Wartime Diaries
Episode 33
Milk, Honey and Sweet Mary Jane
- 52:30
- 2018
Cannabis in the Holy Land is clearly a booming business. Through the unlikely story of Amos Silver, the Israeli 'Green Giant,' we take a deep dive into the world of Telegrass, the hot application that has made buying weed as easy as ordering a pizza.
According to a recent study conducted by the Israeli Anti-Drug Authority, the Holy Land might as well be rebranded as a ‘Weedtopia.’ More than a quarter of adults aged 18 to 40 reported having used marijuana within the last month. This stat, says the Authority’s chief scientist Prof. Yossi Harel-Fisch, places Israel among the countries with the highest rate of pot smokers in the world. In this episode, we chugged along the Hudson Valley and – in Poughkeepsie, New York, of all places – met up with the one man who is most committed to making that number even higher.
Prologue: Striking Green
Given an unusual journalistic assignment, Zev Levi walked up to a car full of drug dealers and got in.
Act I: Milk, Honey and Sweet Mary Jane
Yochai Maital tells us the story of Amos Silver, a long-haired hippie who grew up in an Ultra-Orthodox home in Tzfat and has become the unlikely mastermind behind Telegrass, a blossoming weed-commerce application which has more than 100,000 Israeli users.
Credits
The original music in this episode was composed and performed by Ari Jacob, with help from Yochai Maital and Ruth Danon. Additional music by Boom Pam, Meir Ariel, Michael Swissa, Michael Greilsammer, and Kevin MacLeod. The episode was edited by Shai Satran with help from Julie Subrin. Thanks to Orna Leshem, Philip Bonny, Natali Sharel, Tom Raz and Antonio Hernandez from Off Record Studios in New York.
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