420: A Day with Psychedelic Aroma
What is it?
420 is an annual event taking place on 20 April (the date is 20/4 or in the American date format 4/20), in celebration of cannabis.
While 420 is widely used in common vernacular in reference to the date of the event, it also relates to the origin of the observance, the history of which can be traced back to the early 1970s in California.
How did it start?
It’s widely believed that 420 owes its roots to five Californian high school students – Steve Capper, Dave Reddix, Jeffrey Noel, Larry Schwartz and Mark Gravich.
In 1971, the five San Rafael High School students were tired of Friday night football games and searching for parties. The five students called themselves the “Waldos,” referencing the wall they would sit on at their school. The wall, located in the main courtyard in front of the cafeteria, was the perfect spot for the Waldos to work on impressions of their fellow classmates and teachers. They devised a secret code which they used to indicate to each other that they would meet later in the day to smoke cannabis.
After saying “420” to each other in passing in their school hallways, they would then meet at 4.20pm in order to smoke cannabis.
“I could say to one of my friends, I’d go, ‘420’, and it was telepathic. He would know if I was saying, ‘Hey, do you wanna go smoke some?’ Or, ‘Do you have any?’ Or, ‘Are you stoned right now?’ It was kind of telepathic just from the way you said it,” Capper told the Huffington Post.
“Our teachers didn’t know what we were talking about. Our parents didn’t know what we were talking about.”
They began occupying their time with adventures called “safaris,” after Steve Capper took them to what is now Silicon Valley in search of a holographic city that he read about in Rolling Stone. Safaris were a way for the Waldos to challenge one another to come up with something out of the box to do. Most took place in the Bay Area, but sometimes they traveled farther afield in California.
They often met at 4:20 pm and drove out into the wilderness to find a “legendary marijuana field” for getting high, although the field was not found after all, 420 became a code word for “get high” between them.
So it seems that the name 420 is a bit nonsensical. Probably, people just want to find an opportunity to celebrate the things they really like.
How is it celebrated?
While it began in the US, 420 has since become a celebration observed all over the world.
In addition to the widespread smoking of cannabis which occurs on 20 April, several events also take place to mark the occasion.
As International Marijuana Day, the 420 folk celebration by having it on April 20 (or any day) afternoon at precisely 4:20 p.m. local time. skillfully grab a lighter and Light up a roll of marijuana and smoke it. The entire ritual is straightforward and simple. The whole process is straightforward, simple, and the choice to smoke or not to smoke is a personal one.
The official mode of celebration, on the other hand, is much more grand. Where marijuana is legal, there are often gatherings for smoking-weed parties, where singers and DJs are invited to warm up the crowd.
Such occasions, of course, are supposed to be paired with a group high. This kind of shoulder-to-shoulder, smoky environment is loved by those who like it and loathed by those who don’t. Because of the legalization of marijuana and mobbing, most 420 rally are equipped with sufficient police force to collaborate to maintain order, so there is not much chaos.
