I took my first puff of a cigarette when I was 15, and on the occasional night that my friends and I experimented with booze, some of us pretended we actually liked smoking, like we had been doing it for years. I liked how it reflected my teenage angst. Being troubled was cool. Looking back, there’s nothing more comical than a 15-year-old who’s been smoking for two weeks saying, “Yeah, I’m trying really hard to give up.” Fast forward 10 years and here I am. I’m 25, in Indonesia, still tempted by those wretched things that destroy so many lives, saying, “Yeah, I’m trying really hard to give up.” There’s nothing sadder than that. (more…)
