Legal highs: the craze for laughing gas
The hilarious, dizzy - and, for now, legal - high you get from inhaling Taiwanese-made nitrous oxide is taking the European party scene by storm. But just how dangerous is it, asks Simon Parry
It's a balmy and typically boisterous July evening in the party resort of Ayia Napa, in Cyprus. The streets are packed with giddy, sun-scorched holidaymakers, and British teenager Rebecca and her friends are out to have fun and get high.
Their drug of choice is not marijuana or ecstasy, or even the cheap yet potent "fishbowls" of alcohol popular with the Europeans who flock to the Mediterranean resort in their thousands for their first hedonistic summer holiday away from their parents. Rather, their high comes in innocent-looking, brightly coloured balloons.
Filled with nitrous oxide - also known as laughing gas - they are sold in the street. The gas is inhaled immediately and induces a brief but mind-tingling sensation - something users describe as an out-of-body experience.
From Bangkok and Pattaya to holiday resorts across Europe, the gas-filled balloons have been the hottest thing on the party scene this summer, being openly sold in their millions and providing a new line in seasonal work for opportunist street vendors.
"Every few steps you take there's someone hassling you to buy one," says Rebecca, an 18-year-old trainee kindergarten teacher. "It costs €2 [HK$20] for a balloon, but the prices go up when you go into the busier areas.
"The main strip in Ayia Napa is full of sellers and most of … them are teenagers around our age who've come out here to work for the summer and get 40 cents for every balloon they sell. They sell them in the nightclubs, too, and some bars offer a cocktail, a shot and laughing gas all in for €5."
