How I was falsely accused of drug dealing in Amsterdam

This is one of the stories my friends like to tell about me. During 2001 I was in The Netherlands for about 10 days. Mostly I spent my time in Amsterdam with my ever-traveling friend, Katz, who was there already for a few months when I got there.

Katz took me to places that she liked and introduced me to some of the regulars. One of those places was a coffee shop, and one of the regulars there was called Gevin, who was a pretty cool guy. One day, as I was playing chess with Gevin (I repeat, I was playing chess with Gevin!), he pulled out of his bag a huge plastic bag full of Marijuana and put it on the table, right in front of the cameras (which are mandatory by law).

Turns out that it’s pretty common for dwellers of Amsterdam to traffic drugs for profit if the chance falls upon them. What’s very uncommon was showing that to the cameras. I had no idea about this, and kept playing chess. Later on one of the waitresses dragged me outside of the coffee shop and told me that the cameras captured me dealing drugs in the coffee shop. Of course I chose the only logical course of action – I demanded to see the tape (I really wanted a copy of that). But she said we can only do this in the police station, so I gave it up because I didn’t want to waste my vacation time in a police station. Eventually I was warned not to do it again, and that was it.

So my friends think it’s kind of funny that pretty much the only person they know, who never used drugs, got accused of dealing them. Not only that, I got accused of doing that in Amsterdam, where it’s legal to use soft drugs.

Actually, I think it’s pretty funny, too.

By the way, the drug policy of The Netherlands determines that Cannabis is illegal to use, unlike what most people think. However, they do have a non-enforcement policy.