The basic idea of a Rave is to have a large party, upwards of 2500 to 4000 people usually from late night to early morning in a 'secret' large warehouse. The secret location is so police have a harder time finding it, the reason, drugs, loads of 'em. But the drugs actually give the Rave a unique atmosphere and I would like to let you into that atmosphere without actually having to be there.

My adventure started with paying an unnamed source 20$ to secure me a place on the 'bus'. Now here is where the tale gets interesting, since nobody knows where the party is, except the organizers, they have a bus meet the party goers at a meeting point. Our meeting place was Joyce street station and upon arriving joined the throng of 1 to 200 people standing around at midnight on a street corner. Here we waited, with a small cloud of pot smoke slowly lifting into the cooling night. Soon, a yellow school bus showed up and the throng of people rushed to the bus and 20 or 30 climbed in. I waited around with my new group of friends, amazingly all quite friendly and content to stand, cold, on the street corner. (probaby due to the many many foriegn particles afloat in their blood stream)

Soon, I managed to squeeze onto one of the two buses and I was off. Our bus was really quite quiet, maybe because the large bouncer at the front had annouced there was a propane leak and didn't want anyone lighting up.

Now, if it wasn't hard for the cops to find the 'secret' location, 200 people on a street corner and a couple packed yellow school buses would be obvious to me. But even worse, because the location is secret, instead of taking the bus, many people just follow in their cars. On my trip out to the secret location, one car decided s/he would follow in front, and in reaction, our bus driver would do things like signal left and go straight. Eventually after a few fake turns, the car just pulled over and stopped. Our bus driver pulled over and stopped too and it was then I noticed the 40 or 50 cars behind us, also pull over and stop. To the outside observer, such as two kids and their dad coming back from Hockey practise, it must have been a very funny sight.

After leading the 40 cars along some back streets, we showed up in front of a warehouse surrounded by police cars. The mood on the bus was quite depressed at that moment, more because their partying was cut short, not, like I was thinking, 'Where was I going to get my bail money?'. But strangely the cops did nothing and we walked into the building. Each of us was searched as was best possible by hired security and unleashed into the dark pounding sound. The warehouse was split into two section, each with their own light show and sound system. It was simply amazing what the DJs can do with lasers, smoke, techno-music, projectors and a thousand wired people.

I would like to yank you away for a moment and give some important differences between a Rave and a Dance club. One response most people have to soft drugs such as mushrooms(*) and marjuana is they become laid back, more friendly and don't like to be bumped around. Compare this to an alcohol based dance club enviroment, where aggression is the norm. Take the 'moshing' for instance which wouldn't happen at a Rave, because the music is different and people on soft drugs pretty much avoid contact. There is no alcohol served at Raves, and officially no hard (such as cocaine, herione) or soft (such as mushrooms or marjuana(sp)) drugs either. You don't even need to bring a date cause it's so dark and loud, you'd lose them anyway. Just do the bump and grind from 1am to 5.

There are some bad side effects, the dance happens very late at night and at the peak of your physical exertion, you are breathing air an industrial ore smelter wouldn't let out. I neither condone or dislike soft drugs and have never tried hard or soft, but the Rave dancing enviroment these drugs create is different then most. I think our world's acceptance of drugs is at the same stage that prohibition was, and a new law concerning the semi-acceptance of Hemp in California is a timely example. I think that the world has over reacted to recreational drugs in the rightful persuit of hard drugs but should allow the user to make up his or her mind about the benefical difference between soft and hard. From what I have seen, I think alcohol is a worse drug then natural 'shrooms and marjuana (sp?).

And besides, reality is enough of a trip for me.

(*) - For those who are not familar with soft drugs, mushrooms, are actually real mushrooms, somewhat dried and grown right here in BC.