ITV are commisioning a Big Brother style documentary about backpackers who are travelling around Thailand and Malaysia, and of over 10,000 applicants, this process has been weeded down to just 100. And it's now that that the real hippies get separated from the banana pancake cocktail bucket mob.
The criteria was that applicants must have undertaken backpacking or recognised hippie-dom for at least a month at some point in their life, or must prove themselves to be considered ''hip'' enough to join this potential three week on-the-road bore-fest.
Applicant 22 is Josh, a surfer from Devon, England. 30 years old, he wears his blonde hair in a typical ponytail and goatee, with the Reclining Buddha tattooed across his back. Do these qualify him? Not just yet, he has to positively answer at least three verbal tasks.
''So Josh, have you ever taken acid whilst adrift on a raft off Goa?''
''Erm, almost, but I had a cell phone for emergencies, turned out I was only stranded for 2 minutes''
''Wrong answer, Josh, goodbye'' A red Graham Norton style ejector chair then spills him down a shaft to the floor below. He's out.
Next is Tatsu, an english-Japanese guy of 44. Long hair, goatee, skinny and wearing a jesters hat patterned robe, he's the most authentic looking so far. But that's where the positives end. He packed his finance lawyers job in a year earlier to explore Iraq as a volunteer with the Red Cross, and his life changed. However, he learned nothing of any hippie lifestyle.
''Tatsu, you look right on, dude...high five my brother'' The replying high-five doesn't materialise. Just a puzzled look.
''High on what?''
''Forget it, just tell me why you should join this hippie version of coach trip''
''I was at Glastonbury''
''Oh really? That's a plus point''
''I had my face painted like a panther''...(shows look of enthusiasm..until...)..''Whilst watching Beyonce on the main stage''
''Oh fuck off'' His chair is flipped, and his robe gets caught in the mechanism. The next hopeful is thus delayed, and she is in a hurry.
''Excuse me, I've got to get to like...Starbucks... to meet my boyfriend, I'm like, so late now, and it's like so random that I'm being held up when I got this meeting, which is so like...epic''
''You can fuck off on foot then..who's next?''
In the end the show was scrapped. They couldn't find the hippies, simple as that. My own father hippie-ed his way through India, Burma, Laos, Thailand and Indonesia in the late 1960s. He didn't have a backpack but a shoulder bag. He slept rough some nights, drank himself stupid and spent a month at an opium den. I'm not saying these are stiff guidelines, but it beats getting excited over yet another fire juggling display on a beach strewn with bottletops and cigarette butts.
These days lines between real and faux-hippieism are seriously blurred, what does it take? If anything, so-called backpacker hotspots have destroyed the original hippie scene and the days of tripping for a week whilst naked with like minded others seem to be extinct.
Nowadays all you need to qualify as a hippie is the backpack itself. You're there. Added extras like tattoos on your ankle or neck are mere bonus points, much like the Lonely Planet App on your cellphone. In the old days hippies would walk through fire to get their faces painted, or crawl on hot coals for a sip of snakes blood.
These days the corporates have closed the net over the whole backpack-hippie scene. In fact, technically it doesn't exist any more. Starbucks and Subways battle for as many stalls as possible in the so-called hippie 'communes'. Only the backpack companies are still coining it in. The sales of genuine jesters hats and patchwork fishermans trousers have been replaced by designer sportswear, padded bras and professional walking boots. Lonely Planet health guidelines banned flip flops.
Hippies nowadays aren't vegetarians either, oh no. The days of peace and love to all fellow creatures is narrowed down to just fellow humans. These kids nowadays don't even eat vegatables. Hippie vocabulary has also been modernised, the days of saying ''Right on'' ''Cool man'' and ''That's trippy dude'' have been replaced by phrases such as ''Epic'' ''Random'' and ''LOL''
Applicant 37 is Leila 'the meditator' Swanley-Bowles, who takes her name from the number of times she's meditated.
''So, Leila, tell us about your meditating, what form does this take?''
''All sorts, my karma is well balanced, I'm also a militant vegan''
''You do all this and you're only 21 and at University?''
''Yeah, like.....I do it all on Facebook...''