00:25:11) - So, I mean, she has and she does from time to time. She's not really she's kind of outside some of that cannabis culture. So I can't really get any details from her because she's just not that into it, which is fine. But I'm hoping to get some feedback from some of the people that I've met here. On what cannabis is like from the eyes of somebody who does live here and has more connection with the local cannabis community. So. Well, if you enjoy that episode, friends, please share it with someone you think will also enjoy it. Maybe somebody you know who happens to live in Germany or in Europe. Expand my European listenership. You can always talk to me by email, podcast hotline, DM over on Instagram, or why not consider joining the Bite Me Cannabis Club? It's free for the first bunch of members for life, and consider also signing up for the Edibles Enthusiast email newsletter. I'm doing a giveaway over there right now as well that you might be interested in.

Marge (00:26:09) - And as always, consider using the products and services on the Marge Recommends page, because that really does also help to support the show. I'm your host, Marj, and until next week, my friends stay high. And of course, before we forget, enjoy this closing song called munchies.

Marge (00:26:29) - Lunch and some edibles below. So fly to the end badly, with the last on one dry march. As the host, she's got a heart of gold. Talking about the good stuff. It never gets old. Lined up a block.

AI Song (00:26:57) - Taking it nice and slow.

Marge (00:27:00) - I mean, it keeps me entertained wherever I go. Marjorie Baxter. It's such a delight. She's the queen of edibles.

AI Song (00:27:15) - Taking flight. How much? Laughing all the way.

Marge (00:27:24) - That means the pockets. It brightens my day with much by my side.

AI Song (00:27:34) - Reform, right when it comes to the polls. We ain't gotta hide.