According to the the head of the National Narcotics Agency (BNN), drugs have found their way into all walks of life in Indonesia – even into Islamic boarding schools, where they are being taken by students as prayer-enhancing stimulants.

In his latest tirade about how widespread drugs have become in Indonesia, BNN Chief Budi Waseso (the man famous for fantasizing about building a prison island surrounded by crocodiles for drug convicts) said they found Islamic boarding school students and teachers had inadvertently taken ecstasy, thinking that they were vitamin pills that would help them do the dhikr (silent prayer, often with prayer beads) for longer.

“Narcotics have entered the Islamic boarding school community, especially in East Java. The students, they do the dhikr from one morning to the next with the help of ecstasy. But not just the students, the teachers too,” Budi said at the BNN headquarters in Cawang, East Jakarta, as quoted by Detik on Friday.

“They (the Islamic boarding schools) claim that they receive vitamin pills. They didn’t know [the pills] are actually narcotics.”

Budi’s tale of drug-addled prayer sessions seem somewhat farfetched. Ecstasy pills can cost several hundreds of thousands of rupiah a pop (we heard from a friend) whereas vitamin pills probably cost tens of thousands rupiah each at most. Also, there’s no way anybody could believe a vitamin pill could keep one praying for 24 hours straight.

In any case, Budi said he has given his findings to ulemas and Islamic boarding school heads around Indonesia so hopefully no more children are going to be tripping balls when they should be praying to God.

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