The Olfactory Reminders

Do smells bring back memories to you, like they do to me? Like the smell of petrol and the gas fumes at a fuel station remind me of our drive from Wellington (Tamil Nadu) to Suratgarh (Rajasthan). Our century old Fiat had broken down on the narrow highway somewhere between Jodhpur and Ganganagar and the only thing visible to the naked eye was the reddish blackish sand storm nearing us. It was the first sand storm that we were about the witness and we (mom, dad me and my sister) sat closely huddled inside the car inhaling the fumes and the whiff of petrol. We had shared the boredom and fear of being stuck on a godforsaken road with nothing to look forward to but some divine intervention. Entering a fuel station still means being time-machined back into that day and time, when the family stuck together and stayed together.

Then the mogra flowers pour in pictures of my then ageing but beautiful grandmother’s silvery scanty hair. She was completely blind by the time I grew up. My entire extended family would take her out one evening, each summer vacation that we spent with her. I would tie the mogra flower gajara to her hair trying to grab as much as I could with my two little hands. Her fair complexion and the blossomed white mogra on her hair looked pristine. She was the only angel I knew. Now that she is no more, it’s the smell of the mogra flower that binds me to her memories.

Then it’s that unsettling smell of the hospitals. I was six- years-old when a jumbo ambassador car ran over my left foot at the Hashimara Air Force Station (Assam). I had to visit the Station Sick Quarters (SSQ) each day of the two months that I was advised rest. The dressing over the wounds used to be incredibly painful for the supple skin of a six year old. To divert my attention, my father often pointed towards the urine vial, telling me that the doctor often used it in a hurry instead of going to the loo. It always threw me in splits and I would be laughing till the doctor, oblivious of the joke on him, finished my dressing. The two months of painful dressing translated into 15 minutes of the repetitive joke. I swear, it was so damn funny.

Then it’s the aroma of tandoori chicken wiped over denims. I was a 10-year-old brat in December of 1991. We looked forward to Fridays, because the Officer’s Institute at Sector 31 put up a huge white screen and played those entertaining 1980s Bollywood potboilers- Insaaf Ka Tarazu, Tezaab, Meri Jung so on and so forth. We kids were all dressed in woollens and denim jeans. The tandoor was kept open and we all used to grab the best pieces with along with a gold spot (the wonderful orange aerated drink of the 1980-90s). The kids occupied the front seats of the open air theatre and the elders sat at the back. We used to be so engrossed in our eating and the film that we wiped out tandoori flavoured hands on our denims. Who wanted to miss out on the film by going to get tissue paper? The mothers always had a tough time washing them away. All kids were given instructions not to spoil their jeans, but then when did kids ever listen!