My girlfriend, Taeni, decided to stay on the edge of the balcony and watch as I went down to the main street. Along the smaller highways of India are little one-man booths/shacks where drivers can stop and buy anything from cigarettes to lottery tickets. That would be my starting point.

I exited the elevator, nodding to the guard on my way. He stopped me.

“You should sign out and sign back in later.”

I took a look at the clipboard he handed me. “What should I put for the reason I’m going out?”

He looked confused. “Why are you going out?”

“Umm, walk?”

“Then, you put walk.”

This made sense to me.

The little street down to the main road was dark because there weren’t any streetlights. Even in the pitch black, I never felt unsafe in India. Walking the dark streets of Jaipur always reminded me of wandering around my neighborhood when I was a kid, just with less pedophiles.

Crossing the highway was a bit of an adventure. The secret to crossing the street in India is to remember that life is fleeting and could end at any time. I weaved my way in between the never-stopping vehicles to the other side, and was only honked at 134 times. Not bad.

Behind the man in the shack selling cigarettes was a temple closed off by a metal gate. In front of the gate were rickshaw drivers sitting on their vehicles. I decided to take my chances with them rather than the cigarette shack. When I approached them, they got up, ready to take me where I wanted to go.

“Ride?” One said as the others watched.

“Umm, not exactly. Any chance you know where I can find some weed?” I mimed smoking a joint to them.

They all laughed, their demeanor relaxing.

One of the younger ones stepped forward. “My friend can get you it. I will take you to him.” He gestured to his rickshaw.

I gave him a look that was probably a mix of confusion and terror for my life. Go with him? Where? To die? To be arrested?

He seemed to understand my body language. “If you wait here, I can go and get him and come back.”

“That sounds great. How long?”

He shrugged.

Honestly, I had all the time in the world. I was on a twelve-month vacation. After he left, I stared down at my phone, awkwardly listening to the other drivers talk to each other.

Thirty minutes later, there was no sign of him. The earlier drivers had now been replaced by new ones, and I was starting to get odd glances. A huge white guy leaning patiently on a wall far outside of the touristy area was probably freaking people out.

I decided to go and ask the cigarette shack guy. As I began to speak to him, a grey car pulled up with about six young men inside. One of them bought cigarettes while the others talked to each other and looked over at me often.

Standing at an obese 6"4, I’m not exactly going to be anyone’s first choice for a mugging. So I was more intrigued than scared at the moment.

Four of them eventually swaggered over to me, the one with the slicked-back hair being the clear leader.

“Hey. American?”

“Eww, no. Canadian.” They laughed.

“Why are you here?”

“Traveling the country.”

“Why are you standing on a highway.”

“I’m asking everyone for weed.” I mimed smoking a joint again. “Do you have any?”

“Yes. You want?”

“Really? Hell yeah.”

Finally.

We walked over to the car, and they gestured for me to climb inside. I politely said no, and they seemed to understand why.

They started rolling a large joint and collected whatever weed they had onto a ripped up brochure for the pink city. They obviously weren’t prepared to be selling at this random time.

“You can try it too. Let’s smoke.”

This time I laughed. “No, no. I never smoke in strange places.”

I think the confidence of knowing I had a guardian girlfriend watching me made me shrug when they passed me the joint and smoke it anyways. They asked me about my trip so far. I asked about how they learned such good English. The usual.

Then the mood changed. Suddenly a man was approaching on a motorcycle shouting at my new friends. The guy holding my weed was now moving away to shout right back. I didn’t speak the language, but any moron knows when a fight is starting.

One of the young men sitting in the car started to translate.

“You said you’d buy from him already?”

“Yeah.”

“Then why did you buy from us?”

“He wasn’t here. You were.” More shouting behind me. The man was off his motorcycle now.

The motorcycle guy got in my face. Then the young man with my weed got in my face. I was quickly surrounded by about five people, all shouting at each other and two of them holding onto my shirt.

Oh, and the weed was kicking in.

In the depths of my pleasant Indian-weed high came a sudden realization. Something that none of the shouting group of drug dealers had thought of yet. My eyelids lowered, and I smiled that familiar thousand-yard stoner smile.

“Hey, hey. Why don’t I just buy from both of you?”

They stopped shouting.

“You buy from them and me?” Said the motorcycle guy.

“Yeah, why not? I have enough money to pay you both.”

Everyone hesitated for a moment. Then the motorcycle guy took a little baggy full of weed from his jacket pocket. The young men stood back a bit. He opened the bag, and I inhaled the earthy smell, nodding with approval.

“Two thousand rupees.”

“Ha!” I instinctively responded. Not really the best moment for this. “Eight hundred.”

We settled on a thousand rupees ($15). The motorcycle man got on his bike and sped away; a few other bikes joined him from the street around the corner. I paid the young men the same amount even though they gave me a bit less. Thirty dollars to stop a fight and walk away with a fistful of weed? What a bargain.

I finished my joint with the young men, and they filled me in. It turns out that their “group of friends” (Read: gang) sold drugs around here. This was their turf. They were passing by on their way home when they ran into me. The motorcycle guy belonged to the gang in the area next to this one. The other bikes who joined him when he left were his “group of friends.” This was not their turf. Now I get why the rickshaw driver wanted to take me somewhere else. Whoops!

We said our goodbyes and they left. The guy in the cigarette shack walked over and offered me up some rolling papers and a lighter for purchase — what a capitalist.

I met Taeni on the balcony.

“I got a little worried,” she said.

“Because of the fight?”

“What fight? The turnpike was blocking where you were standing.”

“Oh,” — Jim Halpert looks at the camera — “I’m just joking; there wasn’t a fight. Joint?”