To anyone who might be curious to try these substances:
Both iboga and datura can be deadly!
Beware!
Both iboga and datura have been used in traditional shamanic contexts, and ibogaine (derived from iboga) has shown some promise in treating addiction, but usually this is done with a medical team trained to handle possible dangers.
I know of no remotely safe way to do datura at psychedelic dosages.
Most of the datura trip reports I've read have had a nightmarish character to them, with true hallucinations (ie. ones where the user does not realize that they're experiencing something that is not there), often involve the users putting themselves and/or others in physical danger, and often result in amnesia.
More can be read about iboga and datura on Erowid:
This might be too ‘woo’ for the HN audience, but I found the plant spirit of Datura(Jimson Weed) to be fierce and feral. I had the most intense dreams and frightening ones. For a while before I started farming, I had a garden that I allowed to go wild with invasives and weeds. From wild lettuce(soporific..as Beatrix Potter taught us) to the borderline wicked crone spirit of black nightshades to Mandrake and Mugwort and Wormwood, each plant had its own ‘spirit’, as it were..
Except Datura. Which was very scary. I never ingested or smoked them but I also never wore gloves and was very touchy feely with masses of them. Having said that, I read a lot and my impressions were probably coloured with some fancy ..but it was something I wanted and welcomed. It was a very scripted imaginary ‘trip’, I guess ..on a mental plane as a well researched enacted experience...as I am very risk averse and protective about my physical health.
There is a guy walking around the town of Iquitos (upper Amazon of Peru) who took a dieta with datura and tattoed his entire face green. Another guy was found naked in the street he didn't know who he was. It took months for expats to identity where he was from and find his family.
It's one of those things I'm perfectly satisfied to read about. I have a bit of a guilty pleasure of reading trip reports of ridiculous stuff like Datura on Erowid, that alone would convince all but the hardiest souls to give it the same wide birth as the Elephant's Foot at Chernobyl.