Ziggy Marley first puffed pot at age nine

Reggae star Ziggy Marley had his first puff of marijuana at the age of nine – with his father’s blessing.
Now 50, the former Melody Makers leader admits he thinks dad Bob Marley made a big mistake when he let his kid start smoking the drug, but he understands why it was OK.
“Smoking marijuana wasn’t considered a bad thing in Rastafarian culture,” he tells Reader’s Digest. “It wasn’t something to hide from the kids…. I wouldn’t have let myself do it in my father’s place. But it was a part of our religion. We’re one of those ancient cultures with traditions that modern society wouldn’t accept.”
But it was a few years before he toked away again – and discovered a love for weed: “When I first consciously decided to smoke weed as a teenager, I approached it from a spiritual point of view.
“It’s given me more insight into myself and into my spirituality, and I use it as a form of influence when reading scriptures and books about spirituality. I use it to give me a different perspective so that my mind isn’t in the same place that it normally is. I turn into a shaman.
“It was never just about getting high – I educated myself about it in terms of how Yogis in India use it and I went down that route with it. I didn’t go down the ‘fun’ route.”