The unforgettable smell of rain

This dispach comes curtesy to my friend Mona, who was kind enough to sit down with us and recall the scents of her childhood in Evaz, a village in the Fars Province of Iran. Mona is a force to reckon with, for not only is she beautiful and cool but has an antrepreneurial mindset who fueled the launch of her own clothing brand. She studied fashion and currently practices perfumery with a focus on natural ingredients. Her plans for the immediate future include the  launch of her own fragrance brand and of an website dedicated to natural ingredients used in perfumery. The purpose of the website is to educate those interested in the origins, extraction methods and therapeutic uses of natural ingredients and to raise awareness about the special nature of natural ingredients. When she is not travelling all over the world, Mona resides in  Dubai where her family moved many years ago. During my interview with her I spotted the large painter’s canvas behind her and was reminded that Mona is also a painter.

Rain, mushrooms and wet asphalt in Evaz

I grew up in a village called Evaz, near Shiraz. It’s a village surrounded by mountains, near the city of Shiraz. The weather is dry and hot, without much rain. When rain would finally come, it was very special. I remember well the smell of rain, I love it and it makes me so happy! I also remember the smell of mushrooms we would forage for after the rain. They smelled so nice, we’d gather and cook them but sometimes they were just irresistible that we’d eat some of them raw. In February-March, the pomegranate, and mandarins we had at home started to ripen and I would often smell them even before they were ready to eat, their scent was lovely. There are of course other scents I recall: those of vanilla cake my mum used to bake and of the herbal teas with chamomile and others herbs she used to give us, to sooth a sore throat and clean the stomach. In our village I used to go to a very old store, selling spices and herbs, where the air was so pungent with the smell of spices that I used to sneeze when I entered. From there I bought a special chewing gum (adams kuhi) made from natural ingredients that were growing in the mountains.  At school, mornings always smelled of washed asphalt, because they used to clean the pavement before the kids arrive to minimise the dust in that arid environment. To this day I associate the smell of wet asphalt with the fresh start of a new day. Later in the day, the scent of pistachio trees from the school yard was prevalent.

Damascena roses in Meymand

A special event for the village was the trip to Meymand in Firuzabad county, not far from Shiraz. In Meymand, they grow Damascena rose, rows and rows of pink, fragrant, roses. They smelled so nice that we would rent a large bus to go and smell them. Many people in the village would travel together for a few days (2-3 nights) to see and buy fresh rose water, other rose scented products but also smaller flowers which we later dried and used to make tea. Meymand also had strongly scented pine trees.

Memories of father 

In our village many people would be working in Dubai, because it’s not that far and it offered better opportunities. My father was one of them, spending 8-9 months per year in Dubai and the rest at home. He did this for 40 years. Although he passed away 15 years ago, I still remember the way he smelled after shaving, when he was putting Nivea cream on his face. I don’t remember him using any fragrance though but curiously, I also associate the scent of Vicks vapor rub with him. He was bringing us fragrances from Dubai although my mom never used any fragrance because she it causes her migraines. At that time, some 20 years ago, people liked fresh and flowery fragrances, unlike today, when oud fragrances are trendy.  Fragrance is a common gift for birthdays and special occasions to give between friends or siblings. It’s not common as a gift between spouses, a man would usually gift his wife gold for a special occasion.

Poems and newspapers

Fragrances were popular and used but I don’t recall any advertisements for particular fragrances on TV or in the press.  I think I would remember if there were any because I was already collaborating with a newspaper when I was  14 years old. The local newspaper had a page dedicated to poems and there I published my first poem as a 9 years old. My primary school teacher held a class about poems, which I found intriguing and I decided to give it a try. I wrote a poem about my mother and sent to the newspaper. They liked it, published it and even wanted to interview me but for some reason this didn’t happen. Four years later I started working with the newspaper as regular contributor.

It’s interesting you asked me to remember all these, a lot of these things I did not think about in a long time, I almost thought I had forgotten them.

Photos from Unsplash: Jonathan Meyer and Fredrik Ohlander