Unusual favourite scents from childhood

[Guest guest]

Besides the usual sweet scents that attracts one as a child I wondered

what unusual scents everyone here remember with fondness from your

childhood. Every July Holiday (Winter here) we used to visit my

grandparents on their farm in the Kalahari near the border of

Botswana. Every morning there was a ritual of grating what I remember

looked like huge pieces of cheese. This was layed out on corrugated

iron sheets in the sun and at the end of day this, which they called

" dried milk " was collected. The scent of this freshly grated " milk

cheese " was one of my most favourite scents. I remember with such

clarity going there in the morning, taking handfuls of the stuff and

just inhaling it. From what I can remember it smelled like cultured

milk, just more sour.

Also on the farm there was a rondawel (a big round thatched hut) which

served as a spare room and also my grandmother's larder and store

room. (They were very far from any town, so shopping for basic

commodities like sugar, coffee, flour, etc. was a monthly outing.)

This rondawel was made in the traditional way – once the basic

structure was made from sticks and poles it was plastered with a

mixture of cow dung and sand. When you walked in there it had the most

wonderful earthy–musky-hay scent. I spend hours there just inhaling,

and being enveloped in the scent. I used to make little miniature huts

using the same methods, really just an excuse to smell it. Still today

dry cow dung is used for making fires. Might be an interesting one to

tincture – from free range cows anyway that has been feeding on the

fragrant shrubs? I have heard someone is making incense using cow dung.

Sophia