21 March, 2016. 8:28
ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact
GRADUATING AT THE TOP of your class isn’t easy, no matter what you do.
But for one Sydney law graduate, it came quite naturally.
24-year-old Sophia Ellis-Walter was admitted as a lawyer by the Supreme Court of New South Wales a month ago and since then, she’s barely had enough time to sleep, let alone find a few moments to relax.
The Brisbane native said that since landing her dream job at the conclusion of her internship at a blue-chip law firm, there’s been something missing from her life. Being a young, successful legal professional wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.
That’s when her housemate introduced her to Kandy Kush, a brand of synthetic marijuana that she says had filled the void in her heart.
“My housemate Greg, who never seems to be stressed about anything, despite working part-time at EB Games, said I should give it a try,” she said.
“He’s been smoking it for years and he swears by it.”
And the rest is history.
At first, Sophia only indulged in the dubiously legal drug after work, but her new habit soon because a large part of her life.
She never used to take the full hour for her lunch break, because “it makes you look like a slack piece of shit” and “others will get promoted before you”, but now she always takes her time, sometimes even pushing it out to an hour and a half.
“Yeah, most days now I walk up Bridge Street to the Botanical Gardens and get high in the big greenhouse they have there. Then I slowly wander back to work and rub my feet on the carpet all afternoon. I can still do work, but whatever, it’s easy as fuck,” she said.
“It hasn’t changed me at all, man.”
And she’s telling the truth. Three times a week, she attends her Bikram yoga classes with friends and enjoys a drink at the end of the week.While she was initially apprehensive.
While she was initially apprehensive about telling her mates about her new lifestyle choice, but her fears quickly subsided after a heart to heart with her best friend.
Ally Davidoff noticed a change in best friend Sophia right about the time when she graduated.
“One night when we were all out catching up over a few drinks, we ducked out into smoking area and all of a sudden Soph pulled out a little glass pipe and sprinkled what we all thought was marijuana over the end of it. We were mortified,” said Ally. “But then she explained it was synthetic marijuana and we were all so relieved.”
“But then she explained it was synthetic marijuana and we were all so relieved.”
Hitting back at her the sighs and gasps of her pals, Sophia said they needed to get off their high horses and just let her live.
“I pointed out to them that they’d each glass somebody for a line of coke, so why do they feel like they can judge me? Smoking plastic ganja is a victimless crime. The cocaine trade kills tens of thousands of people each year.”
I say ‘go for it Sophia’. Working in the synthetic world of law, with their synthetic spiel of justice for all, synthetic marijuana is just the shot. If I may offer a suggestion to the with-it-but-spaced-out Ms.Ellis-Walter it would be for her to get a pigeon, so she could take it to work with her each day. Then, when she is staggering back down Bridge Street with her head rolling about she can always say that she is looking for her pigeon. And with all the crap in Chambers, no one would notice an extra bit of pigeon pooh!