The Republic of Awesome

“Dude, shisha is the shit.”

DJ Vu, always one for trying ‘awesome’ substances, declared his approval for Egyptian smoke pipes.

“Never tried it.”

“You should man. I was just out with my buddies at Arab Street. Great stuff.”

“I’ll give it a shot sometime.”

“Yeah. It’s kinda ex though…”

At this point Vu starts to detail his finances. It’s standard routine: he starts with how much fun/awesomeness/chicks/alcohol/etc he had during his previous escapade. Upon establishing this, he then details what it has cost his bank account.

Understandable. He had already blown close $500 in half a year on the drink, decimating his scholarship allowance faster than Bill Clinton goes through his interns.

“Why don’t I build you a shisha?”

“You can?”

“Yeah! I’m sure it’s simple enough. Let me check Wikipedia.”

Wikipedia - the answer to life, the universe and everything in between. If you disagree with me, simply edit this open-sourced blog entry.

So it starts. For over a week while all of my friends were doing more “important” things like school work, studying, socializing and generally living, I worked on my contraption.

Starting with a simple glass jar from Ikea, and attaching all manner of plumbing to it, I slowly fashioned a device not unlike the schematic shown above.

Then a problem arose. The pipe would not stand vertical supported only by the cap of the jar and some silicone glue.

In the days that followed I became quite friendly with the hardware shop owners from the nearby areas. I had become a frequent visitor to their shops as I hunted for supporting struts, L-brackets and other widgets to stabilise my creation.

Finally it was done. At a cost of S$25, the device was far cheaper than the S$100++ shishas available for sale in Arab St…

…with the drawback that it looked like a pile of garbage glued together. Which it is of course. And then there was the question of whether it would work like the real thing.

A small group of my friends had gathered to witness the first trial run of my creation. I hooked up a polyurethane hose to the gasket on the shisha and inhaled.

Air bubbled through the water in the jar and I had a mouthful of stale air.

“Dude, you fucking rock! It bubbles just like the real thing!” DJ Vu exclaimed.

“I’m not done yet,” I said as I retrieved a Lipton green tea sachet from my cupboard.

Ripping apart the sachet, I poured the contents – dried green tea leaves – into a metal mesh. Using a lighter, I burnt the leaves before placing the mesh, smoking contents and all, onto the bowl of the shisha.

Taking the hose in my mouth, I took a deep drag. Up to this point in my life, I had never touched a cigarette, let alone smoked.

I gagged.

Smoking, like drinking, is an activity far more pleasurable in your mind than when you first try it out. I was taken aback by the dry feel of the fumes and how it singes the throat as it goes travels down to the lungs.

Nevertheless, there was clearly the taste of green tea.

Curiosity had now taken over. What else could I smoke?

As my friends tried out the device for themselves, I rummaged the room for other things to inhale. Coffee beans were chosen as the next victim. This was quickly followed by flavoured teas taken from the room next door. Later on, cinnamon and spices.

Once you get over the dryness, smoking’s not too bad. What you get in a single puff is a pure essence of whatever you’re smoking, untainted by taste.

Coffee’s really fragrant and earthly, while flavoured teas have an interesting character provided that they’re not completely disgusting to smoke.

Cinnamon trumps everything else however. Smoking cinnamon is like inhaling the sweetest golden honey through your lungs. No other substance I know of can give you such a sweet taste. This is definitely something you have to try smoking in your lifetime.

In the end, I lost the shisha when I moved out of the old hostel. My parents would not see to carting the device back which in their minds is equivalent to a marijuana bong.

ThinkI should build a new one?