Mon 29 Jan 2007
4 years ago I was @ a Dhanmondi cafe and was astounded to see how much weight a once-tubby friend had lost.
“Ki byapar, e tho dekhi MED BHURI KI KORI er biggapon, etho shukaiso kibhabe?”
“Arre bujhos na,” interrupted a friend, “Yabba e dhorse.”
When I was in high school, we would hear of the gaja‘r ashor in Elephant Road. Out in the villages there was bangla, fermented from rotten khejur. Every now and then you would hear of someone dying from drinking pocha mod. Later when I was in college there was Fancy or Dail (Phensidyl). But Yabba I had never heard of.
I soon learnt it was a speed/amphetamine derivative that had started trickling in from Thailand. Over the next year, as my ear started tracking this term, I read of hundreds of deaths in Thailand related to Yabba dealer gangs. Apparently this was the new epidemic, and scarily enough seemed to be a drug exclusively for the Asian market. Great I thought, just what we need.
Bangladesh has a million problems, but somehow the drug epidemic is not yet at Pakistan levels (because we lack that tragic proximity to Afghanistan’s poppy triangle). But for how much longer?
Yabba started as an expensive drug for the Banani-Gulshan set and now, as has happened everywhere in the world from America’s crack epidemic to Colombia’s cocaine crisis, it has penetrated deeply and to devastating effect into the working class of Dhaka city.
In December, I was in Mexico’s Oaxaca region. At many crossings the army was searching cars for cocaine “mules”. Drug smuggling is the # 1 crisis of that region, bigger even than a year of violent confrontations between protesters and police in troubled Oaxaca. In December, the new President Calderon vowed a full crackdown on drug lords. A week later, a relative of his was shot dead by drug gangs as a reply to Calderon.
If you think things cannot get worse in Bangladesh, imagine a country sucked into the “golden triangle” (which has already ravaged Pakistan and Afghanistan), the streets flooded with cheap deadly drugs, and the country ruled by lethally armed drug gangs.
Read DAILY STAR Report “Heroin & Yabba Flood Dhaka”
January 29th, 2007 at 11:00 am
A report from a year back, which was also ignored by sheethil (not shushil) shomaj.
January 29th, 2007 at 11:16 am
Highlighted previously with some discussion. Need to come up with a way to effectively conclude the discussions with some meaningful action items.
http://www.drishtipat.org/blog/2006/11/02/the-silent-epidemic-called-yaba/
January 29th, 2007 at 12:42 pm
yabba is horrid, and is a form of Methamphetamine and can really mess you up…and if it takes on the same epidemic status as in Thailand, in BD workign class, then that’s one more major headache, in addition to rest of laundry list of synthetic drugs….
January 29th, 2007 at 1:17 pm
[...] seems to be no stopping drug frenzy once it takes hold of a nation. Drishtipat Group Blog tells how Yabba, a speed/amphetamine derivative from Thailand is taking on Bangladesh. I [...]
January 29th, 2007 at 1:34 pm
I have several friends who threw away years of their lives on that stuff. Of course, it’s going to be a much bigger disaster if it becomes widespread among people who don’t have the ability to survive a thrown-away year.
January 30th, 2007 at 9:50 am
Sid Arthur wrote:
“Banglalis have been using recreational drugs way before Nirmanendra Goon popularaised how fun amphetamines can be in the poem ‘Aj Mandrax” back in nineteen seventy whenever.”
http://www.drishtipat.org/blog/2006/11/02/the-silent-epidemic-called-yaba/
I’m not trying to be some puritan about drugs at all. But there is a difference between level 1 (pot) and level 3 drugs (yabba).
Few differences:
*The new synthetic drugs are million times stronger and deadlier than the drugs of the 60s/70s. Over time, ganja can make you slow, but the newer amphetamines (which are nothing like Mandrax) can kill you– whether by heart attack or other debilation.
*The profit margins on certain synthetic drugs are much much higher than on pot etc, which means over time armed gangs move in because it is so profitable. Spend a little time in Mexico as I did this December, or in Colombia as friends have, and you will see a virtual second army which is lethally armed drug lords who can kill anyone at will. You think BD is bad now, wait until there are armed drug gangs.
*With heroin, there is also the issue of the shared needle and much much higher chance of transmitting HIV. A toxic combination in a country that is in total denial about HIV levels due to puritanism about pre-marital sex.
*The last point is more controversial. Recreational drugs have been around for a long time and for various reasons have been more limited to the upper class and to a lesser degree middle class. Now you can make some argument about responsible drug use, but I won’t step into that minefield as it is very classist. But certainly you can argue that when synthetic drugs bleed into the working class the damage is much higher because they will not have the cash to afford rehab, medicine, clean needles or other measures to make sure the drugs don’t kill. Many would argue that, if someone is a responsible, recreational drug user that’s their business. But if they are not, the physical/mental damage is much higher if you do not have money to take care of yourself.
Zeeshan hit it on the head: “if it becomes widespread among people who don’t have the ability to survive a thrown-away year.” It’s a classist argument for sure, but it’s unfortunately also partially true.
January 30th, 2007 at 11:02 am
This matter, on the community scale, cant just be about ‘blocking the means’ ie. enforcing laws.
I want to go deeply puritanical for a bit. I have few qualms about that. It helps in social analysis. and trancends class also.
isnt this about escapism?
whether its students at dhaka uni wasting toooo much of their excellent time chasing romance. private uni people being druggie wasters. young people in general being frustrated by unemplyment and seeking ways out of or to a different reality though.. migration, chemicals, crime and fanaticism?
Do you know of any anti drugs institutions in desh who are amazing?
January 31st, 2007 at 5:36 am
hello from poland!, i read about your drug post on global voices…i left my comment there for you to read…
here in poland, there is alot of speed/amphetamine use among young people at clubs…are there clubs in bangladesh? it is usually during a heavy night of clubbing that young people turn to speed chased down with some red bull of course. i think poland is a major hub in this part of europe for speed distribution…i prefer a strong cup of joe…
January 31st, 2007 at 5:39 am
Naeem,
My investigations revals that in the INDO-PAK subcontinent at first the drugs were used by METHORS(Municipal Cleaners) to bear the horrible smell and at Village level only during functions they used mild drugs or tari( fermented Kejur rosh) until the time of East India Company entered the scene from then on the locals first caught up with smoking Cigars and eventually a mild drug they(british) used 4 energy and comfort. In China they started Ganja/afin etc and then on to Burma and slowly that trickled down to E/Pak n now Bangladesh.India n Nepal picked up the pace faster than both wings of Pak and now modern Bangladesh.
Reasons are as cited by FUG: Frustation not only students and unemployed youths but the fast social life copied from western culture both as means of escapism and style or being the “IN” thing for showing you r the rich guy in the town.
0ne time I accosted a small girl from the streets for chewing something like drug to give her a lesson but what she described to me amazed me. She informed me to come to her Busti and see how many rich people cars come their including high social girls/women for all types of drugs and she asked me to try n stop them before I try to rectify her. She also asked me if I can provide her a job for atleast 1000/pm so that she can take care of herself n her family; the demand wasnt much but as she couldnt provide reference n security I coudnt get her the job. SO Unemployment is no 1 reason n next frustration and next is the age factor which tends young to adventure and then caught into the trap.
Fug,
Reply yr post #7- There are a number of clinics that has cropped up that provides service and have also been brought to TV forum discussions where they said they were successful in rectifying the druggists- but there is no specific statistics about that and therefore unable to confirm how effective they are. I tried to volunteer my service to one clinic at Uttara but they said that unless am high medical professional I cannot do the service and as for some psychology discussions or giving time to just join to spend time - I was informed that administration cannot permit even that unless am Doctor as sometimes situation can become rough and there could be danger for my life too. How true that is I dont know.
January 31st, 2007 at 9:43 am
Its sad that the clinics would have such a compartmentalised view of disciplines.
In an organic cultural way a virtuous counter attack might be set up something like PAGAD ( tough group against gansters and drugs in south africa). Anyone heard of them here?
another broad hearted ways need to be found and will be found as communities reform and strengthen and have to deal with this in their lives. therefore i feel , that especially in urban areas, neighbourhood institutions and awqaf need to get to grips with the messy stuff. but that all gas perhaps.