What's it like to take DMT in China? Who does it and how do they get it? Find out from our anonymous informant who spills the beans and recounts his own breakthrough DMT experience.

I estimate that a few thousand people have had a DMT trip in mainland China. I heard of it for the first time from a friend. At that time, I was still in the excitement of my first encounter with LSD. My friend was boasting that he’d tried “all psychedelics, but DMT”. People spoke about it as the “holy grail” of psychedelics. After researching about it for two years, I finally tried it, and my experience was profound. I can understand why DMT is becoming more popular in my home country.

Lots of different types of people are trying DMT in China. I really enjoy psychedelic music and culture, and that’s how I found psychedelic substances and later reached DMT. There is a growing psychedelic community in China today, among people interested in spirituality. Many of them have heard about DMT, but five or six years ago, very few people knew about it, and even less had tried it. Now this community is expanding thanks to the great internet. However, in contrast to the 1.4 billion people in China, DMT takers are still a small crowd. There are no relevant books or documentaries about it published in China. And as far as I know, there’s only a few in Hong Kong and Taiwan. But to the young generation in the psychoactive underground here, DMT is not a cult thing anymore. Many people know it and are eager to try it.

Chinese citizens have been acquiring DMT through the dark web. A few go even further and are extracting DMT crystals or brewing ayahuasca. During the last two years, the popularity and frequency of using DMT in Chinese has increased at an impressive rate to a new level. You can see this trend in sub-culture online media where articles about DMT and ayahuasca now often appear. But the government is actively trying to suppress the online information.

I used to do DMT extraction myself. I bought Mimosa hostilis root bark (MHRB) online from a recommended international website. I purchased one kilo. Everything went well. The package made it into China without any problem. After several attempts, I made it and also got better at making it. I imported again and again with more and more quantity. One time I ordered some psilocybin mushroom spores as well, but they told me that they can’t deliver to China. It seemed Chinese customs already knew what it is. Last year a bigger package was refused entry and sent back. When I contacted them, I learned that suddenly nothing can be delivered to China anymore. Everything from that international website was banned by China.

Chinese citizens have been harvesting DMT from local plants. Since the second half of 2019, harvesting the domestic sources is becoming increasingly dangerous. People spreading the news in Telegram social media groups say the police are cracking down on the traffic of Acacia Confusa Root Bark (ACRB) in China. It grows wild in Taiwan and southern mainland China and it is a great source of DMT. Three years ago, those dealers sold ACRB on Taobao (the Chinese equivalent of eBay) as a Chinese herb, which it is. But now everyone is nervous, and no one wants to take the risk. People have to find other ways to get the raw material.

Various herbs and extracts marketed on the Chinese online platform Taobao

Acacia Confusa Root Bark

The risks of distributing and taking psychedelics in China are very real but not exactly clear. A new police office was set up in the city of Hangzhou called “office of combating new drugs”. It targets the manufacture and distribution of newly popular drugs such as khat, kratom, LSD, and of course, DMT. As far as I know, some distributors got arrested for distributing acacia plants. The earliest case appears to have been in 2018, when a person selling Acacia confusa root bark online got busted. Police found dozens of kilos of root bark in his home. He is still in jail.

I have given DMT to about 40 people in China. To see the face of someone after they come back from a deep DMT trip is addictive.

I started to study how to extract DMT right after I had my first experience. First, I needed to make it for myself. Second, and more important, I believed that I had to share this experience with interested people, because it’s a very practical way to experience another realm or dimension. This method has been tested. You will have an intense trip if you take it. Researchers Terence McKenna and Dr. Rick Strassman say that 5% of people won’t have any trip at all when taking DMT. But I’ve never seen it not have an effect on someone. I have given DMT to about 40 people in China. I also hope and think that DMT can change people and the world for the better. To see the face of someone after they come back from a deep DMT trip is addictive.

My partner and I studied the extraction together. I will never forget the feeling when we harvested our first batch. I asked my partner, “dude, don’t you think it’s like Fight Club? Instead of making soap, we make DMT! We are writing the psychedelic history of China!” Also, just like in the movie, we sell our homemade products to customers for money in order to buy new materials to cook and sell. We are not pure idealists or some peaceful warriors. Please don’t see us as too noble. We have been low sometimes. One time I just sold one gram of DMT for 130 dollars. And then I went to a dealer and bought a pack of cocaine for celebrating our new product! On my way back I said to myself: “You spend the money made from DMT to buy cocaine, what the fuck? You exchange the most sacred psychedelic for that evil drug that is the most consciousness lowering one available?” That night I was not as high as usual.

Although we make money selling DMT like Breaking Bad, in general we share more than we sell. For the sake of this article, I recollected how many people I introduced to join our DMT club. There are 37 of us, which includes the one who first told me about the DMT trip. At the beginning, I used a wooden pipe and later changed to an electronic vaporizer. I had my most profound trip ever like this. It was so deep that I felt like I had smoked more DMT in the DMT trip. I took one big puff slowly. “Hold it,” my friend said, and that was the last thing I remember, after that I don’t remember much at all. I opened my eyes as much as I could, but I couldn’t see anything in this world. The visual signals cut off. I opened the third eye! People always say if you go deep, it’s no difference with eye closed or opened. This was the first time I totally lost my sight.

I kept thinking to myself to calm down, like I told friends the first time they smoked it. Now it was my turn to “calm down”. I saw a white background dome with some heavenly pillars. Those pillars started to fall, and as they fell down, each one of them became a Chinese fairy in pink dress. They were so elegant. They reached out with welcoming hands inviting me into their world. I was flattered, so much, “who, me?” I asked. “Yes, you.” I felt like I had literally died and entered the spirit world. It was actually an amazing feeling. It’s like I finally found the way home after all those years. All the psychedelic trips, the practices, the meditations, the challenges, are the preparations for this divine moment.

When I abandoned my body, I was shocked that I gave up all my attachments so easily! I just flicked everything off like the dirt on my fingertips.

I took off my body like taking off my clothes. My spirit slowly went out of the physical body. Then I turned around to say goodbye to my identity, my life, and the ordinary world. When I abandoned my body, I was shocked that I gave up all my attachments so easily! I hesitated slightly about whether I should go or not; then I decided to go, so I just flicked everything off like the dirt on my fingertips and flew up with the fairies. I entered a space where there were two fluorescent energies being splashed upon each other. All the colors mixed together, again and again, from different directions, crossing and squeezing one and the other. They mixed so fully; the particles were so close to each other. I was astonished by how close everything can be, and all of sudden every movement went backwards, from mixed in a particle level back to two separate energies. It seemed to show me that you can play with it however you want, by not just putting the energies together, but you can also pull it back to an initial condition.

I became familiar with the “director behind the veil.” I’ve seen a lot of this show, so I knew it was showing me again, telling, and teaching. A metallic vague sound came in, pretty much like the beginning of the Shpongle song Divine Moment of Truth. “mooei~ booei~ wooei~.” The scene changed every time it made that sound. The horizon went up like someone was making a big bubble, until it covered all the dome. Every scene was completely different from the last one. There was no time to watch it closely, because the next scene suddenly came along.

I felt disoriented, like I was an astronaut training in one of those machines that spins 360 degrees. I felt like I was being guided and helped by an inner coach. Once I got higher or faster, that coach would encourage me: “Good job, you are here. Now let’s go higher! Come on!” I was like: “Oh my god, I’m so fast now. Can it be any faster?” “Sure, come on, come on.” Then I tried my best to increase again and again. It’s like climbing stairs. Without exception, the coach will be there waiting for me when I got to the next stair, the next scene.

It’s so easy for the coach to exist in those realms. I don’t know if it was a he or she, if it’s god or what some people call the DMT clown. When I got really high I felt like I could play with it. I could go up and down as I wished. Sometimes I went up three stairs. Sometimes down two. If I got tired, it told me: “You can slow down if you’re tried.” Then I felt I was dropping, and the fluid energy started condensing to matter. The vibrations were getting slow. Then it got really slow. I could almost hear the slow musical beats in the physical world. I stopped myself and went back, “I don’t wanna go back to the place where I come from, I wanna go up and see what’s going on at the top,” I thought. I want to increase my frequency to the highest. “Come on! Go up! Be me! Be me!”

The coach wants me to be god, the highest frequency being. I ended up in a VIP room; it’s a room but has no walls. It’s not crowded, but empty, simple, it is the void. I sat down ready to see what’s going on. My coach gave me a feeling that it’s showing me the final truth, that we are actually one, united, no difference, no limit, borderless, all one. Then the coach showed me around its region. We flew with light speed, created worlds, beyond time and space, no rules, no limits; basically anything can be done there.

“Collective Vision” by Alex Grey.

A figure came out and mocked me in a sarcastic tone: “Oh, you make DMT, you want to be a dealer and make yourself cool? What other labels do you want for yourself?”

I was shocked by the supreme power of the creator, but at the same time I felt its boredom and loneliness. Even god can be bored! Just when I felt like god, I began to come down. I showed up in a seat. It’s my judgment day. Just like the beginning of the trip, the color is white and pink. White background and pink web, very much like Alex Grey’s paintings; hundreds of eyes were looking at me on the web, like monitoring cameras. It was a cosmic live streaming of me confessing. The videos were playing on the web. They showed what I’ve done wrong, everything, one by one. I felt like my soul not only my body was stripped in front of the whole universe. Every other spirit was looking at me and my sins. I was so humiliated.

It was thousands of times harder than a bad trip on acid. I said: “I know, I know, give me a break, please, I’m so sorry.” But they wouldn’t stop until I confessed. I was still holding my ego, stuck there for a long time. The audience was kind and patient to me: “It’s hard but it’s ok; everybody did it. You can do it. Take your time”, they expressed. But I couldn’t do it. A whole court of officials were waiting for me, in addition to the ones watching through the live stream. I felt even more guilty. I was wasting everyone’s time! A figure came out and mocked me in a sarcastic tone: “Oh, you make DMT? You want to be a dealer and make yourself cool? What other labels do you want for yourself? Are you satisfied now?” It made me feel so fake and selfish. All my life felt like a joke. All the details were playing now on the screen. I was watching it. Everyone was watching it. There was no way to escape or deny it whatsoever.

The suffering continued till I came down to earth. It was starting to finish. I looked at my friends and realized I was still alive. They were worried about me because I yelled and screamed “like a dog” they later said. I touched the table, the lighter, and the sofa. I didn’t believe what I just experienced. “What’s the meaning?!” I asked, “If we have that world, what’s the meaning of living in this one? It’s so fake. That one is real.” I was disappointed and grateful at the same time to be back in this reality.

I’ve never questioned the authenticity of this world so much. But on the other hand, I’m happy that I got a new perspective, I still have plenty of time to complete my mission in the earthly normal reality, and now I know what I’m really doing. We are surrounded by millions of judgmental eyes and strange authorities here in mainland China. Perhaps it’s similar elsewhere. I don’t know. But learning to navigate the DMT trip has helped me crystalize and understand my own path.

Header art by Danny Stanley Insta @avongarde

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