My wife and I traveled to New Zealand and Australia for the holidays. We were in Sydney for three days and I figured I could find some good tobacco shops and get some tobaccos difficult to get in the states like St. Bruno or Capstan. So I went to an internet cafe and googled tobacco shops and found three promising ones. The first one was called Chigarro's. It had been out of business for some time. Then I went to Martin's Place where the second shop, Bogart's, was. This was the tobacco shop recommended by the concierge and had a good website. The shop is in an underground shopping mall. My expectations were high.
I then learned about Australia's public health efforts to stamp out smoking. Going into Bogarts I didn't see any pipe tobacco. So I asked the salesman if he had any. He said I am glad you asked and opened some cabinet doors to reveal what little pipe tobacco he had. For you see tobacco products have to kept behind doors behind counters. You have to know what you want; there is no browsing. Then all tobacco products are repackaged to provide some grotesque message about the health effects of smoking plus an accompanying horrific picture.
What little he had, mostly Macbarens, could be found in the states. So I bought a cigar instead. The bag he put the cigar in had in big letters "CIGAR SMOKING DAMAGES YOUR TEETH AND GUMS" and of course was accompanied by a picture of some mouth of some fool who never brushed his teeth.
So then I went to the third shop, King's Cross Tobacco. They had no pipe tobacco they could see me because they hadn't received the new packaging for the tobacco. Plus it looked even less promising than Bogarts.
So Sydney was a bust. I came home empty-handed. But I did find out that a cigarette was being developed that as you smoked it a tumor would start to grow out of the cigarette.
So if there are any Aussie smokers out there, I feel sorry for you.
